Removing What Hinders Fellowship With God

According to the Bible, one of the crowning benefits of our redemption is the restoration of our fellowship with God. In the new covenant, our spirits have been made alive to God, and we can actually KNOW Him and have fellowship with Him. This, to me, is one of the greatest privileges of my salvation.

If any believer will look inside, they’ll recognize there is a summons to fellowship with God in their heart which came into them when they were born again.

The word “fellowship” in the original Greek means to share something in common with another. Although not exclusively, this is primarily talking about sharing spiritual things together. The summons inside the believer is to come and share in, partake of and enjoy what is on the inside of God. God is love, and He’s ready to share all that we need with us. What a thought!

In previous blogs, we looked at the fact there is a difference between our relationship with God, which is our legal standing with Him and having fellowship with Him. Just like in any human relationship, believers have varying degrees of fellowship with God due to the things they have or haven’t worked out between He and them (Philippians 2:12).

There are Things that Destroy Fellowship

Fellowship with God is only possible according to how much we have in common with Him or how much we agree with Him.

Amos 3:3

Can two walk together, except they be agreed?

We need to realize there are things that will destroy our fellowship with God if we let them into our lives, because there are things God can’t or won’t fellowship with. Yes, we will still be God’s child, but something will have gotten in that will hinder our fellowship. This is why some believers struggle in their fellowship with God.

Christians actually have degrees of fellowship with God based on their degree of separation from the things that grieve Him. Let’s look at this truth so we can address anything we need to remove from our lives that is hindering our fellowship with God.

You Can’t Do It

It seems to me that modern-day Christians just don’t understand fellowship with God. To have fellowship with Him, one has to love what He loves and hate what He hates. Believers have to choose, “Do I want the fellowship of this over here in the world, or do I want the fellowship of God and the people of God?” And here’s what many people don’t understand—we can’t have fellowship with both.

I Corinthians 10:16, 18-22

The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion (Greek: fellowship) of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion (fellowship) of the body of Christ?

Behold Israel after the flesh: are not they which eat of the sacrifices PARTAKERS of the altar? What say I then? that the idol is any thing, or that which is offered in sacrifice to idols is any thing? But I say, that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God: and I WOULD NOT THAT YE SHOULD HAVE FELLOWSHIP WITH DEVILS. YE CANNOT drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of devils: YE CANNOT be partakers of the Lord's table, and of the table of devils. Do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? are we stronger than he?

We see in these verses that even though Christians have received the Holy Spirit in the new birth, they can still fellowship with wrong spirits. Many Christians don’t understand that. Even believers can get their motivation from or be influenced by other spirits depending on what they are involved in, company with, watch, listen to or give their attention to. The work of sanctification in our lives as believers is the process of removing these other things from our fellowship, so we can have better fellowship with God.

We also see from these verses that what believers fellowship with, they are partaking of. These verses also tell us we CANNOT fellowship with wrong spirits out there in the world and still maintain good fellowship with God. People try to do so, even claiming they are in fellowship with God, but this verse says no one can do it.

God is a Jealous God

II Corinthians 11:2

For I am jealous over you with godly jealousy: for I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.

The Bible illustrates our relationship and fellowship with God using the husband and wife relationship. What if a man’s wife came home and told her husband that she had met a nice man down at the gym and had invited him to join them for a romantic dinner together? Is the husband going to go for that? No! The husband is going to say, “You’re going to have to choose him or me!” Why? Because he’s a meany or isn’t walking in love towards his wife? NO! Fellowshipping with another man breaks a wife’s fellowship with and fidelity to her husband.

But, Christians sometimes try to do that with the Lord—whom they are married to! And, here’s one reason why they do so. There is a false voice of unity out there in the world that some Christians are listening to. It’s very deceptive and seductive.

Out there in the world, there is a voice that’s saying, “We just all need to get along.” But have you noticed that those who say those things are always hateful towards true believers? They’re not in fellowship with us anymore than we’re in fellowship with them. It’s another spirit than the One we’re of. They are speaking by the spirit of anti-Christ.

They are accepting of every wrong spirit that is at enmity with God. We cannot walk with them in fellowship. I don’t mean we can’t minister to them. But, ministry is different than fellowship.

