APOSTLES AND GIFTS

APOSTLES & GIFTS
Apostolic Age and Gifts of the Spirit

Let's start with the reason for the various callings by God and the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Ephesians 4:1 begins with Paul beseeching us to walk worthy of our calling.

Beseech [Greek 'parakaleo'] is 'to call to one's side' or 'to call to one's aid'. Since Paul was in prison at the time, a house arrest actually, and due to his wording, he wasn't asking for his brethren's aid. He was encouraging them, and us.

Vocation is from the Greek klesis, 'a calling'. The word call comes from various Greek roots, the meaning, as with many words, being dependent upon the context in which it is placed. In this case it means, firstly, God's call to us to become believers in the first place. That is every believer's first priority, because if we don't tend to our personal salvation as a priority, we can lead others to Christ yet be cast off ourselves [Philippians 3:11-16, I Corinthians 9:27].

Castaway corresponds with the Greek aporipto, meaning 'to cast off', as people casting themselves into the water from a sinking, doomed ship. A ship, or ark, signifies the saving grace of God, whereas water in this context corresponds with sea, or the world and it's ungodly ways [see Revelation 13:1 and Jonah 1:11-15]. This means either giving up and throwing ourselves back into the sinful ways either willfully or by our inattentiveness to our salvation [Hebrews 2:3,12:1-17,25], or by letting the problems in life do it to us as well.

The very root of castaway is the Greek adokimos, meaning 'not standing the test,rejected. Jesus plainly tells us that there will be those who have done many mighty works in His name, yet will be castaways [Matthew 7:23]. So it is priority to keep ourselves right in God's eyes first and foremost. I will also add that if a person strays from the Lord, their gifts will wane and will eventually be unusable to that person. Note that the gifts are ALWAYS subject to the Father's bidding, and cannot be invoked by the possessor of the gift.

We are given, let's say, various measures of the gift of grace, according to what our mission is for Jesus Christ's work [Ephesians 4:7]. Some of the various callings are apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers. These callings are for the perfecting of the saints, and other work of the ministry, to edify [oikodomeo-to build] the body (church) of Christ [Ephesians 4:11,12]. And how long are these callings for? They are until believers come into the unity of the faith[Ephesians 4:13] and the knowledge of Christ, to a perfect church.

As long as the church is present on earth [II Thessalonians 2:7], there will be people being converted and growing in the Lord. As long as that is happening, there will be needs for all of God's callings.

Some say that there are no more apostles, because that calling ended with the demise of the original apostles. Let's look into that more deeply, but first, one question, why would the Lord dispense with one particular calling, yet retain the rest of them. If we build a house, are we going to get rid of one or two particular tools? No, we're going to keep them for future use, because you never know when you or someone else may need them.

Apostle is from the Greek apostolos [one sent forth], such as the original twelve, and Paul, plus a few others such as Barnabas [Acts 13:50, 14:4,14]. An apostle doesn't mean an eyewitness of Jesus Christ on earth, because thousands seen him on earth before the crucifixion, and over 500 seen Him after He was resurrected [I Corinthians 15:6].

We have no evidence that Paul ever seen Jesus while He was on earth. It is very clear that Paul was converted and called by Jesus well after the crucifixion, resurrection and ascension [Acts 9:1-18, 15:8]. Note also that it is probable that Paul [formerly Saul] received the Holy Ghost before being baptized in water [Acts 9:17,18].

From these verses, we see that being a physical eyewitness of Jesus Christ on earth of itself does not make one an apostle; that an apostle is one sent forth by Jesus Christ, and; being sent forth does not have to be while Christ was on earth in a physical form.

Others say that the original apostles passed down the apostleship and spiritual gifts to whom they would, and that the “line” has likely been broken. I find no scripture to support that thought, but rather to the contrary, for a number of reasons.

It was 17 years after conversion before Paul sought, or received, the right hand of fellowship from the other apostles [Galatians 1:15-2:1,2,7-9]. It's likely that Paul spent a great deal of those 17 years praying, studying and learning from God through the Holy Spirit, though he did do some, if not a great deal, of preaching during that time, and he was called an apostle because Christ called him to be, not because man finally did [Galatians 1:12].

It's unlikely that even the apostles themselves were given the authority by Christ to choose someone to be an apostle. When deciding on one to replace Judas Iscariot, the apostles cast lots after praying, leaving it in the hands of God to choose an apostle to replace Judas [Acts 1:21-26]. Only God truly knows the heart [Jeremiah 17:9,10].

Referring again to Ephesians 4:7, it is the Lord alone who gives grace, and measures it out to each person as he sees fit. Only God can know what gift(s) each person needs and can be trusted with completely, and only God can give spiritual things to anybody. As powerful as Elijah was, he was not apparently able to bestow a double portion of his spirit upon Elisha. Instead, I believe he prayed the Lord to, if He would, and could only leave it in His hands [II Kings 2:9,10].

