The Sixteenth Sunday After Pentecost

Acts 2.42

Hymns: 538, 279, 541, 494

The biblical teaching of the Doctrine of Fellowship is easy enough to understand. The difficulty comes in applying its prin-ciple in our relationship with other Christian denominations. Perhaps you’ve read or heard about Christian denominations meeting together for joint worship, working together in mission projects, belonging to ecumenical organizations like the World or National Council of Churches, Lutheran World Federation, Lutheran Social Services, or others. But the Wisconsin Synod (WELS), does not participate. Neither does the Evangelical Lu-theran Synod (ELS) with whom we are in fellowship, and sever-al other smaller groups of Christians. Why not? Because of the Doctrine of Fellowship and related doctrines which, we are con-vinced prevent us from doing so.

If we are going to be guided by the Word of God in our religi-ous life then we must be guided by the Word of God. We can’t claim to follow what we read in the Bible and then not follow it by picking and choosing which principles or doctrines or ideas we like and ignoring those which we don’t. The Doctrine of Fel-lowship is a doctrine that some wish that we would ignore be-cause it keeps us from joining in with other Christian denomin-ations in the areas of prayer and worship and some other joint activities. And we come across as being aloof, arrogant, elitist, separatistic, stand-offish or any other adjective that comes to mind that describes us as being against everyone and every-thing that doesn’t agree with our narrow way of thinking. And that can be embarrassing and seemingly indefensible.

But it is neither. We are not against anything that the Word of God is not against; we don’t oppose anything that the Bible does not oppose. We are for everything that we read in the Bible and that is where the line is drawn when applying the Doctrine of Fellowship. The Bible informs us that there is no Savior other than Jesus; he alone paid for the sins of the world (John 3.16; 14.6). We are all for that. But we oppose anyone who teaches otherwise because we are for the trutth. The Bible informs us that God gave every word to the writers of Scripture (1 Corinthians 2.13) because God breathed those words into their mind which they wrote down (2 Timothy 3.16). We are for the belief that the Bible is therefore the infallible and inerrant Word of God which contains no mistakes or errors in word or context. But we oppose anyone who teaches otherwise because they are not for truth. So we oppose what needs to be opposed for the sake of the truth which the Word of God witnesses to us. We are all for this approach. 

What is fellowship? It’s not just having a meal together with a group of people or going on a fellowship outing together. The Doctrine of Fellowship: The Standard-Bearer for Unity. And unity means just what it implies: oneness, which will have its basis in the unity of conviction regarding the truthfulness of God's Word and the reality that Jesus is the only Savior from sin.

Scripture defines the word ‘fellowship’ for us by putting it into context in the sermon text. Let’s take a close look at what the words mean. "They devoted themselves." The first members of the first Christian church in Jerusalem persevered, continued to remain faithful by devoting themselves to something: "to the apostles’ teaching." This teaching was not a single topic like "who is Jesus," or "what did Jesus do." The Greek word here refers to a body of material. Everything the apostles taught they learned from Jesus; he was their teacher, they were his disciples and these first Christians had the privilege of sitting at the feet of those who sat at the feet of Jesus. Jesus was the authority be-hind what the apostles taught and these first Christians under-stood that. That’s why they continued to persevere in listening and believing what they heard.

"And to the fellowship." The word ‘fellowship’ means ‘to have in common, to share." The same Greek word is used by Paul in describing the relationship between the bread and body of Christ in the Lord’s Supper: Is not the cup of thanksgiving for which we give thanks a participation/a communion/a sharing of the blood of Christ? And is not the bread that we break a participation/a communion/sharing of the body of Christ? Because there is one loaf, we, who are many, are one body, for we all partake of the one loaf (1 Cor 10.16,17)?

We are driven to conclude that the word ‘fellowship’ implies a unity, a oneness, a sharing of information, in this case, doctrine, with which they all agreed. And when you agree on something there is unity, oneness.

Scripture consistently assumes that Christians share a unity of what they believe (cf 1 Cor 1.10). Literally Paul is saying that he expects the members of the congregation in Corinth to be of the same mind, united in what they believed, and that there not be divisions, disunity or, literally, schisms among them. What can that mean other than that there was unity. Not that they get to be pretty close to agreement; they agreed. If the finance committee that is working on a health care bill in Washington re-ports that there is agreement, that’s unity. If they are close to agreement, that means there isn’t unity yet but they are hoping to get to that point.

Look again at what Scripture says (Rom 16.17). What is to hap-pen when someone teaches doctrine that is in conflict with what the Bible says? That false doctrine is to identified, marked as disruptive of unity and that doctrine and those who hold to it are to be avoided, that is, there is not to be an activity like worshiping or praying together if there is no unity. How is the absence of unity identified? By comparing what a false teacher teaches with what the Bible says; simple enough. And if someone teaches false doctrine, there is no unity, no fellowship.

Or (1 Jn 4.1). Once again we are called upon to preserve unity in the church, fellowship. And one way to do that is by not listening to false teachers but by identifying their false doctrine and rejecting it, certainly not embracing it or allowing it to stand along side of the truth.

Why? Because, as Paul tells us elsewhere (Gal 5.9,10). At first there was a little bit of false doctrine being taught among the congregations in Galatia. But, like a batch of dough, that little bit of false doctrine grew into more false doctrine. The unity that group once had no longer existed and guess what happening as a result: the full and complete forgiveness of sins through the life and death and resurrection of Jesus was being denied. That means that peoples’ faith was under attack because the truth of the gospel was mixed with false doctrine which led to the disunity which led to the absence of fellowship which led to the loss of faith and salvation for anyone who believed what was falsely taught about Jesus and his free gift of salvation!

Christian denominations that get together to worship say they are united, that they do so "as one," but they are not really in favor of unity. While they worship together, they will never sit down together to discuss any area of Scripture where they do agree with the goal of coming to a unity of idea as to what the Bible says. There is, instead, an agreement not to disagree on anything and not to get into any deep discussion in areas where they already know there is no unity.

They are like a cowboy who sets down on a bull while still in the shute at a rodeo. As long as the cowboy and the bull are in the shute together there is union (cowboy on bull/singing hymns together in public worship) but as soon as they come out of the shute it doesn't take long to observe that there is no unity between the cowboy and the bull...they are not in fellowship with each other!  THEME Union in the church, without unity, is not biblical fellowship. Biblical fellowship, unity, preserves gospel truth, which is the truth that Jesus alone saves...Jesus alone paid for sin...Jesus alone is the Son of God and Savior of the world.