Addendum to God’s Household Order: New Testament Ministry Produced Fellowship
God’s purpose is not vague, nor is it left to human invention. Scripture reveals that His “economy”—His household order—is the administration by which He dispenses Christ and builds His family. When God grants us a vision of this economy, it does not merely inform us; it constrains us. What you see is what you will gravitate toward. Abraham saw a city whose builder and maker is God (Hebrews 11:10)—the New Jerusalem. This is not a metaphor for human achievement or religious effort. It is the consummation of God’s own work: Christ in His Church, the Lamb’s wife (Revelation 21:9-10). Everything God does in time—creation, incarnation, Christ’s death and resurrection, the manifestation of the sons of God, the kingdom, and finally the new heavens and new earth—moves inexorably toward this goal. The Bible is not a record of man’s search for God, but of God’s relentless building toward the New Jerusalem.
The Vision That Governs Ministry
A God-given vision is not optional. It defines and regulates all genuine Christian service. If we lack this vision, our ministry becomes aimless, and what we build may need to be undone. This is not theoretical. The so-called “seeker-sensitive” movement, which attempts to make the church palatable to unbelievers through human methods, is a prime example. It produces a mixed multitude—an environment where the fellowship is diluted, the Spirit is quenched, and loss abounds. This is not harmless innovation; it is a direct assault on the fellowship God intends. When ministry is not regulated by God’s vision, disorder and loss are inevitable.
In contrast, Christ Himself is building His Church (Matthew 16:18). This work is often hidden, not always visible in outward institutions, but it is real and unstoppable. Christ makes His home in our hearts and roots and grounds us in love (Ephesians 3:16-18). This is not mere sentiment. It brings us into the fellowship of the Spirit—a fellowship that transcends time, space, and circumstance. Paul, writing from prison, could say, “For though I be absent in the flesh, yet am I with you in the spirit, joying and beholding your order, and the steadfastness of your faith in Christ” (Colossians 2:5). Physical isolation does not sever this fellowship, because it is produced and maintained by Christ’s own work in us.
The Means: Ministry Gifts and Apostolic Teaching
God has not left His building project to chance or to the whims of human leaders. He has given ministry gifts—apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds, and teachers (Ephesians 4:11-12)—for the equipping of the saints, unto the building up of the Body of Christ. These gifts are not an end in themselves, nor are they to be pitted against one another. Their purpose is singular: to bring the saints into the reality of God’s building. The teaching of the apostles is not a relic of the past; it is the very wall that defines and protects the fellowship. Where this teaching is received, the fellowship is genuine and the building advances. Where it is neglected or replaced by fleshly methods, the result is confusion, bondage, and loss.
The Expression: Lampstands and the Reality of Fellowship
The universal Church is being built, but its expression is always local. In the New Testament, this is called the lampstand—the testimony of Christ shining in the darkness of this age (Revelation 1). The lampstand is not a social club or a gathering based on geography, personality, or human affinity. It is the local expression of the fellowship produced by the New Testament ministry. The fellowship is not ours to define; it is produced by the Word concerning Christ. Anyone who deviates from this apostolic teaching is, by definition, outside the fellowship. This is not sectarianism; it is the necessary safeguard of God’s building.
John Bunyan’s testimony illustrates this reality. Before he was saved, he observed believers whose conversation about Christ was marked by a purity and joy he could not penetrate. He recognized that their fellowship was surrounded by a wall—the Word. He could not enter until he believed the gospel. There is only one Door into this sheepfold: Christ Himself (John 10:7). The fellowship of the Father and the Son is extended to us only through faith in Christ as revealed by the apostolic testimony.
What Is Lost If We Depart from This Vision?
If we abandon the vision of God’s economy and the ministry of the New Testament, we do not merely lose a “better” way of doing church. We forfeit the very fellowship for which Christ died. We trade the reality of the Spirit’s fellowship for fleshly cliques, social clubs, and bondage to human personalities. The wall of apostolic teaching is breached, and the lampstand is extinguished. The result is not harmless diversity, but the collapse of the testimony of Christ and the quenching of the Spirit. This is not a secondary issue; it strikes at the heart of justification, inheritance, and sonship. To accept human methods or flesh-based fellowship as legitimate is to undermine the very foundation of God’s building.
The Fellowship of the Spirit—Not Limited by Time or Space
Genuine fellowship is not defined by physical proximity or institutional membership. It is the enjoyment of the Father and the Son, produced by the Spirit through the Word. Whether you are alone, like John on Patmos, or scattered across the world, you are not missing anything if you are enjoying Christ as He is revealed in the Word. The pursuit is not to find the perfect church or to shoulder a new burden, but to enjoy the fellowship of the Father and the Son through the teaching of the apostles. God raises up gifts in every generation to open the Word afresh, and whenever this happens, fellowship is revived and the building is intensified. This is not a special season called “revival”; it is the normal Christian life.
The Way Forward: Enjoyment of Christ Through the Word
Do not be deceived by substitutes. Fellowship that is not based on the enjoyment of Christ through the apostolic Word is a counterfeit. It produces cliques, bondage, and loss. But where Christ is enjoyed, and the Word is our food and drink, we are being built together as God’s habitation in the Spirit (Ephesians 2:22). This is the reality of the lampstand, the testimony of Christ in the present age.
God’s economy is not a burden for you to bear. It is the invitation to participate in His building by enjoying Christ as your portion. Meditate on this vision. Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly. As you do, you are being nourished, equipped, and built up—not by your effort, but by God’s own work in you through the ministry of the New Testament. This is the fellowship that endures, the building that cannot be shaken, and the testimony that will shine until the New Jerusalem descends in glory.
