COMMUNION or fellowship excludes everything evil. Consequently there must be limits to it. Scriptural fellowship starts from this basis: that those who know it, that is, Christians, are " in the light." (1 John 1:7.) Consequently it is unknown, save by this company.
There may be unanimity, one mind, or a fellowship of men in evil (as Psa. 64:5 among many other places, shows), but the word κοινωμία is not so used in the New Testament, nor is it used in a bad sense there anywhere. I speak here only of the thing itself, without including other compound forms of the word; communion there is only with what is good.
So far as I can find, the word communion or fellowship occurs only nineteen times (in Eph. 3:9 it is considered not genuine) but it is not anywhere used vaguely, that is, as including or allowing the least particle of evil. It expresses the common feelings (and common is the origin of the word) of any two or more, with respect to a third. But naturally man is only evil (see Gen. 8:21; Rom. 3:23), and communion in the New Testament is only with what is good; therefore, this third, in or respecting which we have " communion," is and must necessarily be of and from God. Scripture shows that this is so.
Let the reader now turn to the last passage of the nineteen wherein the word is found. We shall there see that it is limited to a certain company.
1 John 1:7. " If we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another."
It is not said here that we ought to have fellowship one with another, but that we have it, as the company walking " in the light." For the contrast is not between fellowship and no fellowship, but between darkness and light, for John begins by speaking of what he had seen and how the light had shone in, fellowship being introduced as the sure consequence. In verse 5 he has said that " God is light, and in him is no darkness at all;" while this is so, observe, he almost immediately adds, that there were men then upon earth who had fellowship with God, and he speaks of himself as one of these: " our fellowship." But this fellowship he declares to be impossible if we walk in darkness. " If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth." (Ver. C.) And further observe how all the desires of the apostle's heart come out, in connection with the subject of fellowship, towards those to whom he writes, that they may know it. His words are the words of the Spirit of God, that have always cheered the hearts of the saints, and which reach down to and embrace us in this dark and perplexing day.
And now why does he write? He writes-1St (ver. 3), that they (the saints) "may have fellowship with us" (the apostles); and 2nd (ver. 4), that thus their joy "may be full." Never was there, and never will there be, a day so dark for His people that GOD cannot shine through it all; and we bless His name that He never did, and He never will, withhold fellowship with Himself from those who in truth seek His face. (Psa. 145:18.)
It will help to a clearer understanding of 1 John 1:7, if we keep distinct the two companies named in the chapter. There is then a company to whom this fellowship is unknown, though they may claim it. If they speak they " lie," and if they act " they do not the truth." They walk also " in darkness," in contrast to others who walk " in the light." These last form another and distinct company. They have " fellowship one with another," and with the apostles. If they speak, it is with the sense of their relationship with the Father. Though some are babes, yet even they have " known the Father." (1 John 2:13.) John is writing to establish them in it, spite of false ones and seducers. (1 John 2:19,26.) He says it is " that ye may have fellowship with us," for he knew that the saints had the Spirit of His Son (Gal. 4:6; 1 John 2:20,27), the " Spirit of adoption," so that they could enter into it. If they act, they " do righteousness" (1 John 2:29) as those born of God. These then, and these alone, know anything of christian " fellowship." Its limits exclude all others-all that are not " in the light."
As four out of the nineteen occurrences of the word "fellowship" are found in this 1 John 1, we may gather up what we can from the apostle before looking at the others. It is only of those who walk " in the light" (ver. 7), and there it is known " with one another." It is there also with the apostles (ver. 3), and it is there " with Him" (ver. 6); with Him who is at once its source and its supply.
