02 What Qualifies an Apostle?

So welcome back to the middle of our conversation, where we are talking about apostles today and understanding apostles in general. Mike, you had previously mentioned something about the church age, and maybe it takes me to another question where I'd like to know around what qualifies, or who qualifies, an apostle. What are the qualifications of an apostle?

I think one of the things that you were mentioning is that if we look at Scripture, there is so much of the apostle that's mentioned in the New Testament, and it comes after the church and after the Ascension—after the Ascension and into the church age, where churches are planted and started. And so it feels like something around churches and apostles go hand in hand.

But then we also see that there is, you know, if you look at the world around, guys, there's just, “I'm an apostle. You're an apostle. She's an apostle. He's an apostle.” So maybe you guys can help with some clarity around that. What are these qualifications? Do you just wake up one morning and feel it? Or literally, some people are like, “I had a dream, like Paul had a dream, where Jesus appeared to me, and now therefore I'm an apostle.” So what do—how do we find this?

Yes. In the qualifications of an apostle?

Qualifications of the Twelve Apostles

Yes. Well, let's start with the most clarity we've got, which is, if we've made a distinction that the same gift was applied differently, in that same way there were qualifications for the Twelve that were specific. If you remember, when they replaced Judas with Matthias, they said it must be someone who's been with us from the beginning of Jesus' ministry. You could not have joined the Twelve unless you'd been there the entire time Jesus ministered.

So that's important to understand. Then we've got to ask ourselves, is it fair to say that that qualification for them is not required of the same gift with a different function? I would say yes, in the same way that a prophet under the Old Covenant, if you got a prophecy wrong, you were put to death. Sure. And in the New Covenant, you got the same gift, but your qualification is different. If you get a prophecy wrong, well, the church is just told to test your prophecy. And if you get it wrong, well, it's not good, but you're not put to death.

So I think we could make the case that the qualifications are different according to the difference of the function and the way the church needs the apostle, and certainly from the Twelve. So the Twelve had a very specific set of stipulations, and the apostle today does not have to, for example, have seen the risen Jesus face-to-face or have been with Him in His ministry. It wouldn't be possible. You'd be very old if that was the case.

So I think if we can just start there to say that that would be important to understand, that would be helpful to us.

Yeah, that's amazing. And then, so maybe drilling deeper, then, what are the qualifications?

Biblical Qualifications for Apostolic Authority

Well, there's debate over how many qualifications there are. I think the ones that are most accepted, in my understanding, would be having seen the risen Christ or being an eyewitness of Jesus. And Paul definitely uses that, even though he didn't walk with Jesus, but he uses that as a basis for his apostolic authority—the fact that Christ appeared to him after He was resurrected, or after the Ascension. I mean, Jesus appeared to him.

And I think, in 1 Corinthians 9:1, he says, “Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Christ?” et cetera. So he uses that as the basis of his apostolic authority.

Modern objections would say, “But unless you've had Christ appear to you to call you sovereignly, you can't be an apostle.” But I think what Shan is saying is, if we understand it to be possibly a different category of apostle, especially with Paul's type of authority—for example, when the other lists of apostles are given, as we mentioned earlier, Ephesians 4 and 1 Corinthians 12:28, it never mentions that these gifts have to have certain qualifications.

Obviously, the defining factors—they're called by the Lord, and there is an evidence to that, which we'll look at later. But even with the others that I mentioned—Barnabas, Timothy, Silvanus—it's never mentioned that they saw the Lord or moved necessarily in His power the way the Twelve did, or that the Lord appeared to them to call them to be apostles.

Apostolic Fruit: Pioneering Churches and New Territories

But it was in their ministry, it was in their apostolic ministry, that they demonstrate the grace of God and they demonstrate the ability to break into new places with the gospel, into new cities, into new territories, to pioneer churches, et cetera. And I think that's the qualifying factor for the apostle today, is the fruit of ministry.

