The following links take you directly to the word family where our study on Biblical fellowship is founded. Click on this link or this link. You’ll notice that koinonia is translated (by way of quantity in the Bible): contribution (2x), fellowship (12x), participation (2x), sharing (3x). The word koinonos is translated contributing (1), participates (1), share (4), shared (2). These two words begin to “flavor” our understanding of what the early church must have been like. It was so different from the culture around it, and its primary draw was this “fellowship” culture that so lacked in other parts of society. It was how the early church went from 12 to becoming the dominant belief system of the Roman world by 312 A.D.

Take a look at 1 John 1:1-3.

“That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ.”

Note where the resource (according to John) for our fellowship comes from. Of course John had direct contact with Jesus for several years, and his readers were only in the position to get their information second hand. Even so, when you diagram the flow of resources from the Father through the Son, to the Apostles and on to us, it is those resources that have been richly shared that support the basis for our “fellowship.” Meditate on this for a minute and see if you can think of some of the “resources” that have flowed from God and Christ that serve as the basis for our fellowship (relationship culture) today.