Notice, also, brought out here, how this fellowship " with Him" has come about. He begins the epistle by telling us what he had " heard, seen, looked upon, and handled." Grace had come down to man, and the eternal life, Christ, had walked about among men. He was God's gift. " This is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life." (1 John 5:11.) He " came by water and blood"; cleansing and expiation were both accomplished by Him. And, as to John, two things had followed: He had been manifested to him, and John had been drawn to Christ. (Chapter 1:2,2;5. 9, 10; and John 6:44,65.) The Father had both manifested Christ and drawn to Him, as He has with all who have ever come to Him. (Matt. 16:17.) Only with the Father's thoughts of Him John had to do. All else in this epistle is " the world" (chap. 2:16); and as to the world his record is brief. The world " knew him not." (Chapter 3:1.) But he could speak of fellowship with the Father, and with what but respecting the Son of His bosom? And not only so, for if the Father had manifested the Son to John, John had known Him who was thus manifested. He knew for his own heart that he was a disciple "whom Jesus loved," so that he can speak thus: "And truly our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ."
And to have communion with the Son, what is it but to learn of Him whose whole life down here, from infancy to the cross, was marked by the relationship known, which is contained in that one word "Father"? (Compare Luke 2:49, and xxii. 42.) He, the only One who perfectly knew it, has introduced us by the work of the cross into the same: " Go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father and your Father, and to my God and your God." (John 20:17.) And we learn of the Father and of the Son as taught of the Spirit, which is sent into our hearts " because we are sons." (Gal. 4:6.) Thus is it that a man of like passions with ourselves can speak of that communion in which his heart delighted, desiring the saints then, and the saints now, to enter into and enjoy it with him, for thus it was, and thus it is, that grace has wrought.
But having found the company wherein fellowship alone can be, and how it originated being unfolded, we must turn again to Scripture, in order to learn what those who form it are further privileged to have fellowship with, and this will fully come before us in the remaining fifteen occurrences of the word.
The first of these, and the first in the New Testament, we find in Acts 2:42: " They continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship." The apostles' doctrine, what they taught, we have now in the word; but the apostles' fellowship embraced the whole habit and tenor of their daily life. To Timothy he says, while dividing and distinguishing them: " Thou halt fully known my doctrine, manner of life, purpose, faith, long-suffering, charity, patience." Communion or fellowship with the apostles demanded but one common object in life, one purpose, a daily history of long-suffering and patience. These early saints (Acts 2:42) possessed them.
And we are not left in ignorance respecting the apostles' object. Distinctly it is placed before us as to three of them. The word to Peter is, " Follow me" (John 21:22); Paul says, "For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain" (Phil. 1:21); and John writes, " He that saith he abideth in him, ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked." (1 John 2:6.) And as to the way the world acted and thinks of the apostles, both the latter are clear in their testimony: " The world knoweth us not because it knew him not:" " By which [the cross of Christ] the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world."
We leave the reader to trace out more fully what is meant then, and involved, in the path of those who continue steadfastly in the " apostles' fellowship," only asking this one question which is pressed upon our spirit: How much of this, the apostles' fellowship, in which the early saints lived, and for their preservation in which John writes his epistle, do we live in the full enjoyment of now?
To continue. We have seen that "fellowship" is with the Father, and the Son, and with the apostles. It is also with the Holy Ghost. (2 Cor. 13:14; and Phil. 2:1.) We worship in the Spirit (Phil. 3:3); pray in the Spirit (Jude 20); sing in the Spirit (Eph. 5:18,19); and are exhorted to be " filled with the Spirit." With one common voice, and so in " communion," " the Spirit and the bride say, Come," to Him who responds immediately to that call, " Surely I come quickly," in Rev. 22 By the Holy Ghost also the gospel is preached, and in this also the saints have " fellowship": " Fellowship in the gospel." (Phil. 1:5; Gal. 2:9.) In ministering likewise to the bodily needs of His people, we find again that the saints have " fellowship." (Rom. 15:26; 2 Cor. 8:4; 9:13; Heb. 13:16.) Connected also with this caring for the temporal interests of the saints, we find in Philem. 1:6 " fellowship" again used. Philemon having " communication" (really κοινωία, " communion") in the common faith of God's elect, is exhorted to make it " effectual," or operative in his reception and forgiveness of his former slave Onesimus, now also converted.
