diff --git a/drivers/spi/spidev.c b/drivers/spi/spidev.c
index 4eb7a980e670..eb0a075b23a2 100644
--- a/drivers/spi/spidev.c
+++ b/drivers/spi/spidev.c
@@ -95,37 +95,25 @@ MODULE_PARM_DESC(bufsiz, "data bytes in biggest supported SPI message");
 
 /*-------------------------------------------------------------------------*/
 
-/*
- * We can't use the standard synchronous wrappers for file I/O; we
- * need to protect against async removal of the underlying spi_device.
- */
-static void spidev_complete(void *arg)
-{
-	complete(arg);
-}
-
 static ssize_t
 spidev_sync(struct spidev_data *spidev, struct spi_message *message)
 {
 	DECLARE_COMPLETION_ONSTACK(done);
 	int status;
-
-	message->complete = spidev_complete;
-	message->context = &done;
+	struct spi_device *spi;
 
 	spin_lock_irq(&spidev->spi_lock);
-	if (spidev->spi == NULL)
-		status = -ESHUTDOWN;
-	else
-		status = spi_async(spidev->spi, message);
+	spi = spidev->spi;
 	spin_unlock_irq(&spidev->spi_lock);
 
-	if (status == 0) {
-		wait_for_completion(&done);
-		status = message->status;
-		if (status == 0)
-			status = message->actual_length;
-	}
+	if (spi == NULL)
+		status = -ESHUTDOWN;
+	else
+		status = spi_sync(spi, message);
+
+	if (status == 0)
+		status = message->actual_length;
+
 	return status;
 }