We are now living in the midst of an epochal change in the structure of the church. I like to call it the “new apostolic age.”
The church has entered a new phase ever since the third millennium began in the year 2000. Although others may see it differently, I am inclined to read church history as containing two genuinely apostolic ages. The first one lasted for about two hundred years, a couple of generations after the first of the New Testament apostles concluded their ministry. The second came into its own about 1800 years later, around the year 2001.
Having said that, I do not want to be misunderstood. I do not mean to imply that the church of Jesus Christ or the kingdom of God went into a suspension mode of some kind for 1800 years. It most certainly did not. Jesus said, “I will build my church” (see Mt. 16:18), and He has been doing so ever since. God’s people on earth have been preaching the gospel, making disciples, and setting captives free, non-stop. The true church has been with us down through the ages, sometimes larger, sometimes smaller; sometimes stronger, sometimes weaker.
I have no question that apostles have been present in the church throughout its history. However, forces have been quite obviously at work, both in the invisible world and in the visible world, to keep them as subdued as possible. But who could doubt, looking back, that Gregory Thaumaturgus or Martin of Tours or Patrick of Ireland or Benedict of Nursia or Boniface or Anselm of Canterbury or Savanarola or John Wyclif or Martin Luther or Francis Xavier or John Knox or John Wesley or William Booth or William Carey or Hudson Taylor were apostles? A biography of Dwight L. Moody by Wilbur Chapman, published back in 1900, carries the subtitle, “A Tribute to the Memory of the Greatest Apostle of the Age.”
Calling Moody “an apostle” in 1900, however, is an exception to the rule. Generally speaking, even those who unquestionably had the gift and ministry of apostle were not, with notable exceptions such as the Irvingites of the 1800s or the Apostolic Church of the 1900s, publicly recognized by the church as apostles per se. Historically apostles were kept, so to speak, beneath the surface after the first couple of centuries or so. But no longer. A growing number of Christian leaders are now recognizing, acknowledging, and affirming both the gift and the office of apostle. The apostles have surfaced!
It took us about 100 years to get to where we are now. The earliest precursor of this New Apostolic Age, at least to my knowledge, was the African Independent Church (AIC) movement which began around 1900. Over the century the growth of the independent churches far outstripped that of the more traditional mission churches across the African continent. More recently the Chinese house church movement developed along apostolic lines, producing what is arguably the greatest harvest of souls ever seen in one nation over a 25 year period. The strongest evangelistic force in Latin America in recent decades has been what some call the “grassroots churches,” which operate on what we now recognize as apostolic principles.
My term for the new wineskin which God has provided for churches like these is the “New Apostolic Reformation.” It is a “reformation” because we are currently witnessing the most radical change in the way of doing church since the Protestant Reformation. It is “apostolic” because the recognition of the gift and office of apostle is the most radical of a whole list of changes from the old wineskin. And it is “new” to distinguish it from several older traditional church groups which have actually incorporated the term “apostolic” into their official name.
If truly the Spirit has been speaking to the churches about the apostolic wineskin that I am describing in this book, it must be biblical. Actually, there are three scripture verses which are the primary proof texts for recognizing the gift and office of apostle. Many other texts support this, but these three are core:
Ephesians 4:11 And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers.
The “He” is Jesus, who gave gifts to His people when he ascended into heaven after rising from the dead and spending forty days with His disciples (see Eph. 4:8). He subsequently gave gifted people to the church on two levels: (1) the foundational or governmental level (4:11), and (2) the ministry level through the saints (4:12). The five foundational or governmental offices are apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor, and teacher.
A common name for these five offices is “the ascension gifts,” because Jesus first gave them at His ascension. Others frequently refer to them as “the fivefold ministry.” This may not be the best term because “ministry” is mentioned, not in verse 11, but in verse 12 as the role of the saints, while apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers are supposed to equip them to do their ministry. It is admittedly a minor point, but it is the reason why I mostly prefer “foundational or governmental offices.”
