The Apostolic in Exile

The Cost of Evicting the Apostolic Ministry

When it’s time to construct a building you call an architect.

Much later, when when a building becomes so old it’s obsolete and even dangerous, it’s time to call an architect again.

This is not controversial in the world of construction.

We understand the role architects play.

Using their skill doesn’t mean they now own the buildings they work on.

We aren’t threatened by their gift. We’re grateful. When we need their service we give them a call and once their assignment is complete they move on to another project. Simple right?

Not in the Church.

For centuries the architecture of the Church has been in desperate need of an overhaul. The New Testament makes clear that the mission of the Church is to make disciples, the experience of the Church is as a loving family, the function of the Church is as an interdependent body and the impact of the Church is a world so attracted by the love shared between its members it grows exponentially wherever it’s planted.

We have all the resources we need to make the vision of Jesus a reality. We have the Scriptures that light our path, the Holy Spirit who fills our heart with love for one another and all the gifts of the body so that every diverse role needed to build up the Church is present. Well, we have all the gifts except the one we’ve decided is too disruptive to function in cultures with established churches. Of course I’m referring to the one gift most mentioned in the New Testament and least utilized today—the apostolic gift.

“Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers. (Ephesian 4:11 NLT)”

What would happen to the Church if over several centuries we chose to under-utilize or ignore any one of these five?

We would fail to experience the result of these five ministries working together…

“Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ. This will continue until we all come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of God’s Son that we will be mature in the Lord, measuring up to the full and complete standard of Christ. (Ephesians 4:12-13 NLT)”

We need all of these gifts.

Now it’s clear there was a kind of “capital A Apostle” that existed in the first century (2 Corinthians 12:12), that wrote the New Testament (1 Corinthians 15:7–9) once and for all (Jude 1:3) but that does not mean that we no longer need the apostolic gift today to reach the maturity described in Ephesians 4.

So how does the apostolic gift work and how might we utilize this gift in churches today?

The passage that has most helped me understand the basic way this gift works is when Paul describes the mechanics of his ministry in 1 Corinthians 3.

He begins by renouncing the claim that he is working to attract a personal following and describes his ministry as simply the first in a sequence of gifts each of which is equally essential but with God as the only true center.

“who is Apollos? Who is Paul? We are only God’s servants through whom you believed the Good News. Each of us did the work the Lord gave us. I planted the seed in your hearts, and Apollos watered it, but it was God who made it grow. It’s not important who does the planting, or who does the watering. What’s important is that God makes the seed grow. The one who plants and the one who waters work together with the same purpose. And both will be rewarded for their own hard work. For we are both God’s workers. And you are God’s field. You are God’s building. (1 Corinthians 3:5–9 NLT)”

Now Paul zooms in on the apostolic ministry and in order to do that he moves from the gardener planting a seed analogy to the analogy of an architect laying the foundation of a building.

“10 Because of God’s grace to me, I have laid the foundation like an expert builder. Now others are building on it. But whoever is building on this foundation must be very careful. 11 For no one can lay any foundation other than the one we already have — Jesus Christ.

12 Anyone who builds on that foundation may use a variety of materials — gold, silver, jewels, wood, hay, or straw. 13 But on the judgment day, fire will reveal what kind of work each builder has done. The fire will show if a person’s work has any value. 14 If the work survives, that builder will receive a reward. 15 But if the work is burned up, the builder will suffer great loss. The builder will be saved, but like someone barely escaping through a wall of flames. (1 Corinthians 3:10–15 NLT)”

I’ve always been struck by Paul’s bold statement that he is “an expert builder” We have some idea of what it’s like for a teacher to be an expert, or even an evangelist but what does it mean for a apostle to be an expert?

There seems to be a specific skill involved in ensuring the foundation of a church is rooted in the Gospel of Jesus Christ in such a way that it can withstand the fire of inevitable trials and persecutions.

How is this done?

We see this in Paul’s own writings. Most of his Epistles are about 50% laying out the critical principles of being the Church (in modern language we call these values) and the other 50% seems to be laying out specific practices that will deliver on those principles (in church language we often call these traditions).

If you want to see a near perfect example of a modern apostolic framework you can go to the website “We Are Church”.

If you look at the site menu you’ll see “Values” and “Practices”.

This is core to the apostolic work—to define for a community the values the worker believes settles the church squarely on the Gospel of Jesus and provides the foundational practices on which the other gifts can be fully expressed so the body can grow into full maturity. This needs to be constantly updated so that the language and the traditions continue to be effective within the current cultural context of a particular community.

There are two pitfalls at this point that are very easy to fall into.

The first is to confuse man-made traditions with biblical commands (Jesus had very harsh things to say about this mistake in Mark 7:1–8) but the second is to disrespect the importance of man-made traditions in helping a particular community practically live out the life of Jesus in their context (Paul was very adamant about this point in 1 Corinthians 11:1–2).

But what do you do when your traditions are out of date and are no longer resulting in the values you profess to believe? That’s when you call an architect.

Every faithful church movement or denomination was the result of someone’s apostolic ministry.

The Methodist church was launched when John Wesley used his apostolic gift to create a new set of practices (a new method) for a movement of new churches.

The Vineyard church was launched when John Wimber used his apostolic gift to establish a set of new traditions that brought to the center some principles and experiences he believed the church was neglecting.

This kind of work is a lot easier when launching a new movement with new believers as Paul told the church at Rome (Romans 15:20).

But what can be done for existing churches whose apostles have died?

What tends to happen today is that the values and traditions of these churches become more and more ineffective and sometimes even get corrupted because there is no apostolic worker permitted to attempt an update. They cling to the traditions of their long dead founding apostolic worker.

Now you might think that the worse case scenario of this state of things is a few groups of Christians living a little too far into the past but the problem is far worse. The areas dominated by churches where the apostolic workers have been dead for more than 200 years tend to be the least reached areas of the once reached world. These churches define for believers and nonbelievers in their region who Jesus is, what his Kingdom stands for and this often false witness makes those areas more difficult to reach than even unreached part of the world.

Is this inevitable?

Let me suggest a simple, biblical solution to this problem.

Every church, everywhere in the world must have access to a living apostolic worker.

It’s not the job of these apostolic workers to lead these churches. For existing churches their work should be done in submission to the existing Elders or governance structure of that congregation or denomination but these churches preserving the traditions of dead apostles, must acknowledge their ongoing need for the apostolic ministry.

This is not a controversial idea when considering a church’s need for any other gift.

We all see the need for living teachers in the church.

We don’t ask dead pastors to preside over our weddings, funerals and baby dedications.

Why are we so committed to only following dead apostles?

If you want to experience how challenging it is to attempt to use one’s apostolic gift within existing churches spend several years at a church that is more than 50 years old and then go to the leaders with five new traditions you recommend they start and five old traditions you recommend they stop to better accomplish the mission of the church.

Beware of the wrath of those defending the traditions of the dead.

We need to honor the work of the apostolic workers of the past without ignoring our need for apostolic workers today.