The Call to Fellowship
1 Corinthians 1:9-10
One of the most troubled churches in apostolic times was the Corinthian Church. They were plagued with a myriad of problems in the church including: divisions, arrogance, sexual immorality, incest, litigation, doctrinal error, abuse of the Lord’s table, quarreling, and a lack of church discipline. Dr. Jack Arnold writes, “The reason for all the problems in the Corinthian church was that they did not understand the implications of their calling and their relationship with Christ, nor were they submitted to the Lordship of Christ in their experience.” The Corinthian’s calling and relationship with Christ are laid out in the first chapter of Paul’s first letter to the church. In the opening verses we see that both they and we are called to salvation by the grace of God. Salvation is all of God and not of anything of ourselves. Having responded positively to that call, we are then called to live out our salvation with holy lives that glorify God. Now in verses 9 and 10 we see that the church is called into fellowship with Christ and His saints.
In verse nine, we read “God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.” God’s desire and call to us is that we would enter into fellowship with Jesus Christ, the Son of God, our Savior and Lord. Prior to coming to Christ, we were alienated from God and without God in the world. But according to Ephesians 2:13, in Christ, we have been brought near by the blood of Christ and have been reconciled with God (verse 16) and are to walk in fellowship with Him. But this reconciliation is not just with God it is a calling for reconciliation and fellowship with “all who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, their Lord and ours.” Fellowship with each other is the effect and result of the fellowship of each with God in Christ. God’s Word tells us “But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another.” (1 John 1:7) We are told that fellowship was an integral part of the early church in Jerusalem. In Acts 2:41-42 we read, “Then those who gladly received his word were baptized; and that day about three thousand souls were added to them. And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers.” Fellowship was one of the four things to which the early church devoted itself.
Few understand what the Bible means when it uses the term fellowship. Dictionary definitions for fellowship include friendly association, especially with people who share one's interests; family, companionship; or a society; a company. The biblical word for fellowship, “koinonia”, is a bit more profound. It speaks of becoming a part of an active partnership and a sharer of one’s life with another. Fellowship with Christ is the work of the Holy Spirit. It is his task to take the things of Christ and make them known unto us, to make the person of Jesus real in our daily experience. It is Christ in me and I in Christ. Paul declares, “"I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ lives in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me" (Galatians 2:20)
Every day of our lives as believers we are partners with Christ in everything we do. Remember our sanctification is synergistic: Christ working in me and I yielding my life to His Holy Spirit in the pursuit of holiness and service for Christ. Martyn-Lloyd Jones said, “Fellowship with God” is probably the most glorious and wonderful truth in all of Scripture. Life outside God is not life, it is merely existence...” (copied)
True fellowship with Christ necessitates fellowship with other born-again brothers and sisters in Christ. Fellowship with the saints is not simply attending a church service or having coffee and donuts during the break between Sunday School and the morning service. Fellowship is not something that can be done yourself. Just like there are no Lone Ranger Christians, there is no fellowship with the saints if no other Christians are participating with you. Fellowship with the saints means entering a partnership with other believers to glorify God, edifying or building up others in Christ, and being on mission together for God. This cannot be done by simply showing up one hour a week on Sunday mornings or doing “church”. It is doing life together as the family of God.
What are the requirements to meet God’s call for fellowship with God and with the saints? First of all, for you to have fellowship with a Holy God, you must first know Him. Simply put, you cannot fellowship with, partner with, or live for God without knowing Him as your Lord and Savior. Many make feeble attempts by being religious or doing good. But Christ says in Matthew 7:21 that not everyone who says to Him, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven.” Merely being religious, getting baptized, or joining a church will not cut it. It does not establish a relationship with Him. We must know Christ Jesus as our Lord and Savior, having repented of our sin and surrendering to His lordship. When we have done this, under the leading of God’s Spirit, we now have something in common with God; we have a special relationship; we are His children and have become partakers of His divine nature.
Being born-again is the first step in fellowship. First John 1:5-2:2 tells us that, if we are to have fellowship with God, as born-again believers, we must walk in the light. In verses 5-7 we read, “"This is the message we have heard from Him and announce to you, that God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth; but if we walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin" (1 John 1:5-7 NASB). Walking in the light is to live obediently to what God reveals to us in His Word. Someone has said it is bringing our lives into alignment with the Word of God.