There is no scripture to indicate that anyone but God or Christ can make the final determination as to who is proclaimed an apostle. And it is evident that, as Paul was called to be an apostle by Christ well after the ascension, no scripture indicates that Christ doesn't call others in the same manner. I don't know any personally, but have read of a few, a very few, throughout the ages who have been said to have been an apostle.

There are scripture references which illustrate that only God can decide on spiritual matters [Ecclesiastes 8:8], and that God giveth the Holy Spirit without measure to people He sends forth [John 3:34, man added the words unto him, making it seem like only Jesus had the Spirit without measure]. This is reinforced by Jesus saying to believers, that what He did while on earth, we will do also [John 14:12].

It is God and the Holy Spirit alone who bestow spiritual gifts upon believers, as they choose, not as man chooses [I Corinthians 12:5-11, Acts 3:12]. The believers are simply the vessel through whom God works. It is also God who chooses who the apostles, prophets, teachers are and who has what gift. It is unfortunate that many churches choose people for reasons other than the spiritual gifts, such as solely on intellectual grounds [I Corinthians 12:28-31].

Paul tells all believers to yearn for spiritual gifts. And though he talks of imparting a spiritual gift upon believers [Romans 1:11], gift here means “that which is imparted through human instruction”, not a spiritual gift, which man is not capable of bestowing upon someone. That is only able to be done by God and Christ, the Holy Spirit doing the actual work now. A believer with the gift of healing can heal someone supernaturally, yet it is God doing it, not the person with the gift [James 1:17].

All throughout chapter 14 of I Corinthians, Paul tells us what the spiritual gifts are for: to edify, exhort and comfort. To those who say the gifts are no longer needed, I ask them, do you and others no longer need edified, exhorted and comforted?

To quench the spiritual gifts is to quench the Holy Spirit which, ultimately, will lead to blasphemy of the Holy Ghost, an unpardonable sin [I Thessalonians 5:19, I John 5:16, Matthew 12:31,32]. Sadly, much of the church has quenched and blasphemed their way into nothing more than an intellectual state of being [Romans 1:18-22, Malachi 3:15], which is really an advanced state of Judaism [Galatians 3:2,3].

The greatest work of the Holy Ghost is the cleansing and regeneration of the heart. The gifts of the spirit are not to be gloried in, simply used as a means to an end, such as tools are used to restore a car. We don't glory in the tool, but rather in the restored auto.

People often ascribe a bit more power to the apostles than what they actually had, citing John 20:23 as the basis for a man, or men, deciding who will be forgiven sins, which is putting a man in the place of God, which is blasphemy and the same sin that lucifer committed [Isaiah 14:12-19]. No one can forgive sins, or hold sins against a person except God, Christ and the Holy Ghost.

Remit in the above verse is from the Greek aphiemi, 'to send away', but not absolution on the part of any man. According to Vine's, “scripture makes it clear that the Lord's words were not intended to bestow the exercise of absolution, which scripture declares is the prerogative of God alone. There is no instance in the N.T. Of this act on the part of the apostles. The words are to be understood in a “declarative” sense; the statement has regard to the effects of their ministry of the Gospel...They could not, nor could [or can] anyone, forgive sins, any more than that Joseph actually restored the butler to his office and hanged the baker [Genesis 41:13], or any more than the prophets actually accomplished things when they declared that they were about to be done [Jeremiah 1:10, Ezekiel 43:3]”.

Throughout generations, a lot of wolves in sheep's clothing have crept in to the church, the seminaries and such, and perverted the Gospel, thus the ministry, for earthly gain. They have watered down the professed Gospel, and have not the Holy Spirit nor the love of God [Jude, I Timothy 6:5].

I have personally seen every gift used, and have experienced some. The gifts of the Holy Spirit are still available, in use and will be as long as the church is on earth, that is, the believers, which is the church. People who quench the gifts and declare that they are no longer available, either are simply ignorant of the truth, maybe afraid of the gifts due to false doctrine, some are a wolf in sheep's clothing, attempting to destroy the faith of all they can and have the wrong spirit, the spirit of antiChrist [anti means against or instead of] [II Timothy 3:5, Proverbs 30:8,9, Zechariah 4:6, Proverbs 3:27, Acts 1:8, Luke 19:11-27, Hebrews 10:38,39, 4:1,2, 10:19-36, 12:15,25, 2:1-4].

We do need to be careful when seeking spiritual gifts, because satan has a counterfeit of God's things, such as the magicians of Egypt could duplicate some of the spiritual works that God did by the hand of Moses [Exodus chapters 7-9].

FOR A MORE DETAILED ACCOUNT OF THE HOLY SPIRIT'S GIFTS, SEE 'GIFTS OF THE HOLY GHOST: ARE THEY STILL NEEDED AND AVAILABLE?'

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