True Fellowship

Selected Scriptures

I was raised as a preacher's kid.  In fact, any of you who know me know I'm either the fourth or fifth generation of preachers.  We can't quite remember that far back, but somewhere around the fourth or the fifth generation.
 
And I was raised in a church.  I had so many quarterlies stacked up on my little shelf and eight zipper Bibles that every time I graduated somebody gave me another zipper Bible with my name in it.
 
And they used to say that I - in our church, when I grew up, we had little stickers they stuck on your head.  If you were good, you got a gold sticker.  If you were sort of average, you got a red sticker and if you were bad, you got a black sticker.  And I can remember growing up with stickers on my head as a little kid and spending a great portion of my life in the church.
 
And if you were to ask me out of my own background to define the term fellowship, I'm afraid what I'd come up with might not be Biblical.  Fellowship to me was a linoleum floor in the basement of the church with a shuffleboard court on it, red church punch and stale chocolate chip cookies. 
 
And they called the place what?  Fellowship Hall, right?  And very little fellowship went on, mostly drinking stale - or drinking red punch and eating stale cookies.  You got the message, anyway. 
 
But that's not fellowship in the Bible.  Fellowship isn't coffee and doughnuts.  Fellowship is much more than that and I want you to see tonight as we examine the pages of the Word of God just precisely what the Spirit of God delineates to us as the truth about fellowship.
 
Now to begin with, just a definition, the word fellowship in the Greek is koinonia, a very familiar term to those of us who've been Christians for any length of time.  The word koinonia is a common word in the New Testament.  It is a common word that is translated fellowship.  It is translated communion.  It can be translated partnership.  It could be translated togetherness.  And all of those basically having to do with a commonness, a common partnership.
 
And fellowship as a concept is vital to the family of God, vital to the body of Christ.  Way back in Genesis 2:8 God said, "It is not good for man to be alone."  God created man to be a fellowshipping preacher.  He created man for a relationship with other men and other women for his fulfillment and, in fact, with God Himself.
 
So being alone is not the will of God.  "It is not good," said God, "for man to be alone."  God has designed that we have fellowship.
 
And I really believe that the church has to be a fellowship. It has to be more than coming in the back door, staring at the back of somebody's head for an hour and then leaving.  It has to be more than that.  There has to be a fellowship, not only from God's standpoint but I think from man's standpoint as well.  I think we realize the problems of loneliness.  We realize the problems of isolation and we desire to have meaningful relationships.
 
I was reading a book by a man named Larson who said this: "The neighborhood bar is probably the best counterfeit there is to the fellowship Christ wants to give his church.  It's an imitation dispensing liquor instead of grace, escape rather than reality, but it is a permissive, accepting and inclusive fellowship.  It is also unshockable.  It is Democratic.  You can tell people's secrets and they usually don't tell others or even want to.  The bar flourishes, not because most people are alcoholics but because God has put into the human heart the desire to know and be known, to love and be loved, and many seek a counterfeit at the price of a few beers."
 
Well, I think he's right.  I think people are looking for somebody to talk to.  Somebody to love.  Somebody to be loved by, even if it's only one night.  Even if it's only two hours.  Man has a deep hunger for fellowship.  He has a deep need to be with people in a meaningful way.
 
Now this I believe is basic to the church.  We desperately need to be a fellowship and as I look at Grace Church becoming larger and larger, with all of the mass of people that God has sent to us and I see the tremendous increase in the family of God at Grace, my heart cries out that we would never lose the sense of fellowship, we would never become an organization and I can see this even happening in my own life. 
 
The problem of trying to keep myself in a personal and close relationship with even the staff of Grace Church is a difficult thing.  Because the bigger the church gets, the broader the spectrum of administration, the broader the spectrum of a superficial kind of involvement. 
 
And the more well-known our church becomes and the more I am known, the more people say well, come over here and do this and come over there and do that and come over here and speak to this group, and pretty soon I begin to float away from the people I love the most and the people who mean the most to me and the people I need the most.  The people who make up the team who serve Christ here.
 
