Fellowship Needs to Be a Priority

Ephesians 2:19–22
» View this passage in NIV (Bible Gateway)

We begin with the words “Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens” (v. 19). Fellowship  is enjoyed by those in God’s family and with His people, however, today God dwells in people. The early Christians devoted themselves to fellowship. They just didn’t have fellowship; they devoted themselves to it. This means that fellowship was a priority and one of the objectives for gathering together. They made fellowship a priority.

Biblical Christian fellowship is two-dimensional, and it has to be vertical before it can be horizontal. We must have a relationship to the Father through His Son Jesus Christ before we can know the reality of fellowship with each other. Paul says, “you are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets with Christ Jesus Himself the chief Cornerstone” (vv. 20-21). In Him, and in fellowship with one another, you are being built as a place for God’s Spirit to live (v. 22).

1. Fellowship is about - RELATIONSHIP - Fellowship is first the sharing together in a common life with other believers through a relationship with God through Jesus Christ. Fellowship is first and foremost a relationship, rather than an activity. The principle is that any activity that follows should come out of the relationship. This is fellowship in the vertical.
2. Fellowship is about TOGETHERNESS - Paul says that we are together God’s family and that we are being built together. To do that you have to spend time with each other. And in spending time together you learn to care for each other in a giving and receiving. You will need to minister to someone and be ministered to. This is fellowship in the horizontal.
3. Fellowship is about COMPANIONSHIP - Companionship involves communion and communication; interchange, intimacy, sharing and receiving. God has created us to be dependent people: dependent on Him and on one another.

Application

Lord help me to be a person who promotes genuine fellowship and is hospitable to others (I Peter 4:9), praying for others (James 5:16), and teaching and giving myself to others (Gal. 5:13).