What Is the Meaning of "the Fellowship of the Mystery" Ephesians 3:9?
1) Direct Answer
“The fellowship of the mystery” is the shared participation believers have in God’s once‑hidden plan now revealed: that the one God, who was manifested in Jesus Christ, would indwell a redeemed Body made of Jews and Gentiles as one new man. It is communion in the very Life and purpose of Christ—Christ in you—uniting us to God and to one another as His Bride.
2) Scriptural Explanation
- Ephesians 3:3–6, 9–11: The mystery was revealed to Paul “that the Gentiles should be fellowheirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel,” and his commission was “to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery… to the intent that now unto the principalities and powers… might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God.”
- Colossians 1:26–27: The mystery “hid from ages… now made manifest… which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.”
- 1 Timothy 3:16: “Great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh”—first in Christ, then through Christ in His Body.
- Ephesians 2:14–16: He broke down the middle wall, making “one new man” in Himself.
- Ephesians 5:30–32: We are “members of his body… This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church.”
- 1 John 1:3; 1 Corinthians 1:9: We are called into fellowship with the Father and His Son, and with one another in that same Life.
- John 17:21–23: “That they all may be one… I in them,” the very nature of this fellowship.
- Revelation 7:9–17; 20:4: This one Body called out of every nation is the Bride who will reign with Him.
3) Simple Clarifying Logic
- “Mystery” means God’s plan hidden in Himself, now revealed by the Spirit—not learned by human wisdom.
- “Fellowship” means sharing—communion, participation—in that revealed Life and purpose.
- Put together: God’s purpose was to reveal Himself in Christ, then in Christ’s Body by the Holy Ghost. When that Life enters a believer, he becomes a fellowheir, of the same Body, and a partaker of the promise. That is real fellowship—not around creeds or organizations, but around the revealed Word and the indwelling Life of Christ. Through this living union, the church displays God’s manifold wisdom to spiritual powers.
4) Reinforcing Statement
Now notice, this fellowship is Christ-centered, Spirit-given, Word-governed, and Bride-forming. It is God having the preeminence in a people—Christ in you, the hope of glory.
Ask a Follow-up Question
What did the Laodicean Church Age (our age) Angel (- messenger) Say about this?
Ranked passages from the local William Branham sermon and Church Age Book database. Relevance is relative, not a statement of doctrinal certainty.
Fellowship
60-0611B §55
Aren't you glad to be under this fellowship? Aren't you glad you heard the Word? Faith cometh by hearing. Taking simple faith and applying it, taking the cedar wood of the cross and being sanctified from all the things of the world. Then entering in by the scarlet, the dipped wool, into the dye that dyed the wool red with an animal's blood. In this way the wool---our own selves---being dyed. Oh, my. I was a leper one time, just as spotted with sin as I could be. But He take me to the vat of His own blood, and He dy...
Fellowship
60-0611B §36
...is completed. It's ready then, life is, for the little ones, and so forth. That's what the church is. When it comes through justification, sanctification, into the baptism of the Holy Ghost, she's in travail. The church is then to bring forth little ones, crying, "My God, my God [See?]; Abba, Father." That's how we come through those elements into the presence of God for fellowship. Fellowship is only recognized under the blood.
Fellowship by redemption
55-0403 §35
In the meetings sometimes, I watch how them visions become material. I thought, "O God, how can it be. When, standing here, a minute ago, stood a man with His arms folded, looking to me. And I heard His voice talking to me, and telling me things that's going to happen there, that never fails." And yet, He vanishes from me. And I know that there is a land beyond the river, there is a region yonder, somewhere, that the glorious persons of the great Angels of God and His being are fellowshipping again.
Fellowship
60-0611B §46
Now, when the Romans put a rag around His face, and they knowed He could see visions, so they hit Him on top of the head with a stick and said, "Tell us who hit you. If you're a prophet, tell us who hit you. Now we're going to believe you." But He opened not His mouth. See the wisdom of God? If that had been an ordinary prophet, He would have boiled loose there or something. But He was God, He knowed what to do. He knowed who that was in them people. When He got up at the ... started up the cross, they said, "He sa...
Fellowship by redemption
55-0403 §33
...now is coming radio activity ... radio messages. Coming right through this building now is coming television pictures, but it's too fast for our eyes. Now, you go millions of miles beyond that dimension, and you'll get into a place that's just as real as television pictures is in this room this morning. There is the Lord Jesus Christ, the resurrected Son of God standing here; and the reason that you can't see Him is because our heart hasn't become tuned down to it. And the reason we can't see the television pictur...