In the last two weeks God has really spoken to my heart about some things very specifically.  I wasn't feeling well, I went off to the doctor just to make sure I was all in one piece and the doctor's advice was you'd better slow down.
 
And then the elders came and sat down with me and they said you know, you'd better slow down a little bit.  You've got a lot of things going far away and you need to establish some priorities right here with the men of this staff who need your fellowship.
 
And so for the last three or four days I've been canceling meetings all over the place so I can be here and fellowship because I need to be enriched in my own life from those people that I love the most.
 
And so God has really been dealing with me about the need that I have to give myself to the staff and to the family that is Grace Church.  And I've often taught you, and I've been reminded about what I've taught in the past and I'm not too sure I've been following through on it lately, but I remind myself of what I've taught you so many times that if you worry about the depth of the ministry, God will take care of the breadth of it.
 
And there's a new commitment in my heart to you as my beloved family to pour my life into this place and let God worry about how he spreads it through you.  Because if I spread myself so thin then I can't be to you what God has primarily called me to be. 
 
And so God has really dealt in my heart.  As I mentioned this morning, four of us on the staff spent three or four days together this week just reiterating what our commitment has to be.  We have to set the pace for you in reaffirming our love to each other, and reaffirming our honesty and openness with each other, and reaffirming the need that we have to hold each other up and to bear each other's burdens. 
 
And that's the great burden that I have for all of Grace Church.  That we would never become spectators.  That this thing would never become a place where you go and watch it happen, but that this would always where you come and make it happen.  Where you're involved.
 
And so with all of those things in my heart and mind, I want to talk to you about fellowship.  And I want to talk to you about the basis of fellowship, the nature of fellowship, the symbol of fellowship, the danger, the responsibly and the result.  Or any part of that.
 
First of all, the basis of fellowship.  Look at I John 1.  What is the basis of fellowship?  Is there really a legitimate basis for fellowship?  Do we fellowship simply because we're all the same socioeconomic status?  Are we a part of a fellowship simply because we happen to live in the same place?  Are we a part of a fellowship because we happen to dress the same way, or think the same way, or vote the same way or whatever?  Do we really have common ground?  Or when we talk about fellowship in the church, are we just trying to stir up ecumenical hash?  Is there real fellowship? 
 
Well, I think there is.  I'm confident that there is as I examine I John 1:3.  "That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you that ye also may have fellowship with us and truly," here's the basis, "our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ." 
 
Now, listen.  Anybody in fellowship with Jesus Christ is also in fellowship with anybody else in fellowship with Jesus Christ.  Did you get that?  Anybody in fellowship with Jesus Christ is also in fellowship with anybody else in fellowship with Jesus Christ. 
 
That is our common ground.  Our common ground is not social.  It's not economic.  It's not intellectual.  It's not cosmetic.  It's not any of those superficial things.  Our common ground is that pulsing through the life of every Christian is the heartbeat of God.  Our common ground is that we possess the common eternal life.  Our common ground is that we are children in the same family, born of God.  That's our common ground. 
 
Coming back to the word koinonia, again.  The literal and simple meaning of the word is commonness.  Something we hold in common.  Koinonia is commonness.  Koinonoss, koinonoss is a partner.  Koinonoss means a partner.  Now listen to this.  Koinonoss means a partner.  Koinoneto, the verb, means to be a partner or a sharer or a partaker. 
 
Now let me emphasize something people that I think is very important.  I believe that fellowship in the Church of Jesus Christ is not basically experiential, it is positional.  We are in the fellowship therefore we are to enjoy one another. 
 
But the fellowship is positional.  Look again at Verse 3.  That's what that verse is saying.  "That which we have seen and heard."  And what is it?  Well, it's the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  He mentions it in the first two verses.  "The Word of life, the Gospel, which we've seen and heard, we declare to you that you may have fellowship with us and our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ."
 
Now, listen.  The proclamation of the Gospel was not an end in itself.  The proclamation of the Gospel was to have as its goal the creation of a fellowship.  When the Gospel is preached, beloved, it is preached because God wants to make a fellowship.  God wants to draw some people into His family.  And into family with each other.  Truly our fellowship is with each other and with the Father and His Son, Jesus Christ.
 
