Experiencing Life Together ~ Part 1

Each one of you is 

part of the body of 

Christ, and you 

were chosen to live 

together in peace.

       Colossians 3:15

God intended for us to share our lives with each other. This is called fellowship. The word fellowship now is used to describe casual conversation, socializing, food, and fun. When we say, "Where do you fellowship?", we often mean, "Where do you go to church?" This just skims the top of what fellowship means. Real fellowship means to experience one another's life together. Real fellowship is unselfish. It includes loving, sharing, serving, comforting, giving, and all the other commands in the New Testament that deal with relationships.

Fellowship is more meaningful in smaller groups. The larger the group gets, the more likely that someone will be left out. We can worship in a crowd but, when it comes to fellowship, smaller is better. Remember, our true goal in fellowship is to share one another's life experiences.

Within a church, there are several groups of fellowship; this could be a home fellowship group, a Sunday school class, or a Bible study. These groups are where the sharing takes place. The big group, our church, is where the worshiping takes place. "If you think of your church as a ship, the small groups are the lifeboats attached to it" (Warren).

God has made a promise to the fellowships, "For where two or three have gathered in My name, I am there in their midst" (Matthew 18:20). Unfortunately, at times, some groups will not experience true fellowship, even though they are small. What is the difference between real and fake fellowship?

In real fellowship people experience authenticity. Real fellowship involves heart-to-heart sharing. We are honest about what is happening in their lives. We share our hurts, our feelings, our doubts, our fears, our failures and our weaknesses. We asked for prayer. It is only when we become open about our lives, that we experience real fellowship.

"If we live in the light, as God is in the light, we can share fellowship with each other… If we say we have no sin, we are fooling ourselves" (1 John 1:7 – 8). God says that intimacy occurs in the light, not darkness.  We often use darkness to cover our sin. Darkness hides all of the things that we share openly in fellowship.


Since fellowship requires the courage and humility to share our deepest secrets and fears, it involves risk. Why would anyone do this? The answer to this question is easy: because it helps us to grow spiritually and be emotionally healthy. The Bible says, "Make this your common practice: Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you can live together whole and healed" (James 5:16a).

Next time, we will discuss more about fellowship.  Thank you and God bless you.