What I mean is, we can’t share fellowship with the same spirit they are of. We're called out of the world and have no fellowship with evil spirits. They are under the dominion of the spirits that rule over those who are yet in spiritual darkness. We are of the light and have no fellowship with them because we read in the Bible that light and darkness have no fellowship (II Corinthians 6:14-7:1).

Fellowshipping with wrong spirits that are on wrong people, some music, entertainment and movies and even some political movements breaks our fellowship with God.

Why is God Not Talking?

There are people who grieve the Spirit of God because of what they are into (I Corinthians 5:9-11), and until a believer separates fellowship with them, God won’t talk to them. When I say God won’t talk to them, I’m not saying they aren’t God’s child; I mean they have grieved the Spirit of God.

If you’ll remember in the Old Testament story of Abraham and Lot, God only spoke to Abraham after He separated from Lot, who was fellowshipping with the spirits of the world (Genesis 13:14). And, the New Testament says the same is true for believers today. We read in Ephesians 5:11-14 that only after believers come out from among the spiritually dead and have no more fellowship with them will they get the light that God offers them in fellowship with Himself.

So, coming out from fellowshipping with the spirits of the world is the key to getting more light from God and His Word. Why is that? Light comes in the place of fellowshipping with God. But, fellowshipping with the spirits of the world hinders fellowship with God, which in turn hinders a man from getting more light.

It may sound old fashioned, but the New Testament still teaches separation from the world.

Separation/Revelation/Manifestation

There are some things the Spirit won’t talk to you about until you separate from those who grieve Him. And, there are some ways the Spirit of God won’t move until these other things people are fellowshipping with are removed. This is why Elijah called for a minstrel to play. He was in the presence of some who were grievous to the Spirit.

II Kings 3:15

But now bring me a minstrel. And it came to pass, when the minstrel played, that the hand of the LORD came upon him.

This is also why Jesus took some sick folks out of the town they were in to get them healed.

Mark 8:23

And he took the blind man by the hand, and led him out of the town; and when he had spit on his eyes, and put his hands upon him, he asked him if he saw ought.

This is also why Jesus cast the money changers out of the temple and why miracles happened after He did.

Matthew 21:12-14

And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the seats of them that sold doves, And said unto them, It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves. And the blind and the lame came to him in the temple; and he healed them.

Sometimes, there are things that have to be removed from a believer’s life before the Spirit of God will move.

Count the Cost

God demands to be alone in fellowship, otherwise, a man has unwittingly separated himself from fellowship with God and all the rich blessings it brings. If we’re holding to the fellowship of the world, we’re going to do it at the expense of good fellowship with God. When the world comes in, God goes out. When God comes in, the world goes out. God and the world have no fellowship. And don’t EVER let someone tell you otherwise. The Bible calls anyone who says otherwise a liar (I John 1:6).

If people choose to fellowship with wrong spirits, it won’t be God who cuts them off from fellowship with Himself--they cut THEMSELVES off by fellowshipping with what God has no fellowship with. He still loves them--there’s just something between them and Him. We, as believers, need the fellowship of the Lord more than we need the fellowship of the world. Choose wisely what you let into your life.

If the Lord won't fellowship with some folks, why are believers the bad guys if they won't? Why are they, "not walking in love," if they won't? One translation of James 4:4-5 says that the Spirit that is in us jealously desires us. That means, He desires that we be His ALONE. He wants us to Himself.

God is a jealous God, and it’s enmity with God to fellowship with the spirits of this world. It's not just the music, the person, etc. It is the spirit that is on them or behind them.

I’ll say it again—God demands to be alone in fellowship, otherwise we have unwittingly separated ourselves from having fellowship with Him and from all the blessings that fellowship brings.

And, regarding fellowshipping with other people, true believers have decided they need the fellowship of the Lord more than they need the fellowship of the world. And, since true believers know it’s a one or the other proposition, and because they guard their fellowship with God, they don’t accept the condemnation some try to put on them for, “not walking in love.” If someone chooses to fellowship with wrong spirits, that person cuts THEMSELVES off from having fellowship with God’s people, not the other way around.