So the fellowship is non-experiential.  It's a fact of partnership.  It's again I Corinthians 6:17.  "He that is joined to the Lord is one Spirit."  We're all in one family.  We're all in one partnership.  That's the essence of koinonia. 
 
Now you often hear people say well, Brother So‑and‑So is out of fellowship.  I don't think that's a scriptural statement.  I don't think a Christian can ever be out of fellowship.  If fellowship means partnership and you were saved and came into a partnership with Jesus Christ, that partnership is for how long? Forever.  You can't be out of fellowship.  To be out of fellowship, in the New Testament use of koinonia would be to lose your salvation.  So when you say well, So‑and‑So's out of fellowship, that meant that he lost his union with Jesus Christ, which is an eternal union?  No.  No Christian is ever out of fellowship.
 
Well you say well, what do you, how do you describe it when a Christian just doesn't seem to have it?  Verse 4, 1 John 1.  "And these things," that is, all the spiritual principles of 1 John, "write we unto you," not that you may stay in fellowship but that your what?  "Joy might be full."  Now instead of saying well, So‑and‑So is out of the fellowship what we should say is So‑and‑So has lost his joy.
 
Now you remember David?  And his prayer?  He said restore unto me Thy salvation.  Is that what he said?  He said restore unto me what?  The joy of Thy salvation. 
 
You see, the believer doesn't forfeit the fellowship.  Jesus Christ is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother.  One who said, "I will never leave you or forsake you." 
 
Do you remember that man who gave his testimony last Sunday night when I baptized him?  He said he received Jesus Christ as a small boy then he became an alcoholic, and was an alcoholic for 16 years?  And he wound up in prison up here and Rich Hines got ahold of him, and talked to him about Jesus Christ?  And he said well, I received Christ 16 years ago and Rich said to him, then Christ never left you.  And the man bowed his head and found that Christ was there and recommitted himself to Jesus Christ.  Christ had never left him.  The fellowship had never been broken.  But the joy had been lost because of his sin, you see? 
 
And that's why He establishes in Chapter 1 that the fellowship is the essence of what happens when you're saved and the joy is the essence of what happens when you obey the principles in the rest of this epistle, along with the rest of the New Testament. 
 
That's important for us to realize, beloved, that everybody who's a Christian's in the fellowship.  And everybody who's a
Christian has the right to our fellowship, to our concern, to our love, to our care, to our ministry. 
 
What is the basis of fellowship?  Salvation, in a word.  Salvation.  Everybody who's a Christian's in the fellowship.  And there's no excuse in the Church for looking down your nose at somebody else because their social situation's different, their economic situation's different, their IQ is not quite what yours is or anything else.  If they were all master-planned by the Divine God of the universe into His Church before the world began, they have infinite worth and if they have all been master-planned into the body and enter into the fellowship, they have all the rights and privileges just like you do and they have the same common eternal life and if you love the Lord Jesus Christ who dwells in them, you ought to love them, too, right? 
 
Fellowship.  I just think we ought to realize that we have the same responsibility to everybody in the family of God.  The basis of our fellowship is common eternal life.  We possess that with God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit and with every other believer on the earth.  All saved people are in the fellowship.
 
So you don't have to say well, of course, in our fellowship we believe in emersion.  No.  There are some in the fellowship who believe in emersion and some in the fellowship who believe in sprinkling.  And we love them, even though they're wrong.  But they're right other places.
 
There are some in the fellowship who maybe have their little distinctions, but listen.  We don't want to separate the Christian family into the little denominations, you know, where you get everybody with his theological shotgun up on his ecclesiastical ivory tower ready to fire away at anybody who disagrees with him.  We don't want that.  We're all in the family.  We're all in the fellowship if we believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. 
 
And John contrasts all the way through, the believer with the unbeliever.  And his first contrast in this Epistle is between who's in the fellowship and who's out.  Let's look at Verse 5.  "This then is the message which we have heard of Him and declare unto you that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all.  If we say that we have fellowship with him and walk in darkness, we lie and do not the truth.  But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another and the blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanses us from all sin."
 
