Large Group #6: The Meaning of Fellowship

Hi everyone!
As you've already heard, CCF is trying to bring back house-based small groups (with the emphasis that it is all inclusive, regardless of house affiliation) because fellowship and building each other up is very important.

It was very timely that Tim had prepared a large group on the meaning of fellowship. I've included his notes (discussing the origins of the word and how it was applied in the bible), and then we discussed some small group-oriented questions. Read on to find out more!


What is Biblical fellowship? Often we imagine that it means Christians doing various activities together: playing games, working on sets, etc. But the Biblical meaning is deeper.

The Greek word is koinonia, which has the following two meanings. First it means “sharing together.” It thus refers to a relationship, not an activity. We are part of a family, which entails both responsibilities and privileges. It also means partnership. It originally referred to a business partnership. Luke used this word to refer to the fishing enterprise of Peter, James, and John (Luke 5:10). Such a business is created for a specific purpose: to provide goods and services to make a profit. What is the objective of our spiritual partnership? To glorify God. (Robb reworded it to something like: to make more of the body of Christ to do more of the God-sharing.) We do this both by growing in Christ-likeness, and by bringing unbelievers into our fellowship.

Second, koinonia means “sharing with.” This could be the sharing with each other of things that God has taught us, or some other word of encouragement. Regardless, the focus is always on God. It also refers to sharing our material possessions with one another.

In Acts 2:42-47, we are given the clearest picture of what fellowship looks like. The early church was “devoted to the fellowship.” They met together daily, and shared with each other everything they had, both spiritual wisdom and material possessions.

We are also given a picture of what fellowship does not look like. In Matthew 11:16-19, Jesus tells the following parable.

“But to what shall I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to their playmates,

“‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance;

we sang a dirge, and you did not mourn.’

For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon.’ The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Look at him! A glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’ Yet wisdom is justified by her deeds.”

Rather than getting involved, the Pharisees stood on the sidelines and criticized.

Our question then is, how do we encourage true fellowship? Through small groups! There are many benefits of small groups.

1) Small groups are Biblical. This is how the early church met.

2) Small groups are unlimited in number and in reach. A large group meeting once a week could not possibly satisfy everyone. But small groups can pick any topic, and meet anywhere, at any time.

3) Small groups encourage discipleships. For me, this has been the greatest benefit of being involved in CCF. I finally found people who I felt safe talking to about anything I went through.

4) Small groups show how the Bible is actually lived out. This difference between small groups and large groups is like the difference between prac and anal.

Discussion:

Q: How often should small groups/fellowships meet? Bible says they met daily in the temple, and that’s pretty hard core…

A: Frosh prayer meeting daily is kind of like a small group. Council meetings, to an extent, is somewhat of a small group. With regards to frequency, the minimum is hopefully once a week. To meet even less than that makes it very difficult to connect with people. Other than burnout and schedule conflicts, there’s probably no limit to how frequently we meet.

Q: Regarding sharing possessions, how far does that relate to how government policies should be handled and how we donate to charity and such?

A: We mentioned two things: how some people use Acts 2 the early church to describe early communism but many people disagree (if Jesus was the head of the communist party…), and also about Ananias and Saphira who had lied to God and the other brothers/sisters about money donations to gain prestige. We decided to save this discussion for another time.

Q: What would you go to small group for? What would you want?

A:

Lisa said it’d be cool to do biblical politics, though it could get messy. There certainly is a lot of material for that in the bible.

Grace mentioned Laura who mentioned it would be cool to go through books of the bible; it’d be nice to go back to the roots (aka, the word) rather than topical discussion since we already do that in large group.

Eric disagrees: there is benefit in topical discussion than having just bible study. And topical discussion in large group is limiting because you can't go in as much depth compared to when you’re in a smaller group.

Jessica says why not combine both topical and bible study.

Some small groups include worship (Lisa thinks this is cool). There is also the option to combine worship and fellowship.

Robb says different groups can choose to optimize certain aspects (all worship, all bible study, etc.) but this could limit the full potential of what a small group could be/ how beneficial it can be.

Q: Would you be comfortable with going to a different house’s small group?

A:

Most of the people at large group agreed that they’d be okay with going to different house’s small groups, but it might be a little bit uncomfortable if we were to go to a small group where we didn’t know anyone.

Robb says that he wanted to address this. So perhaps we can have it so that the core people leading the small group are people in that house, so then there is a core of people who will more reliably be there, and be in the house if people wanted to go to them. But nobody would be limited by house-affiliation to decide which small group they’d like to go to.

Q: Is there a way to address the problem of being in a small group where you know some people but not others, because you’d be more inclined to spend a lot of time with the people you know and never get to know the people you don’t.

A:

Madeleine says part of the goal is to ask questions to get people to talk about things that would help us know each other. At first it might be a bit uncomfortable, but that’s how it’ll always be with people you don’t initially know.

Tim says one of the perks of having a house-based small group is that you’ll have people who’ll most likely be there for future terms, so you’ll have more opportunity to know them.

Grace says this is a problem you can see everywhere, in houses, in churches, in clubs, etc. But maybe we could try introductions for new people and have the core leaders make an emphasis on including everyone (like if we split in groups, mix people up a certain way)

Q: Just out of curiosity (Grace may start a small group this/next week*), what would you guys be interested in?

A:

Breaking of bread/ or just tasty food. Food plus fellowship.

What our role is as a Christian in college.

Comparing religions. Get Christians more aware of other religions. It could involve friends from other religions. This could be very intimidating to the invited party. Setting the tone of the discussion is very important (that we’re here for friendly discussion, not interrogation).

Small groups in general, let’s keep it not too theoretical and have it accessible to everyone. Have more fellowship. Have more accessible topics.

*(note: this actually happened just a few hours ago :) )