ESOCS Devotional 7 September 2024 – Called into Fellowship
MEMORY VERSE: ““God [is] faithful, by whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord.” 1 Corinthians 1:9 KJV
TEXT: 1 CORINTHIANS 1:1-9
Paul, called to be an apostle of Jesus Christ through the will of God, and Sosthenes our brother,
2 To the church of God which is at Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, with all who in every place call on the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both theirs and ours:
3 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
4 I thank my God always concerning you for the grace of God which was given to you by Christ Jesus, 5 that you were enriched in everything by Him in all utterance and all knowledge, 6 even as the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you, 7 so that you come short in no gift, eagerly waiting for the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ, 8 who will also confirm you to the end, that you may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
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This is the key verse of First Corinthians. The rest of the letter revolves around it. It is a statement that God had called them to a very important relationship, and that this is the reason for all of the problems in the church. They had not understood the implications of their calling, and the relationship they personally had with Jesus Himself. Instead, beginning with the very next verse, the apostle had to deal with divisions, scandals, lawsuits, immorality, drunkenness and quarrelling. It is very clear that, despite the fullness of provision which they had received, they were experiencing a great failure in the church. They all had the ability to do mighty things in the Spirit but not much was happening in the city. Instead of making an impact on Corinth, Corinth was making an impact on the church. All these ugly attitudes and actions that were going on every day out in the city were beginning to infiltrate into the church, and instead of the church changing the city, the city was changing the church.
This reminds me of Peter Marshall’s very vivid description of contemporary Christians. He says, ‘Christians are like deep-sea divers encased in suits designed for many fathoms deep, marching bravely forth to pull plugs out of bathtubs! What was wrong was the Corinthians lack of understanding of what it meant to have Jesus Christ living among them. The major struggle of most churches is right at this point. They have lost the sense that Jesus is among them, that they have an individual relationship with the Lord of glory Himself. They no longer live their lives in the awareness and the excitement that they are partners with Christ in everything they do. When that begins to fade from the Christian consciousness, all these troubles that the Corinthians were experiencing begin to crowd in. This letter was written to call them back to an awareness of what it means to have fellowship with Christ.
Fellowship with Christ is the work of the Holy Spirit. It is His task to take the things of Christ and make them known unto us, to make the person of Jesus real in our daily experience. That is what Paul is talking about here — Christ made real to the heart, enabling him to satisfy the thirsts of the soul; Christ providing the power that it takes to do and meet the demands of both the law and the love of God. Fellowship with Christ is not only direction in what to do, but it is dynamic — it is how we are able to do it.
- What is the primary aspect of our calling as lovers of Christ? Are we giving pre-eminence to anything less than our privileged and needed fellowship with Him?
- Lord, may my heart be always willing to come back into fellowship with the Lord Jesus and rely completely on the indwelling of your Spirit.
Further Reading: Judges 17:1-13; Luke 10:38-42; Haggai 1:1-11
ESOCS Devotional 7 September 2024
