Acts 2:42: The Fellowship

Watch this lesson on YouTube, or listen to it here.     

2)     Acts 2:42 – They devoted themselves to the fellowship.

A)   Intro

1)     Acts 2:42 – What were they doing?

2)     People use this word, fellowship, in all kinds of ways in our world today:

(a)   You might hear people use it refer to their local congregation: “This is my fellowship.”

(b)   This is also a way that denominations describe their network – “This is our fellowship of churches.”

(c)   An informal gathering time. We have a men’s breakfast coming up and the women are getting together to talk about wife/mom/home stuff, or we have our church family Thanksgiving coming up. “We’re going to get together and have a fellowship.”

(d)   We call our individual get-togethers things like teen studies, or ladies’ studies. Some church groups call them ministries. Some call them fellowships. Teen fellowship. Women’s fellowship.

(e)   Sometimes it’s just a way of saying, “We’re hanging out.”

3)     We are asking the question, “Who am I and what am I supposed to be doing?” It’s going to be really hard for us to answer the question, “What am I supposed to be doing?” if I don’t have a clear understanding of what the text is describing.

B)    koinonia

1)     koinōnia 19x in the NT (14x by Paul) / koinōnos 10x

2)     I think we can boil all of these uses down to two concepts: Association (connection), and Sharing.

3)     Association / connection (This is the fundamental meaning).

(a)   Non-spiritual connection: Lk. 5:10

(b)   Association and connection with God:

(i)    1 Cor. 1:9

(ii)  Gal. 2:9

(iii)          Phil. 2:1

(c)   Because of our connection with God, we are connected with each other:

(i)    1 Jn. 1:3 x2 – fellowship with each other because of fellowship with God

(a)   1:6

(b)   1:7

(ii)  2 Cor. 8:23 – Titus was Paul’s partner and fellow worker.

(iii)                    Philemon 17

(iv) Heb. 10:33

(v)   Negative – Because we are associated with / connected to God and each other, we are NOT to be associated with / connected to things that are not in alignment with God.

(a)   2 Cor. 6:14-16a – “Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness?”

4)     Sharing or participating (…that is based upon our connection with God and each other).

(a)   Not necessarily physical things:

(i)    Matt. 23:30

(ii)  1 Cor. 10:14-20 (4x) – Positive and negative

(iii)          Phil. 3:10; 2 Cor. 1:7 – Share in sufferings (Jesus and Paul)

(iv) Philemon 5-6 – Sharing of your faith

(v)   1 Pet. 5:1 – Partaker in the glory that is going to be revealed

(vi) 2 Pet. 1:4 – Partakers of the divine nature

(b)   But often, physical things:

(i)    Phil. 1:5 (4:14-19) – Partnership in the gospel

(ii)  Heb. 13:16 – “Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have”

(iii)          *Paul’s Jerusalem collection trip

(a)   1 Cor. 16:1-4 – Paul told the Corinthians that he was coming.

i.       Acts 20:3-5 – Various local congregational representatives were carrying their church’s gift.

(b)   2 Cor. 8:4 – “taking part”

(c)   2 Cor. 9:13 – “contribution”

(d)   (wrote Romans from Corinth): Rom. 15:26 – “contribution”

C)    Given 1) The meaning of the word, and 2) The context of Acts, I think we can say that Acts 2:42 is a reference to Christians sharing what they have with each other because of their common bond through Jesus Christ.

1)     I’m not going to die on this hill. If you want to say that Acts 2:42 is a reference to the special connection that that these first Christians had with each other and that they were devoting themselves to that special connection I think you can make a case for that.

2)     But there are other things happening that make me think we’re talking about sharing stuff:

(a)   Acts 2:44-45

(b)   Acts 4:32-37

3)     Schreiner, CSBC – “Second, the community was devoted to ‘fellowship’ (koinōnia), meaning they shared resources with one another. The new Spirit community was forming an alternative society within the larger society…”

4)     Peterson, Pillar – “The koinōn- words in Greek normally mean ‘to share with someone in something’ above and beyond the relationship itself, or ‘to give someone a share in something’. The sharing in this case could simply refer to material blessings, as described in vv. 44– 45, where we are told that the believers had everything in common (koina).”

5)     Stott, BST – “But secondly, koinōnia also expresses what we share out together, what we give as well as what we receive. Koinōnia is the word Paul used for the collection he was organizing among the Greek churches, and koinonikos is the Greek word for ‘generous’. It is to this that Luke is particularly referring here, because he goes on at once to describe the way in which these first Christians shared their possessions with one another: all the believers were together and had everything in common ( koina).”

D)   Why does this matter?

1)     Let’s use Bible words in Bible ways: “They devoted themselves to the fellowship.”

(a)   This is NOT a word that is used to describe “hanging out.”

(i)    e.g. “Let’s get together and have some fellowship” or “Let’s get our kids together for some fellowship.”

(b)   Rather, they devoted themselves to their new relationship with one another based upon their new connection with God…

(c)   …and that connection was manifested in action (sharing / fellowship).

2)     What does this NOT mean for us?

(a)   We do NOT have “fellowship” with those who are NOT connected to God.

(b)   Wilkins, NIVAC – “In secular Greek the word was used for the sharing of possessions (cf. 2 Cor. 9: 13). We should be cautious about using different occurrences of any word in the Bible to arrive at a general meaning of it, as words take different meanings according to the context in which they appear. But the nineteen occurrences of koinonia in the New Testament suggest that the church used this word for the unique sharing that Christians have with God and with other Christians.”

(c)   cf. Matt. 25:34-40; Acts 11:27-30

(d)   Sometimes money is just money. But sometimes it’s more than just money. It represents a family bond and connection that we share through Jesus.

(e)   This fellowship is a great incentive to being a part of the family of God. We’re all in this together and nobody is going to starve because we take care of each other.

(f)    I assume that nobody intends to work against the Gospel, but when you give a person the “fellowship” and benefits of Christianity without them actually having fellowship with God and you, you may be incentivizing their NOT being a Christian.

(g)   We have sayings about this in other parts of life: Why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free? Why would a man choose the responsibilities and obligations of marriage if his girlfriend will give him anything he wants without marriage first! You get all the incentives without any of the responsibilities and obligations. That sounds like a pretty good deal to me!

(h)   We should also apply this principle to those who are Christians in name but are not a part of the family. You’re not going to get the benefits of being a part of the family of God if you’re not going to be a part of the family of God.

(i)    DON’T INCENTIVIZE UNDESIRABLE BEHAVIOR!

2)     What does this mean for us?

(a)   We DO have fellowship with God’s family. We are intimately connected with each other because of our common bond through Jesus Christ. This means that we freely share our stuff with each other. What’s mine is yours.

(b)   1 Jn. 3:16-18

(c)   One way to show people the Good News of Jesus Christ is to advertise the benefits of being in his family.

(i)    If I do something nice for you, I am NOT supposed to blow my horn and make sure people see it.

(ii)  But if you do something nice for me, everybody wins when I publicly praise God for letting me be a part of this awesome family.

(iii)          This is just one way to shine the light of Jesus into a dark world. Show them the benefits of being a part of God’s family.