September 15, 2024

Acts 2:41-47

Ecclesiastes 4:9-12

Rev. Kristen J. Kleiman

Fellowship. It’s such a churchy word. No other part of our society uses it. And yet, it’s a really important churchy word. Fellowship is key to following Jesus. He modeled it from the very beginning of his ministry when he called the Twelve. God has models it by being in relationship with Jesus and the Holy Spirit.

When I go looking to find another word to describe fellowship, I can never find just the right one. And yet, I keep looking because even church people aren’t always clear about what the word fellowship actually means.

The Greek word that gets translated as fellowship wasn’t a churchy word. “Koinonia” was used for hundreds of years before it showed up in the Bible. Aristotle, the Greek philosopher, used it to talk about a community of any size from a single family to a city.

A “koinonia” or fellowship is a group that has something in common. It’s a company of friends or an association of professional colleagues. It’s people who share the same home or who all play pickle ball together.

In the case of the ‘apostles’ fellowship’, they were a community that had the deepest thing in common – the belief that there is something more to life than this life; the belief that God created us and God also guides us, protects us, loves us; the belief that through Jesus Christ, we can experience hope, healing, and new life, and offer those gifts to others.

There are lots of clubs, communities, and associations in our world. Kids are signed up for dance, soccer, swim team, and scouts. Adults can be a part of the Senior Center, the Rotary Club, school PTO’s and Booster Clubs. We can take aqua aerobic classes or gather with others to clean up our city parks.

There are lots of groups we can spend our time with. There are lots of communities we can choose to be a part of. We choose Christian community because we’re looking for something more. We’re looking to go beyond the common interests, beyond the superficial conversations and interactions, beyond the how are you’s/I’m fine’s when everything is not fine at all.

We choose Christian community because we’re looking for a very specific kind of fellowship. We’re looking for an authentic community of God’s love.

We’re looking for a place where everybody knows our name, and where we are known. A community in which we feel comfortable inviting people to know our stories, to know our worries, our struggles, our failings.

For me, I am looking for the kind of community spoken of in this poem from Dinah Maria Mulock Craik:

Oh, the comfort—The inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person,

Having neither to weigh thoughts, Nor measure words—

but pouring them All right out—just as they are— Chaff and grain together—

Certain that a faithful hand will   Take and sift them—

Keep what is worth keeping— and with the breath of kindness Blow the rest away. (Dinah Maria Mulock Craik, A Life For A Life)

Oh, the comfort, to find an authentic community of God’s love, where we can be ourselves, a community where we can be safe, where we can be certain, that a faithful hand will hear our words, see our actions, keep what is worth keeping and with the breath of kindness blow the rest away; and I would add, also inspire us to be kinder, to be more compassionate and loving, to be the best version of ourselves, the one God created us to be, the one Jesus calls us to be. Oh, the comfort to find such an authentic community of God’s love.

I am listening to a book called Deep and Wide by Andy Stanley, in which he talks about churches in which people cover up their problems, challenges, and sin, in order to keep in the good graces of others in the church. According to Andy Stanley, there are two problems with that. One, covering up your hurts, sin, and brokenness only fuels what you are covering up. And two, it’s hard to share God’s grace in a church where no one will admit they need it.

If I am only ever willing to show myself in the best possible light, how will I ever find a faithful hand that will offer me compassion and grace? If we never allow ourselves to be truly known, how will we ever create an authentic community of God’s love?

When scripture says that the three thousand devoted themselves to the apostles’ fellowship, this was the kind of community that changed their lives. A community where they could authentically be themselves and be loved; a community where they could share their hurts, their challenges, their sins, and find forgiveness, find grace, find healing and hope; a community where they could be nurtured in their growing relationship with the God of love we know through Jesus Christ, nurtured, not judged, and nurtured in their gifts so they could generously share their blessings with others.

This was the kind of fellowship that changed their lives and made others want to join and be a part of this amazing Way of Jesus Christ.

After decades of working with churches of all kinds, Paul Nixon believes small groups are the best way to build authentic community within the church. He writes, “small groups must be seen as the main event in the church’s life, often as more essential than the large-group worship gathering.” He goes on to share, “Young adults are telling us they are often more likely to go to their small group than to the worship service in any given week.” (Nixon, I Refuse To Lead Dying Church, pg 43)

Here’s what else Paul knows about small groups:

1. Small groups work.
2. These groups are powerful forces for spiritual life in the churches that depend upon them.
3. People in traditional churches often have major resistance to small groups. (Nixon, I Refuse To Lead Dying Church, pg 37)

I completely understand that last one. Twenty five years of ordained ministry, and Paul would hear me say what he has heard plenty of other pastors say, “ ‘Small groups don’t work.’ [Paul’s response to me and all of those other lead ministers is] The real message beneath those words is, ‘I have not been willing to work hard enough to lead my people toward the discovery of authentic Christian community in the small group setting.’” (Nixon, I Refuse To Lead Dying Church, pg 37)

Ouch. It’s true. I have a lot of anxiety around starting a small group ministry. How to even begin? Will I be required to lead them all? If not, how will I find the time to nurture and resource the small group leaders? Will there be a lot of resistance and all that reading, preparation, and prayer will be for naught?

For most of my life, I have been told that worship was the heart of the Church, and yet most of the Christians I know, tell me they come to worship because of the relationships, because they are known, because they are embraced, because they experience the love of God through the love of others.

Just like with eating together, many Christians are sheepish when they admit that. Fellowship, though, creating an authentic community of God’s love, is important and worth the hard work because Christian fellowship was and continues to be a spiritual practice that changes our lives and the world.