Ephesians 2:20 [The household of God is] built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone.
A well-known hymn states that “The church’s one foundation is Jesus Christ her Lord.” This is true in a general, theological sense because there would be no church at all without the person and work of Jesus Christ. However, in the nuts and bolts of the growth and development of the church after He ascended and left the earth, Jesus apparently prefers to be thought of, not as the foundation, but as the cornerstone. The foundation of the church through the ages is to be made up of apostles and prophets. The cornerstone, in turn, is essential because the cornerstone holds the foundation together. But if a church has Jesus without apostles and prophets, it is probably not everything that God desires it to be.
The wording of this verse is another reason why I like to call apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers “foundational” offices.
1 Corinthians 12:28 And God has appointed these in the church: first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, varieties of tongues.
The numbers here, proton (first), deúteron (second), and tríton (third), indicate that this not simply a random selection of gifts and offices. Proton here should be interpreted to mean that apostles are first in order or sequence, with the emphasis not necessarily relating to hierarchy. To put it simply, a church without apostles, other things being equal, will not function as well as a church with apostles.
It is interesting that the traditional church has understood apostles and prophets to be offices relegated to the past apostolic age, but not continuing in churches throughout history. Based on this assumption, teachers would then be first in order here in l Corinthians 12:28 by default. Since supposedly there are no longer apostles and prophets, teachers are next in line.
Much of Protestant denominationalism over almost 500 years has, in fact, been governed by teachers and administrators, not by apostles and prophets. What do I mean by that? When you think of it, most denominational executives are, in the final analysis, administrators. Most pastors of local churches, at least ever since the sermon became the central point of weekly congregational life, are assumed to be teachers, with the sermon being their primary vehicle for teaching.
It is rather fascinating that, over the centuries during which we have had church government backwards according to this scripture, we have practically evangelized the world! Think of what will happen now that church government is getting in proper order! Administrators and teachers are essential for good church health, but administrators will be better administrators and teachers will be better teachers if the apostles and prophets are in place.
Here in North America, God began to open doors for the reemergence of apostles right after World War II. Some churches and groupings of churches began to recognize the office of apostle back then. However, the movement eventually sputtered. As we look back to those days now we hear terms such as “Latter Rain” and “Restorational Movement” “Deliverance Evangelism” and “Shepherding Movement,” just to name a few. The leaders of these movements had great expectations that what they had started would reform the whole church in their generation, but it did not happen. To all intents and purposes, these post-World War II movements of God no longer exist today, and those that do continue have relatively little influence.
However the leaders of these movements were true pioneers. Let’s be clear—the post-World War II apostolic movements were initiated by God Himself. They were glorious. Huge numbers were saved, healed, delivered, discipled, sent out as missionaries, and personally revived. But many of the pioneers who led the movements made their share of mistakes. We shouldn’t see that as strange. Making mistakes goes with the territory of being a pioneer. Think of the pioneers who opened up the western part of the United States. They made their share of mistakes as well. They killed too many buffaloes. They broke promises they had made to the Indians. They ruined good farm land. But with all their mistakes, our pioneers laid the groundwork for what the United States is today and we take off our hats to them.
Let’s also take off our hats to the Christian leaders of fifty years ago! They were the pioneers who began to shape the new wineskins for the body of Christ that we are blessed with today.
While their efforts, post-World War II, may have sputtered, they did not die. God began speaking to the church once again about restoring the office of apostle in the early 1990s. This time the process was different. It was a bit more gradual, involving first of all the office of intercessor and then the office of prophet. The decade of the 1970s saw the beginnings of the emergence of the enormous global prayer movement that we see today. As a part of that, the body of Christ began to accept the gift and office of intercessor. In the 1970s and even the 1980s it was unusual, even odd, for churches to recognize certain members as “our intercessors.” But no longer. The odd church today is the one which does not yet recognize intercessors.