You cannot habitually be disobedient to God. We were created for fellowship with God, but disobedience separates us from this fellowship. David writes in Psalm 66:18 “If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me.” In fact, in 1 John 2:3-4, John asserts that the validity of one’s profession of faith is seen in His obedience. He states “Now by this we know that we know Him if we keep His commandments. He who says, “I know Him,” and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.” The soul that is born again will demonstrate faith, hope, love, and holy living. Having fellowship with God recognizes that He is absolutely holy and that we must not walk in the darkness of disobedience. To claim fellowship with God yet live a life that is in disparity to the truth is a lie, a complete contradiction.
Fellowship with Christ necessitates that we fellowship with other believers. It is because of our fellowship with God that we have fellowship with one another. First John makes this abundantly clear. When Paul says in 1 Corinthians 1:9, “You were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.” He means both (1) sharing vertically in the union each of us has in Christ, and (2) sharing together with other believers the common union we have with Christ and each other. (John Piper, We Need Each Other) Christ emphasizes this union or fellowship saying, “By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.”
It is necessary for every believer to be an active part of the fellowship of a local body of believers. Stubborn refusal to be a part of a local Bible believing fellowship is evidence of not walking in the light. Dale Robbins says, “Fellowship with the body of Christ is where love is tested and proven. It is the opportunity to learn how to love one another, it is God’s great classroom of the development of Christian character. We are benefited by both, the strengths and weaknesses of the fellowship.”
Writing to the church at Ephesus about the union of believers as the body of Christ, Paul pens, “...He gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, until we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, and cunning craftiness, in which they make plans to deceive, but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head, who is Christ, from whom the entire body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.” Notice that in doing life together the individual parts of the body are strengthened through this cooperative fellowship and the whole body is built up.
The church exists to worship God and to proclaim His Word to a dying world. It also exists to encourage one another, “to build one another up in faith, to pray with and for one another, to learn from one another and teach one another, and to set one another examples to follow, challenges to take up, and urgent tasks to perform” (copied).
What does fellowship with the saints look like? Fellowship as described in the Bible puts in a nutshell all the Bible’s “one another’s”: love, care, teach, serve, admonish, exalt, build up, and bear with one another.
Biblical fellowship is about sharing our lives with fellow church members, allowing the simplest and the deepest aspects of our days to become entwined. Christ does not intend for anyone to live the Christian life in isolation. and the lone Christian is just as likely to wither in loneliness as they are to stumble into disobedience. Proverb 27:17 declares that: “As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another”. As believers, we need each other to get where God wants us to go.
Hebrews says in chapter 10:24-25, “Let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching..” What these verses are saying? One, we are not to avoid participating in the body. Two, we are to love others in the body of Christ regardless of our differences. Three, we are to stir up or provoke others to live holy lives. We are to edify, or build up one another.
Sometimes living the Christian life together may feel uncomfortable. We still carry the vestiges of the old nature and we often struggle and have difficulty seeking to grow in Christ. We sin; we stumble; we fall. Ecclesiastes 4:10 states “... woe to him who is alone when he falls, for he has no one to help him up.” We are all on the same ground, we’ve all sinned, and we all have the same struggles. We need to be there one for another; to rebuke sin; to offer forgiveness; to seek restoration and reconciliation; to hold one another up as we read in Galatians 6:1-2 “Brethren, if anyone is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of meekness, considering yourself lest you also be tempted. Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.
The cost of sharing life and partnering with others in our Christian pilgrimage requires openness and transparency. All Christians ought to have somebody that they can unbare their heart to, who can pray for them in their areas of weakness. James tells that we are to confess our faults to one another, and pray for one another, that we may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much. As a church we need to be a safe haven where we can be open and honest without fear of a judgmental spirit.
We are called into fellowship with Christ; to know Him and to be conformed to His image; to walk daily by the Savior’s side; to obey His every command; and to love Him unconditionally. We are also called into fellowship with the saints of God. We accomplish this by doing life with believers through the local church. Most of the work of God is accomplished through people who are honest with one another, committed to serve one another, and willing to receive wise counsel from one another. When we participate in biblical fellowship, we will be amazed at how God can and will work in and through us.
Disclaimer: My goal is to glorify God in the proclamation of His Word. Often, my messages are taken from many sources, both known and unknown. At times I may use another minister’s wording. I attempt to acknowledge my source when possible. I make no claims of originality.
