Fensanity said:
Many Baptists and others wrongly assume that apostles and prophets have passed away, yet they retain the other leadership gifts. Some simply rename things and say that modern apostles are really 'missionaries'. Likewise, they pick and chose from the spiritual gifts and seem to be biased against tongues and prophecy (cessation model). There is no exegetical basis for this. It is a preconceived theology supported by their lack of personal experience (contrary to the experience of hundreds of millions of charismatics or Pentecostals).
The Greek word is the same and basically means a 'sent one'. Most Greek words have a spectrum of nuances depending on the context. The 12 Apostles do not have to be identical to subsequent apostles throughout church history. In other words, apostles in Acts, the early church, or today do not have to have seen the risen Christ directly.
The 5-fold plurality of leadership gifts are valuable for maturing the church. Our modern model of one strong pastor leader and a board who sometimes hinders his vision might work in the corporate world, but was not the intention of God's blueprint. Contrary to our traditions, the evangelist gift is one who is resident in the local church and equips the saints to do the work of the ministry. If every member was an equipped evangelist, we would have more impact than one travelling evangelist. The converts would also be discipled in the context of the family of God, rather than falling away after the emotional appeal of a fly by night evangelist looking for $.
I wrote a paper on a biblical philosophy of ministry. Sorry I cannot develop the evidence in a few posts. I humble apostle does not need to call himself such. I am familiar with ministries that seem to have an apostolic function and are called or call themselves such. e.g. In India and Canada, I am aware of leaders who have planted dozens of churches and give oversight to them. They raise up and send out other church planters and the kingdom of God grows numerically and in spiritual maturity. They seem to have a gift and anointing that goes beyond being responsible for one local church. Regardless of the label, like Paul, they function as those who are sent out and send out others. They have not seen Jesus first hand, but they grow His Church in impactful ways.
We could take one of these 'apostles' to the Mormons. There concept is different. Anyone can claim to be an Apostle and sit high up in an organization's hierarchy. Mormon apostles have a revelatory and governing role and sit in headquarters. They are not actively planting churches and giving direct oversight to them and mentoring other church planters. This is similar to JW's Governing Body (policy makers, but not effective at raising up congregations to reach the lost).
Anyone can claim to be an Apostle. In some charismatic circles, some high profile charismatic leaders go by this title. This does not make them apostles nor are they necessarily doing what NT apostles did (sent out of local churches, planted churches, oversee churches, etc.). The local church is God's plan for the family and army of God. If He gives leadership and spiritual gifts for edifying and equipping the local church, why would we negate them and rely on modern church growth techniques that often come from the corporate business world?
The bottom line is to find out all that Scripture says about the Church and leadership. We should line up our beliefs and practices with the Word and not our humanistic models of church government (there is no one model of church government in Scripture...culture, local situation, etc. can affect the exact model, yet we should apply biblical principles).