During the 1980s the gift and office of prophet began to surface in churches. Not that prophets had been absent in previous years and centuries, but now their ministry was being understood by a much wider segment of the body of Christ. The prophets gained stature in the 1990s, and, although they have not arrived at perfection as yet, their ministry is broadly accepted and appreciated.
Looking back, I think that we can discern God’s logic, so to speak, in bringing intercessors and prophets on the scene before apostles. The role of intercessors is essentially to stand in the gap and open the communication highways between heaven and earth. Once they are open and the voice of God can be heard more clearly, it is the role of the prophets to receive the divine messages directed to His people. Then apostles, working hand-in-hand with prophets, have the task of implementing what God wants done on earth in a certain season.
Parenthetically, there is at least some possibility that one of the handicaps of the post-World War II apostolic movement was that the way for the apostles had not been adequately opened for them by the intercessors and prophets.
I am actually writing about these pioneering efforts through hearsay. While I have been in Christian ministry since 1955, the traditional evangelical circles that I moved in knew virtually nothing about the apostles and healing evangelists of those days. The brief references that I heard to them while I was in seminary in the early 1950s relegated them to the lunatic fringe. I really didn’t tune in strongly to the apostolic movement until 1993 when I received a clear new assignment from God to raise apostolic ministry to the top of my personal agenda. That’s not too long ago!
Which brings us to the matter of timing. Just think—the last half of the Twentieth Century which began post-World War II is less than 3 percent of all of Christian history! The time since the reemergence of this idea in the beginning of the 1990s is only one-half of one percent of the history of the church! The New Apostolic Reformation is very new, but it is strong. My sense is that this movement will not sputter!
However, there are some who disagree. Back in the pioneer post-World War II days, many highly respected Christian leaders took strong public positions against the fledgling apostolic movement. Whenever the apostolic leaders would make one of their higher profile mistakes—and many of them, in fact, did not finish well at all—the opponents were more than ready to say, “I told you so!” I strongly suspect that the major reason why the post World War II movements did not carry the day as some expected they would was that the criticism, much of it being based on empirical facts, was simply too strong to resist.
Even today we find continuing criticism of the New Apostolic Reformation. Take, for example, Vinson Synan. Few would deny that Vinson Synan is today’s Number One historian of the Pentecostal/charismatic movement. His book, The Century of the Holy Spirit (Thomas Nelson), is a landmark publication. My high esteem of Vinson Synan is precisely what leads me to choose him as a contemporary representative of what we could call the opposing view.
Here is what Vinson Synan writes: “It is axiomatic to say that anyone who claims to be an apostle probably is not one. An apostle is not self-appointed or elected by any ecclesiastical body, but is chosen by the Lord Himself.”
The U.S. Assemblies of God, again one of today’s most highly respected Christian bodies, is even stronger in their opposition to the New Apostolic Reformation. During the post-World War II phase, their General Council in 1949 decreed that “The teaching that the Church is built on the foundation of present-day apostles and prophets” is “erroneous.” This was reiterated in their General Council of 2000. The denomination declared that the “teaching that present-day offices of apostles and prophets should govern church ministry” is a “departure from Scripture” and a “deviant teaching.”
I cite these criticisms, and I have many more in my files, to raise the question as to whether the current apostolic movement is in danger of sputtering like the last one did. I don’t believe that it will, based on four observations: (1) We have learned from the mistakes of the pioneers, and we are determined not to repeat them. (2) This movement was preceded by the ministry of intercessors and prophets who are now part of its warp and woof. (3) The growing library of substantial books on different aspects of apostolic ministry that began appearing in the late 1990s is highly impressive. These authors are building a solid biblical, historical, and theological foundation for the movement. (4) Apostolic accountability has been heightened by the formation of many units of apostles who are holding themselves responsible to peers for their ministry and their character.
As I see the picture, God has given His church a new wineskin and He will be pouring out new wine into that wineskin for the foreseeable future.