Now some people find a great deal of difficulty in these few verses here.  Let me help you to see them.  What is he saying?  All right, let's look at Verse 5.  And he reviews the Gospel.  The message of the Gospel, "God is light and in Him is no darkness at all."  By the way, there's no mixture with God.  "In Him is light and there is no darkness at all." 
 
And so having stated the Gospel, John recognizes that there are two kinds of people within the Church, the if we sayers and the if we doers. 
 
Now in Verse 6, the if we sayers come along and say we have fellowship.  We're in the fellowship.  But if they walk in darkness then they lie because God is light and in him is what?  No darkness.  So anybody walking in the darkness isn't walking in God.  Anybody walking in darkness is not a Christian.  Anybody walking in darkness is not in fellowship with God.  No matter what he or she says. 
 
I believe in Verse 6 you have non‑Christians.  You say well, don't you believe a Christian could walk in the darkness?  No.  Because I don't care what you do as a Christian you're in God and in Him is no darkness at all.  Now by the way, you can do the deeds of the darkness but you do them in light.  Just want you to know that.  And God sees and you see, and the Church is to act and discipline as well. 
 
Just let me help you to understand that, because you may be a little confused.  Let me give you some verses.  Don't try to look them up.  Just jot them down.  In Acts 26:18 it says this, "That Paul was called by the Holy Spirit to open their eyes," the eyes of the Gentiles, "to turn them from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God."  In other words, now listen to me, salvation is turning someone from darkness to what?  To light.  All Christians are always walking in the light because they are in God.
 
Let me give you another Scripture.  I Thessalonians 5:4.  "But ye, brethren, are not in darkness."  It can't get any clearer than that.  You are not in darkness.  What's the next verse?  Verse 5.  I Thessalonians 5:5.  "Ye are all sons of light, and sons of the day."  We are not of the night, nor of darkness.
 
When you were saved according to Colossians 1:12, you were made a partaker of the inheritance of the saints in light, it says.  You were delivered out of the power of darkness.  Jesus said, "I am the light of the world.  Whoever walks in this light shall never walk in," what?  "Darkness."  John 8:12.  Never.  No Christian, no time, is in the darkness. 
 
If you're in the fellowship, you're in the light.  Now you may choose to sin in the light, but you're doing it in full light.  With full responsibility, and full manifestation before God and your own conscience.
 
And so in Verse 6, then, back to I John.  He says there will be some come along, the if we sayers and they'll say, we're in the fellowship but you look at their life and they're not in Christ.  They're not in God.  They've never been saved.  You see what he's saying is, the basis of fellowship is not denominational, it's not church membership, it's not socioeconomic, it is salvation.  And when somebody comes along and says, I'm in your fellowship but they've never come to Jesus Christ, they're walking in the darkness, they lie or they're not in the fellowship.
 
Beloved, we have a unique fellowship.  Verse 7 speaks of us who are in it.  "But if we are the ones walking in the light as He is in the light, then we are the ones having," what?  "Fellowship."  You see, the people having the fellowship are the people in the light because God is light and in Him is no darkness.
 
In other words, what He's saying is, the fellowship is made up of people who are saved.  People redeemed.  People who know God.  We're the ones who've had the blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanse us from all sin. 
 
What's the basis of the fellowship?  Salvation.  Hey, listen to me.  If you're saved, my friend, if you're saved, listen to this.  You are in the fellowship.  You can't sneak and out of the body of Christ.  You can't slip in unnoticed and you're not going to be able to hang around with Christians incognito.  We're going to get you.  You're in the fellowship.  That's the basis of the fellowship.
 
Let's look at the nature of the fellowship.  The basis of it, salvation.  The nature of it, for lack of a better word, togetherness.  Acts 2.  You say okay, I'm in the fellowship, MacArthur.  I'm saved.  I received Jesus Christ as my Savior.  I'm in the fellowship.  What does that mean?  What exactly are you trying to say to me? 
 
