The Fellowship of the Mystery

What is the Fellowship of the Mystery?

If ye have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which is given me to youward: How that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery; (as I wrote afore in few words, Whereby, when ye read, ye may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ) Which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit; That the Gentiles should be fellowheirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel: Whereof I was made a minister, according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me by the effectual working of his power. Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ; And to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ. Eph. 3:2-9

I placed two phrases in the above passage in italics, because to address the latter, which is the topic of this essay, it is necessary to first identify the former. Therefore, let us proceed with doing this.

The Mystery

The phrase, “the mystery”. appears in only four places in Scripture, all in the epistles of the apostle Paul: Romans 16:25, Eph. 3:3 and 9, and Colossians 1:26. It is clearly identified in the passages in Ephesians as “the dispensation of the grace of God” ( and “the dispensation of God” in the Colossians passage), which is the parenthetical that expositors of the “grace” message like to show sandwiched between the Old Testament (which is usually shown to extend through Acts 8) and the New Testament (which begins with the letter to the Hebrews¹), as follows:

Genesis through Acts 8 ( grace disp-Rom. through Philemon) Hebrews through Revelation

This particular dispensing of grace² by God, through the Apostle Paul, is one that makes, as it says, “the Gentiles….fellowheirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel.” The doctrine, promises and instructions for “the obedience of faith”(Romans 16:26) that pertain to it are all found in the letters written by its revelator, the apostle Paul, who, in the above referenced passages, said it was “hid…from ages and from generations…in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men….kept secret since the world began….hid in God, but now is made manifest, and by the scriptures of the prophets….made known to all nations.” (compare Matthew 13:35; Acts 3:24)

The Fellowship of the Mystery 

The “fellowship of the mystery”, while it is integral to the mystery, is not the mystery itself.  Many Bible expositors, including those of the dispensational persuasion, attempt to make this one and the same as the dispensation of grace, “the mystery.”  They get help in this effort from modern translations of the Bible. For example, the NIV replaces the word “dispensation” in Eph. 3:2 with the word “administration,” and does the same thing in Eph. 3:9 with the word “fellowship,” also replacing it with “administration.” The Greek word behind dispensation, in both the TR and Nestles, is “oikonomia” from which we derive our English word “economy,” defined as the management or stewardship of the money of a household or government.  The Greek behind the word “fellowship” is “koinonia,” which literally means “communion, community, association, society, etc.; not even remotely the same as an oikonomia.” To say otherwise is to corrupt the English language. A thing cannot be “of” a thing and also be that thing.

Nor is the FOTM the church, the body of Christ. The body of Christ is a spiritual, invisible organism into which believers of the gospel of Christ (Rom. 1:16) are “saved” through a spiritual baptism (1 Cor. 12:13). It is not a “fellowship.” A fellowship is something that is visible and demonstrable. The fellowship of the mystery is the visible, demonstrable association of members of the body of Christ, created by the abolishing of the religious practices pertaining to Israel, which were ordained for the church during Paul’s Acts ministry. These practices not only included those things listed by Paul in 1 Cor. 11, but also rituals like the “Lord‘s supper“, water baptism, physical circumcision, the sign gifts, etc.

Only One Body, By the Cross

Drawing this distinction between “the mystery” and “the fellowship of the mystery” does not, as some mid-acts dispensationalists like to contend, create two “bodies.” Both Acts believers and post-Acts believers were saved into the body of Christ by the gospel of Christ. But they could not enter into fellowship with each other because the former, the “we”, were practicing “the ordinances“, and the latter, the “ye” weren’t. The declaration by Paul of the abolition of the ordinances in Eph. 2 and Col. 2, did not create any new spiritual entity, but rather made way for these two groups to become one physical fellowship(association, community) in Christ, viz., “the fellowship of the mystery,” viz. “the one new man” of chapter 2.

That  There Be No Divisions Among You (1 Cor. 1:10)

I believe the primary reason there exists so many divisions in present Christendom is the failure (or refusal?) of Catholicism and Protestantism (and all their derivations) to recognize the truths of Ephesians 2 and 3 and Colossians 1 and 2, concerning the ordinances and “what is the fellowship of the mystery.” Despite the fact that Paul commanded, in Romans 16:25, 26, that his gospel (i.e., his 13 epistles, rightly divided) was to now be the doctrinal blueprint for church practice, and that he clearly ordered the church to cease and desist from the practice of all those ordinances that were in order during the Acts period, Christendom has, by and large, ignored this commandment and as a result, is now fragmented into thousands of divisions.⁵ Considering Paul’s commandment in 1 Corinthians 1:10, “that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you..”, how can anyone believe that this fragmentation of the body of Christ is in the divine will of God?

Mike Schroeder

All Scripture references are taken from the King James Bible. Please feel free to distribute this article, or any other articles on this site, as you see fit.

Related articles: The Mystery; Baptism in the Grace Dispensation;And These Signs Shall Follow Them that Believe…..;The Lord’s Supper

I also suggest reading the chapter in my book, 85 Pages in the Bible, titled: The Fellowship Of The Mystery Revealed: The One New Man

Post Script

Are you saved? Jesus Christ—“who knew no sin”—and his sacrificial death on the Cross, has made the way for “everyone that believeth…to be reconciled to God. History has shown that whatever peace man has achieved in the world can only be temporary. The Bible says that individual men and women can know, beyond a doubt, that they are saved and bound for heaven, and therefore have absolute and permanent peace, regardless of what is going on in the world, by trusting Jesus Christ and his death on the cross for their eternal salvation. “If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved…Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.” Have you done this? If not, why not now?