Fellowship

For your fellowship in the gospel from the first day until now; (Philippians 1:5 KJV)

Fellowship. It's a word that conjures up good times, friendship, camaraderie. But there's an older sense of the word that is being utilized by the King James translators, and that is the sense we are going to look at. It is the sense of partnership.

 

The best way I can think of to describe this use of the word is in J. R. R. Tolkien's novel The Fellowship of the Ring. If you've read that book (or seen the movie) you'll know that the ring is not something the people gathered around for food and conversation the way Baptists do once a month in the 'fellowship hall' of the church. No, the fellowship of the ring was the group of adventurers who volunteered to go on the quest to destroy the ring. They were putting their lives on the line for a mutual goal, a mutual purpose, a purpose for which they pledged themselves. And this is the sense of the word that the King James translators were thinking of when they chose to use it in Philippians 1:5.

For your fellowship in the gospel from the first day until now; (Philippians 1:5 KJV)

The ESV translators chose to render it this way:

because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now. (Philippians 1:5 ESV)

We are partners in gospel ministry. We are the Fellowship of the Gospel.

You're probably thinking, gospel ministry, that's for preachers. That's for pastors. That's for professional clergy. While that may be our thinking, that's not biblical thinking. Paul thought of himself as belonging to a fellowship of the gospel, partnered together with all the saints, all the members of that universal church of the firstborn (Heb. 12). We are members of an exclusive club, called out of the world, united to Christ by faith, committed to the proclamation of the gospel. 

It is the gospel which we have embraced and the gospel to which we are committed, for the gospel is the hope of the world.

So the thing that brings Paul joy as he remembers the saints at Philippi, as he thanks God for them, as he prays for them, is that they are a part of the great fellowship of the gospel. They are partners in gospel ministry. They have embraced that for which they were embraced by Christ. Their heart is Paul's heart--it is glorifying God through the gospel.

Where is your heart? To what are you dedicated? What is your part? What is your role in the fellowship? What have you pledged? Where is your joy? Is it in proclaiming the good news of Jesus Christ? That he came to save sinners? That he lived the life we could not live and died the death that we deserved to die? That he rose again from the dead that we might be justified before God? That he's coming again to make all things new?

Today, every day, be about the gospel. Live it. Love it. Proclaim it. Find your niche, your role in the church, your place in the fellowship of the gospel.