Of what this faith of God's elect is based on, the Lord's death, we are reminded in the breaking of bread on every first day of the week; and strikingly connected with it we again twice find the word "communion." "The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ?" (1 Cor. 10:16.) It is thus in His own presence, " in the midst" (Matt. 18:20), that we remember at the table the Lord in His death. Together there, on common ground, and all alike redeemed, we view afresh by faith " his hands and his side." We learn the preciousness of the price paid for our redemption (1 Peter 1:18,19), and we learn, too, the love that paid it (John 15:13), and also that provided it. (Gen. 22:8.) The object of faith, and the work accomplished by Him, are both before us in the breaking of bread. Precious to God is He who accomplished this work, and precious also to Him is that blood He has shed. In all the value of it I am there before Him. He who took my place of distance is now the accepted Man, " crowned with glory and honor." And here, and so connected with all this, I find the word " communion." Once afar off, without God and without hope in the world, I am now made nigh by that precious blood, I have this " communion of the blood of Christ," this " communion of the body of Christ," and two things follow in result in a world that crucified Him, namely, suffering and consistency.
Thus, in communion at the table, and consistent therewith, I shall learn something of " His sufferings:" " That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death." Here we find again the word "fellowship" introduced. (Phil. 3:10.) Self-ease is here excluded. Paul desired only to know practically Him who " pleased not himself"; and he says it in a day wherein he has to testify, even as to the saints, that " all seek their own," and Timothy was the only comfort he had. Death is the only terminus before the apostle in this path of consistency and faithfulness; it looms up distinctly before him, but he fears it not and contemplates it calmly; for, if it may be in his pathway through the sufferings of which he speaks then, he says, " To die is gain." To this " fellowship of his sufferings," beloved reader, arc we also called (Phil. 1:29,30), and well may we pause and ask, What do we each know of them?
Finally comes in the word " communion" in the question of the apostle (2 Cor. 6:14), " What communion hath light with darkness?" A question already answered by the apostle John.
These, I believe, are the only places wherein the words communion or fellowship are used. We may briefly classify them thus: Communion or fellowship is, 1, With the Father; 2, With the Son; 3, Of the Spirit, or Holy Ghost; 4, With the apostles; 5, In the faith; 6, Of the blood of Christ; 7, Of the body of Christ; 8, In ministry to the temporal needs of the saints; 9, In " His sufferings;" 10, In the gospel; and lastly, 11, With one another.
Such is the scope of christian fellowship, and such its objects. Nothing can be more exclusive, since it is " in the light." The simple word fellowship rings the death-knell and sounds the condemnation of everything that is not of God. Known upon earth with the Father and the Son by the Holy Ghost, and in its varied exercises, which we have read, it goes on to its full measure, to be known only in heaven, and that city of God, " the bride, the Lamb's wife," where into there can enter nothing " that defileth."
The allowance of evil is destructive of fellowship or communion. Therefore, in the activities of John 13:4-17, Matt. 18:15-22, and Luke 17:3,4 (the reproduction on earth of Christ's present work on high), our individual and collective responsibilities one to the other are discharged, and thus can communion one with another exist. But the regret of some that there should be found to exist so little fellowship among Christians, that is, one with another, in the things of God, is often found to mean, when examined closely, "/t is impossible that faithfulness and fellowship can exist together-they destroy one another." This is man's idea. I believe we are taught just the opposite in the word; namely, that " fellowship" cannot be one with another apart from faithfulness. It is for us to take heed how we separate what God hath " joined together." We see both in Christ, fellowship and faithfulness. In fellowship with the Father Himself, He will not allow defilement in them. He cares about it, and to us also says, " Ye ought to wash one another's feet." " If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them." This is faithfulness. Now, beloved reader, that company is, with whom alone fellowship can be sought and found. You know you can have no fellowship with any others; we need say no more, therefore, on that head, for you have learned it in the word (James 4:4). But with what you can have fellowship, when you have found the company, that same word must still be allowed to instruct you. It is a day when you must examine these things, and give words their right meanings. You will be questioned, doubtless, but if you have found the word of God as to the meaning of " fellowship," and with what, refuse evil, and go on unhesitatingly. Let its directions alone govern you and sway your actions, and then be content and fear nothing from either man or Satan. (See Psa. 91)
Η. C. A.