Relationships

David Stern, author of "The Jewish New Testament Commentary" wrote:

"To the Jewish mind the Torah is not something dead, fixed forever, but a living teaching to be applied in the light of circumstances to the lives of individuals."

Concerning "fellowship" he writes:

"Fellowship (Greek koinonia, 'community, commonness, communion, fellowship') includes two elements, each of which fosters the other: (1) deepening friendship, and (2) developing a common vision, goals and priorities."

"Breaking Bread. Many Christians assume that this refers to 'taking communion' and have an image of the early believers meeting in home to eat a tiny wafer and of bread and drink a symbolic amount of wine or grape juice, just as Christians do today in their churches. However, the context is not twentieth-century Christianity but first-century Judaism; and for Jew then as now, fellowship was mediated by meals. To say that the early Messianic Jews broke bread is to say neither more nor less than that they ate together.

The meaning of the eating together must be grasped. First of all, when possible, religious Jews begin a meal with bread and say over it a b'rakhah. Then they break off a piece of the loaf and eat it so that the blessing of God specifically for His provision of bread to eat will not have been said in vain.

Yeshua knew and observed this practice, but he also gave an additional meaning to the act of breaking bread when He said, as He broke the matzah at the Last Supper, 'This is my body, which is being given for you; do this in memory of me' (Lk 22:20 and 1 Cor.11:24). This practice clearly became part of the 'Torah of the emissaries,' so that the early believers were to recall Yeshua's death for them as they began their meal - though some fell short of the standard (1 Cor. 11:20-34). Then after that, the entire meal time was to be devoted to fellowship, 'communion' in the ordinary sense of the word (see above on fellowship), not in the technical Christian sense (wafer of bread, cup of wine).

Yet this fellowship was not merely worldly socializing that God ignores. "

David Stern goes on to write concerning fellowship and breaking bread:
There is a Jewish mishna (saying):
"If there is no meal, there is no [study of] Torah, and if there is no [study of] Torah there is no meal."

" In other words, if one becomes preoccupied with religious studies and ignores normal social interaction, the individual's study does society little good. But, conversely, if at the main time of socializing (the meal) one ignores the things of God, it is a sign that religious truth has not penetrated deeply into the life of the individual.

Yeshua, by His identification of Himself with the bread, focuses the meal on Himself and enables the reworking of the mishna [giving it new meaning]:

If there is no time of interacting with fellow believers, one's identification with Yeshua and study of God's Torah is incomplete. But if the time of interacting with fellow believers does not relate itself to Yeshua's death on our behalf and to encouraging one another in living the life God wants us to live, the time has been wasted."

To sum all of this up and tie it together, our "fellowship" is to result in a deepening of our friendship and development of common goals and vision. We are called unto the fellowship of Jesus and each other. The purpose and result of this fellowship is as Ephesians 4:13 says,

"Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a mature man, unto the fulness of Christ."

And as Ephesians 1:18,19 says:

"that He will give light to the eyes of our hearts, so that we will understand the hope to which He has called us, what rich glories there are in the inheritance He has promised His people, and how surpassingly great is His power that works in us who trust Him."