Fellowship forum

Intro:

I’ll do a brief introduction on the definition of fellowship and how it works in the church before we talk about enhancing fellowship between young and old believers.

I. Definition of fellowship

@@ The word “fellowship” comes from the Gk word κοινωνία (koinonia) which means 3 things:

‘- community, participation and fellowship.

Fellowship means to share and communicate with someone the same interests.

Hence human beings like to have friends. But the term fellowship is much more than just friendship.

II. Why Christians can have fellowship in the first place ,

1 John 1:3–7 KJV 1900

3 That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ. 4 And these things write we unto you, that your joy may be full. 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. 6 If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth: 7 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 cleanseth us from all sin.

1 John 1:3–7 KJV 1900

3 That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ. 4 And these things write we unto you, that your joy may be full. 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. 6 If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth: 7 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 cleanseth us from all sin.

In v3, John tells us 2 things.

1st: we have fellowship through the Gospel is very clearly seen in v1-2 which are not shown in the slide. Without the Gospel, there is no Christian fellowship.

2nd: our fellowship is the result of having fellowship with the Father and His Son Jesus Christ. That is, Christian fellowship can only take place between truly born again believers (who have fellowship with God and Jesus Christ).

In v6-7, we learn the 3rd thing about Christian fellowship. To have real Christian fellowship, believers must be walking in the light. That is, confessing that you’re a Christian is not enough, you must be opened to God’s Word (i.e. His light) and be willing to submit to it.

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III.

III. Levels of Fellowship

In reality, there are a few levels of Christian fellowship. We first look at the lowest level which I call personal fellowship. [NEXT SLIDE]

A. Personal Fellowship

The only requirement is believing the Gospel. You can have fellowship with any born again believer who desires to please God and holds to the same Gospel.

Since the requirement is the least, it is also the least responsible kind of fellowship. That is, you’ve the least commitment to such fellowship.

As such, we shouldn’t have problems having fellowship with a Christian from another church who embraces the same Gospel as us.

But because of some differences in certain doctrines, you would not want to be too close to anyone from another church.

B. Church Members

ouAnyone wanting to be your church member must subscribe to your church doctrinal position.

At this level of fellowship, there will very little doctrinal differences and so Christians can be more closely bonded together. Not only that, but there is more responsibility to help one another in such fellowship.

It is at this stage that young and old believers have to meet and know one another.

C. Ministry Involvement

When a church becomes sizable, you may not know many people in the church. But you might be involved in some church ministries like a choir and you need to work closely with your team.

Hence you will have more fellowship and responsibility to your team members. At this stage, interaction between young and old members can be critical and they must learn to work closely together.

And the way they can know each other better is to make a deliberate effort to understand the other party. The old believer must understand the world of the young believer and the young believer must learn to respect the old believers.

The more elderly the believer is, the more difficult it is for them to understand the young believer. In such a case, the young believer must know and be conscious of the old believer’s limitations.

D. Leadership

The most responsible level of fellowship is local church leadership. The Bible gives us high requirements for becoming a pastor, elder or deacon.

Church leaders are called on to shepherd the flock and hence they must endeavour to understand their sheep as much as possible.

As a lay person, you may come to a point where you take on significant responsibility in the church. This is a time you need to work closely with the church leaders and you need to be very patient with them as well.

Sometimes your work becomes so much you forget that your work is not the most important thing, your relationship to your brother is.

Conclusion:

We like you to ask questions and we’ll do the best to answer your