Fellowship.. Today is potluck day. There will be more food than we can possibly eat, and we’ll all probably eat more than we should.
Our culture seems to build everything around a table full of food. ‘Going out to eat’ has become entertainment, and even replaced the home cooked meals for some people, opting instead to ‘drive thru’ and purchase food already prepared.
I wonder that we haven’t lost a great deal more than we realize because of our lack of table fellowship these days. My family gathers at the table together at the same time only on very special occasions now, holidays mostly. And even then it is more about the food than the fellowship. We talk about the food way more than we talk TO each other ABOUT each other.
‘They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.’ (Acts 2:42 NIV) There was about three thousand newly baptized believers in this ‘they’ of scripture. I don’t doubt that jobs and family life continued with business as usual. But I think conversation topics changed, priorities changed and when free time did come…there was fellowship to be had with people who’d had the same experiences and knew the same Jesus. Seems to me they used the simple fact that they HAD to eat as an excuse to spend time together to study and pray. Killing two birds with one stone you might say.
‘koinonia’ = fellowship in this passage in Acts 2. The word in the original language means partnership, literally a participation. It means to commune or communicate. The same word is used in 1 Cor. 10:16 and is translated as communion in the KJV. ‘The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, it is not the communion of the body of Christ?’( the NIV uses the word participation)
Hebrews 13:16 uses the word koinonia also. The KJV translated it communicate. ‘But to do good and to communicate, forget not: for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.’ the NIV translates it ‘to share with others’.
Fellowship….it’s about communication….communing with our spiritual siblings, filling our hearts from the overflowing joy and love of others…
It’s not about filling our stomachs.
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