Outline
Ⅴ
The divine fellowship is everything in the Christian life; we must realize that when fellowship disappears, God also disappears; God comes as the fellowship:
A
Just as the current of electricity is the electricity itself, the fellowship of the divine life, the flow of the divine life, is the divine life itself.
B
Our Christian life is a life in the fellowship of life; eventually, in this divine fellowship God is interwoven with us; this interweaving is the mingling of God with man.
C
The divine fellowship is the dispensing of the Triune God into us, the tripartite men, making us and God one; the Greek word for fellowship means “joint participation,” and this joint participation issues in oneness.
D
Actually, fellowship is just oneness; when God is fellowshipping with us and when we are fellowshipping with God, that makes God and us one; in the whole universe there is a big oneness, and this big oneness is the divine fellowship.
E
The Lord desires to make us all one as the Father, the Son, and the Spirit are one; in John 17 the Lord prayed, “That they may be one, even as We are one” (v. 22b); the oneness of the Body of Christ is the enlarged oneness of the Divine Trinity (v. 21).
F
The divine fellowship is the reality of living in the Body of Christ:
１
The reason that the Lord has not yet come back (Rev. 22:20) is that the believers are individualistic, independent, opinionated, and divided.
２
By being restricted in the divine fellowship, the Body of Christ is kept in oneness, and the work of the ministry continues to go on; the thing that makes everything alive is fellowship—Eph. 4:11-12; cf. Ezek. 47:9.
G
Fellowship also indicates a putting away of private interests and a joining with others for a certain common purpose; hence, to live in the divine fellowship is to put aside our private interests and join with the apostles and the Triune God for the carrying out of God’s purpose—Acts 2:42; 1 John 1:3; 1 Cor. 1:9; 3:6, 12.
H
Eventually, the church and the Divine Trinity are one in fellowship—John 14:21, 23.
Ⅵ
As we are enjoying Christ in the divine fellowship, we continually experience a cycle in our spiritual life of four crucial things—the eternal life, the fellowship of the eternal life, the divine light, and the blood of Jesus the Son of God; such a cycle brings us onward in the growth of the divine life until we reach the maturity of life to corporately arrive at a full-grown man, at the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ—1 John 1:1-9; Heb. 6:1; Eph. 4:13.
Morning Nourishment
Rev. 22:1 And he showed me a river of water of life, bright as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb in the middle of its street.1 Cor. 10:16 …The bread which we break, is it not the fellowship of the body of Christ?
In 1 John 1:1-7 we see a cycle in our spiritual life, a cycle formed of four crucial things—the eternal life, the fellowship of the eternal life, the divine light, and the blood of Jesus the Son of God. Eternal life issues in the fellowship of the divine life, the fellowship of eternal life brings in the divine light, and the divine light increases the need for the blood of Jesus the Son of God so that we may have more eternal life…Such a cycle brings us onward in the growth of the divine life until we reach the maturity of life. (Life-study of 1 John, p. 68)
Today’s Reading
Our Christian life is a life of the fellowship of the divine life. The New Testament reveals that the Christian meeting, the Christian married life, and the Christian work are just the divine fellowship. The divine fellowship is everything in the Christian life. Those who were saved in Acts 2 were brought into and continued steadfastly in the apostles’ fellowship (v. 42). Later in the New Testament, the divine fellowship is called the fellowship of the Father and of His Son (1 John 1:3), the fellowship of the Holy Spirit (2 Cor. 13:14), and the fellowship of spirit (Phil. 2:1).The apostles wanted to have fellowship with the believers; this is horizontal fellowship. Then the apostles stated that their fellowship was with the Triune God; this is vertical fellowship. The vertical fellowship brings us into the horizontal fellowship. The horizontal fellowship then brings us into the vertical fellowship on a larger scale. This larger scale of fellowship is the meetings.
All the functioning in the meetings should be an expression of the divine fellowship. To prophesy is an expression of this fellowship. To testify is also a part of this fellowship. To read a verse from the Bible to the saints…may also be a small part of this fellowship. The entire meeting should be a fellowship. We should be vertically fellowshipping with the Lord and, at the same time, be horizontally fellowshipping with one another.
In this divine fellowship God is interwoven with us. This interweaving is the mingling of God with man. All the meetings should be an interwoven fellowship with both the vertical and horizontal aspects. Our married life should also be an interwoven fellowship. The husband and the wife should be interwoven not only with each other but also with the Lord…Our coordination and work together should also be the divine fellowship.
We must realize that when fellowship disappears, God also disappears. God comes as the fellowship. Today our meetings, our married life, the coordination among the co-workers, and the fellowship among the local churches are abnormal because we are short of this fellowship. The divine fellowship is everything in the Christian life. The apostle Paul lived in this fellowship. When we live in the divine fellowship, our Christian life becomes very living, active, and full of impact. We need to fully enter into the experience of the divine fellowship in its two aspects by the two spirits.
The divine fellowship is the dispensing of the Triune God into us, the tripartite men, making us and God one. Actually, this oneness is the fellowship. The Greek word for fellowship, koinonia, means “joint participation,” and this joint participation issues in oneness…In the whole universe there is a big oneness, and this big oneness is the divine fellowship. We, the tripartite men, are one with the Triune God. In John 17 the Lord prayed, “That they may be one, even as We are one” (v. 22b). The Lord’s desire is to make us all one like the Father, the Son, and the Spirit are one. The church’s oneness is a part of the divine oneness of the Divine Trinity. Eventually, the church and the Divine Trinity are one in fellowship. (CWWL, 1990, vol. 1, “The Triune God to Be Life to the Tripartite Man,” pp. 363-365, 369)
Further Reading: Life-study of Isaiah, msg. 25