Well, let me tell you.  If you're in the fellowship you have some interesting responsibilities and they can all be summed up by the term togetherness, really.  Let me show you. 
 
Acts 2:41.  "Then they that gladly received His word," Peter's word on the Day of Pentecost, he's preaching here, "were baptized and the same day there were added to them about 3,000 souls."  So there was the birth of the church.  Three thousand people on the first day.  Isn't that great?  Great way to start.  Three thousand people.  And they continued steadfastly.
 
I'll tell you one thing.  When you get 3,000 people saved and 3,000 people who continue steadfastly, that's some kind of evangelism.  And what did they continue in?  The Apostle's doctrine and what?  "Fellowship, and breaking of bread and in prayers."  Fellowship. 
 
Now this is the experiential element of fellowship.  The positional element, salvation.  The experiential element, how does it work out?  Well here we find the beautiful picture of togetherness.  No sooner was the Church born than it had fellowship.  And how did that fellowship work?  Well, he goes on to tell about it.  They met for teaching, the Apostle's doctrine. Breaking of bread.  The Lord's Table.  And prayer.  This is the way they fellowshipped. 
 
And as you look at this text you find some wonderful things. Their togetherness had all kinds of elements.  First of all, they were all saved.  Verse 42.  "They continued steadfastly."  Three thousand people joined the Church.  Three thousand people continued in the faith.  That's real salvation.  By the way, it is the people who continue who are the genuinely saved, right?  John 8:31, Jesus said, well it says in John 8, "Many believed on His name," and then in Verse 31 Jesus said, "If you continue in My word, then you're my real disciple."  Continuing steadfastly is a sign of real salvation.
 
I John 2:19 says "They went out from us because they were not of us.  If they had been of us, they would no doubt have remained with us but they went out from us that it might be made manifest they were not of us."  True believers continued.
 
So first of all, the nature of their fellowship, they were all saved.  And we've already made that point.  They were all saved.  They were real, true believers.  There weren't any phonies in the bunch.  You know, that's why the Bible warns the Church about the false believers and the false prophets and the tears among the wheat, because they can so debilitate the Church.  They can so sap the strength of the Church.  It's the old rotten apple in the barrel principle.  The Church must be pure and the Church must be holy because its togetherness is based upon the reality of its redemption.  You know, you've got to watch that. 
 
I remember when I first came to Grace Church nine years ago and we had a little problem.  We began to just kind of preach about what the church ought to be and somebody said, did you know that we've got several couples, two couples, I think, in the choir who aren't saved.  They're not Christians.  But we think if we let them sing, they'll come around.  Well, I had a problem.  So we talked about that a little bit.  I was kind of new and, you know, wet behind the ears and my first church and all, I didn't want to blow the saints clear out of the saddle.  And I knew they knew a lot more here than I did when I arrived so I was leaning on them heavily.  But I realized that you can't do God's work with Satan's people.  And so I said well, I just think we ought to use God's people to sing God's praises because I think that's the way a church has to be. 
 
You know, I'll never forget a pastor who came to me at a pastor's conference and he said, after listening to all the teaching, you know, we're taught all week long.  He says to me you know, I figured out my problem.  I said well, what is it?  He says, half my board is saved and the other half aren't.  I said yeah, right.  That is a problem.  Because God does not work well with Satan. 
 
The genius of the early church in Jerusalem, they were all redeemed.  They all continued.  And the legitimacy of their salvation gave impetus to the church so that the church grew.  Verse 47, people were added daily.  Further on, the people were so upset, they said you filled Jerusalem with your doctrine in Chapter 5, Verse 28.  You've literally taken over our town with this stuff.  Praise the Lord.  That's what we're supposed to do.
 
In Revelations 2, look at this for a minute, just expanding your thought for a second here.  Revelation 2:14 says, our Lord, of course, here writing to the church at Pergamus or Pergamum, whichever, said "I have a few things against thee because there hast there them that hold the doctrine of Balaam, who taught Balack to cast a stumbling block before the children of Israel to eat things sacrificed unto idols and to commit fornication.  So hast thou also them that hold the doctrine of the Nicolaita