One of the mistakes we make is we think that the way we identify the ministry is just by the word, but it's actually supposed to be by the fruit of that ministry. And the apostle is going to have fruit that looks like pioneering new places, breaking into new cities, establishing churches, raising up leaders, et cetera. And we know where there's fruit, there's a gift, and that gift is what we call an apostle.

But let's take the scenario, then, of a person that's in a church that's never planted a church, has never started anything, but they believe they've been called an apostle. I mean, I think many people would say that. I remember in 1 Corinthians 9, when Paul says, “Aren't you the fruit of my ministry?” And I think one of the most defining characteristics for an apostle is there has to be some fruit. And it tends to be churches, and there are other kinds of fruit that can happen in ministry as well that we see in the New Testament, but generally there should be some kind of fruit that you can point to and say, “This is the grace of God working in my life to enable me to do this.”

And when we look at the apostolic gift and how it equips the rest of the body of Christ, there are a lot of things that can happen around an apostolic function. It can be writing books and literally changing the way people think. It could be someone like a John Maxwell, who he's not necessarily a pastor of a church or a church planter, but he has apostolic authority to be able to teach God's people in such a way that it brings liberty and establishes them, et cetera. So there could be these other applications.

So when someone says that they're an apostle, I would ask, “What is the evidence? What is the fruit of that ministry?” And when we look to Paul's ministry, especially in the book of Acts, from the point of his conversion, God speaks to Ananias and says, “I've chosen him as a chosen vessel to bring My gospel before kings and magistrates, and he's going to be My apostle to the Gentiles.”

So when you look at Paul's life from the time of his conversion all the way through the book of Acts, you have these cycles where he's sent to a place, and he's establishing new groups of believers, new churches, new communities, and he's bringing the gospel to places that it's never been before. And it's a cycle you see happening again and again through the book of Acts.

So there's just some really clear evidence. And even when Paul is defending his apostleship to the Corinthians, he says, “I've done the works of an apostle among you,” and he lists out all the fruit and all the things that he's done to demonstrate that. So I would just say, look for the evidence.

Self-Examination and Evidence of Apostolic Ministry

Well, and we should be looking for the evidence in ourselves, too, because this isn't just—you shouldn't just be showing up and saying, “Hey, I'm an apostle. Look at the fruit.” This ministry doesn't work without you individually doing your own homework and self-examination, and really looking and saying, “What am I producing? What am I doing?”

And we understand that each gift has a unique fruit, and we need to make sure that the fruit of our life is testifying to the gift that we're claiming.

Amen.

Seeing the Risen Christ and Signs of an Apostle

The signs and wonders definitely not some of them that maybe is given. There's a—if I can carry on—there's an interesting scripture in 1 Corinthians 15 where Paul speaks about, in verse 7, the same idea of seeing Christ. And he says, then in verse 7, He appeared—Jesus appeared—to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all, as to one untimely born, He appeared to me.

And some would say, well, that means it's clear that Paul understood that he was the last of the apostles and he was the last to see the risen Christ. Therefore, he's qualified to be an apostle, but that doesn't happen today. Um, but if we understand that he was the last of a particular group that would have seen the risen Christ and experienced that, and then you've got a new group—these post-Ascension—then I think it's quite easy to land at that. That's not necessarily a qualification for today.

Does the Lord appear today? That's—you know, yes. Can He appear? Yes. Has He appeared to individuals? Yes, because we are serving the living God. So I think when it comes to signs and wonders, we can also—that's the other qualification that's often given of an apostle. You know, 2 Corinthians 12:12 says, “The signs,” Paul writes again, “the signs of a true apostle were performed among you with utmost patience, with signs and wonders and mighty works.” And so, you know, some would say, therefore, you have to be moving in significant miraculous gifts to be considered an apostle today, which would validate your ministry.

But again, if you understand that the Twelve—and they were carrying something unique into the foundation of the church as a one-off—then their ministry had to be validated in a way that's probably not necessary today. So Mike referenced 2 Corinthians 12:12, where Paul says, “I persevered in demonstrating among you marks of a true apostle, including signs, wonders, and miracles.”

I think when we read this, we should understand that to build a theology around one line of scripture is something we must be very careful of. And what some people might interpret that as is, if you don't have signs, wonders, and miracles in your ministry, you clearly don't have an apostolic gifting, or you're not an apostle.

I think if we just look at it, Paul actually seems to be saying that he demonstrated the marks of a true apostle, and also there were signs, wonders, and miracles in his ministry. He's building the case for his apostleship with these Corinthians, but he's not saying, because I demonstrated signs and wonders and miracles, you guys must accept me as an apostle. He's saying, now, I did also have these things, but it was in addition to demonstrating the true marks of an apostle.

It's one line. We don't have other scripture to reference it with, necessarily. We have his letters to his apostles that he released, and he doesn't mention in any of his letters to them them demonstrating signs, wonders, and miracles as a sign of their own authority to do those things.

So I do think there's more than one way to read that line of scripture. We should be careful of just having a single way of looking at it, and it means this.

Yeah, so basically saying, then, it was characteristic of his ministry. It wasn't a qualifying factor of his ministry. And for apostles, in light of those other scriptures, that it's not a qualification for an apostle, but it does characterize some types of apostles—definitely the Twelve and Paul. Paul definitely puts himself, in some ways, into that category if you read 1 Corinthians 15, as one having seen the Lord. So, but definitely a characteristic rather than a qualifying factor.

What Qualifies Someone to Be an Apostle?

What does that look like in terms of qualifications? Is there a checklist? What are people looking for? What are the apostles looking for? What is the Lord looking for that qualifies somebody to be an apostle?

Well, you look at 1 Corinthians 12:28. It says, “And God appointed first apostles, second prophets, third teachers.” So that sovereign aspect is clear. I think we have to be very careful to say, well, you know, we can just simply choose to be what we believe we can be, because, um—and we are an age—Sean and I were talking about it earlier today—that we live in an age where people feel like they can just pick and choose what they feel they want to be, you know. And that's the problem of the self-appointed prophet.

Self-appointed apostle, but it's very clear from Scripture that the apostles were sovereignly called by God. And I remember Michael Eaton, the great Bible teacher who very much believed in modern apostles, using the illustration from the Book of Judges and how judges would appear on the scene. They would appear on the scene to lead the people of Israel in certain areas. They weren't necessarily set apart as they were sovereignly given to the people as a gift from God. They were raised up, and there was influence, and the people recognized that. But I think that's an important qualification, so to speak: that it comes from God.

I feel like I can see in Paul two things that he does. He appeals to his own commissioning by Jesus Himself. So he's got that deep revelation, in a sense. That's the beginning of the call: it's that he feels the Lord has done it. But then he has to also appeal to the work of his hands. He would say something like 1 Corinthians 9:1-3. He goes, “Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are you not the result of my work in the Lord? You are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord.” And then verse 3, he says this: “This is my defense to those who sit in judgment on me.”

And so Paul, he not only lands in what's happened inside his own heart and his own mind and his own encounter with the Lord; he takes it into something objective in terms of the work that he's done and the fruit that it's borne. And he lets them think about it themselves: “Is this legitimate? We'll ask yourselves. You are the seal of what I've done.”

And I think we've got to—anybody who is going to be considered an apostle today, as we believe people should be—they must reckon with both of those. They must reckon with the call of God that comes first, precedes everything, but there has to be fruit. If there's not, you're just left with something inside your own mind, which I fear is where many people are today. Many people consider themselves apostles, and it's actually mainly in their minds.

You couldn't just have good standing with people without a call from God, and you couldn't have a call from God without good standing and growth and life and something trailing behind you that proves it. You've got to have both.

The Apostolic Call Requires Prayer and Recognition

Mm, that's really good, and I think that's helpful because it starts to nail it down to, like, actually, these are things. I mean, even in Acts 13, the thing I find is so funny: it said, “The Holy Spirit said, ‘Set apart for Me,’” and then they still said, after more prayer and fasting—it was like it's such a serious issue that even after they hear the Holy Spirit say, they still pray and fast more.

And I think one thing for me is what you're exactly saying: it's almost like the process of becoming an apostle—it's a process. It's not a moment. There is this, like, you grow into it. You've gone to apostle school.

Yeah, you don't get a certificate, and today you weren't one and tomorrow you are. But actually, you start to have this track record of what you've been building and doing, and others start to acknowledge what God is doing in your life and through you. And I think that's what is part of the qualification of being an apostle.

And I would say that it's possibly the Lord has done it like this because the margins are fine. If you're going to carry an apostolic gifting on your life, your ability to do damage is quite strong. And so there needs to be a time period. There needs to be a proving. And you've mentioned, you know, yesterday you went a deacon, today you're a deacon. Yesterday you went an elder, today you've had hands laid on you and released into that. An apostle's different because, in a sense, we can't mess around with it, if I can use that type of language. It must be proven, and there must be a track record of actual legitimate impact through that gift.

How Apostolic Qualifications Work in Practice

Yeah, so then I think a big part of this for me, which in our conversation of understanding the apostle would be, in our context, what qualifies an apostle, and how do we see that working out?

Yeah, let's get down to the nitty-gritty of these things, so to speak, of how it works in practice. And again, we want to try and use Scripture as a reference in this. But I think, as a movement, as Four12, in qualifications—

For Apostles, it would be number one, as I mentioned. I think that there’s an—obviously called by God—but that can be very subjective, so a clear sense that God has appointed. But in reality, the way they would work itself out, I think we’d look, number one, to make sure that they are—they’re an elder in a congregation. It’s not a pre—you know, again, scripturally, there’s room for an individual not to be an elder, but then you look at Peter in 1 Peter 5:1, where Peter says to the church, “I, Peter, a fellow elder.” So it’s definitely preferable to be an elder, and especially, I would say, in our context, to have led a work before being recognized as an Apostle, but led a work where there’s fruit to raising up leaders and planting churches from you, where there’s evidence of sending others out to plant and being sent. In that sense, there’s that Apostolic Grace to do that.

Apostolic Grace: Loving the Nations and Raising Leaders

It’s interesting, Terry Virgo—they once asked him, like, what, for you, if you have to describe the five-fold gifts, five-fold offices, how would you describe them? And he said that, well, you know, you have the pastor—he characterizes loving people. You have the Evangelist—he characterizes loving the lost. You have the teacher—he said, recognizes loving books, hopefully more than that for us. Then he mentioned the prophet, loving vision. And he said, but what marks out an apostle is someone who loves the Nations. And I love that because it, in a sense, I think we would recognize individuals, and we’ll look at how that works itself out, but in terms of that, there’s an ability to inspire people. They’re seeing the bigger picture, and the church they have led and the work they’ve led, the influence they have, is fruit of going into the Nations, sending and being sent, so to speak, is very important.

Part of that, yeah, there was a movie years ago called The Apostle. It was—it wasn’t a Christian movie, but in it, a man basically appointed himself an apostle in his own mind, and he was a criminal. Baptized himself—he baptized himself. I think that’s many people’s worst fear, is, okay, are we going to just have a bunch of subjective Revelations that are just inside someone’s own heart and mind? And so it always must go hand in hand. The Revelation is legitimate and valid, but it must go hand in hand with something provable, a trail of works that follow.

Then the question becomes, well, what validates a person who has an Apostolic call on their life? Is it the size of the church they lead? Is it power meetings? It would have to be something like holistic church health, where what is in the New Testament is evident in what someone has built. So I would think that would be important. It would go hand in hand. You wouldn’t just have someone saying, “I’m apostolical. I’m an apostle. Recognize me.” They would be able to point to their own call, and people around them would be able to look and see that what they have been walking in and what they are walking in and building can actually stand the test of the whole of Scripture, of every part of what it means to be a healthy church.

Yeah, and I think for you guys, it would be lovely for you to join the conversation as we take it further. We’ve talked about one of the qualifications is almost being recognized, and how do we recognize these people, and who recognizes them? And so we will see you on the next episode.