Much has been made recently, particularly in renewalist circles, about the so-called “five-fold ministries” as described in Ephesians 4:11-13:

And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. (All quotations KJV with some minor updating)

            Many expositors have analyzed and over-analyzed the five types of Christian ministers listed in this passage, and many others have counter-analyzed these analyses until the current state of study of this topic has become for many a confused maze of proof-texts and self-aggrandizements which do not help our understanding at all.  There have also been many good and profitable studies which I do not disparage, yet I see that there are still a few additional points that could and should be made.

The role of the Hebrew Scriptures

            Although the above passage is clearly situated in the New Testament and is given in connection with the Church, the section of the Bible known to Christians as the Old Testament still contains many relevant teachings which can apply easily to these roles.  One of the clearest ways to understand these ministries is to discern the primary intent of God in telling the stories of the patriarchs and prophets, which is summed up in First Corinthians 10:11:

Now all these things happened unto them for examples: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come.

            In the context of this passage, Paul relates how the Israelites had both exercised faith and sinned grievously during the time of their journeys in the wilderness.  The above quoted portion then instructs us of three things: first, that the events actually took place—they are not mere fables or myths, but historical and factual.  Second, we see that they are there for the sake of our learning.  They teach us what to do and what not to do, and how our actions and attitudes can either please or displease God.  The third idea here is that these lessons are all the more important in these last days, therefore we must not ignore history, but apply it to our situation.

            This will lead us to a very profound conclusion—that God performed the events described in the Scriptures to give us a set of living object lessons.  We already know that Jesus always included parables in His teaching sessions, and that this illustrative method has been shown to be effective for everyone from Plato to Homer to Aesop to Shakespeare.  But God actually made the things in the Biblical stories happen so that the reports of the events could be told throughout the times of man and would serve to teach us to be responsible for our actions and live our lives well before Him.  Psalm 102:18 also echoes the same outlook: “This shall be written for the generation to come, and the people which shall be created shall praise the Lord.”  As a principle, this same idea would apply to New Testament characters and their stories as well as those in the Old Testament as models for action and purpose.

I.  Apostles

            The Greek word apostolos unfortunately is one of those words that was not translated but transliterated into English.  There was no direct equivalent, nor was there another term that was acceptably close (at least as far as early English translators were concerned), so the word apostle was coined to fill the need.  The basic sense of the word is someone who is commissioned and sent out to another place to begin a new work, or possibly a continuation of something that may have already begun at another site.  This carries the sense in the business world of an agent for a company who starts a different branch in a new location, or in government of the work of an ambassador or emissary to another country.

            If there is a particular “job description” for this ministry beyond the meaning of the word itself, it would doubtless be the activity of the apostles as described in the book of Acts.  There is a succinct summary of this activity given in Acts 14:21-23:

And when they had preached the gospel to that city, and had taught many, they returned again to Lystra, and Iconium, and Antioch, confirming the souls of the disciples, and exhorting them to continue in the faith, and that we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God. And when they had ordained elders in every church, and had prayed with fasting, they commended them to the Lord, on whom they believed.

            This pointed synopsis of Paul’s work in southern Galatia is not the whole story, but the seven points of preaching, teaching, confirming souls, exhortation, ordaining leadership, prayer (and fasting), and releasing them to the Lord’s purpose will tell us what we need to know.  This is only an outline and not an extensive dissertation; yet it serves well as a starting point for understanding apostolic ministry.

            If there was any Old Testament character who had such a commission it was Abraham.  According to Genesis 12 he was told by God to go to a new country which would be shown to him, where he would then become a mighty nation through which “all families of the earth [shall] be blessed.”  This of course would only apply in the widest possible sense of the term.  Hebrews 11:8-16 draws the parallel in this way:

By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went. By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise: for he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. Through faith also Sarah herself received strength to conceive seed, and was delivered of a child when she was past age, because she judged him faithful who had promised. Therefore sprang there even of one, and him as good as dead, so many as the stars of the sky in multitude, and as the sand which is by the sea shore innumerable. These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country. And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from which they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned. But now they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly, wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them a city.

            This tells how the journey of Abraham in some ways parallels the apostolic directive of being sent by God to fulfill a particular purpose in a new place.  Many other details fall short of the analogy drawn here, but the basic idea stands.

The question of today’s apostles

            If we understand the wider definition of this ministry, we must also understand that many hold to a much narrower one, and this discrepancy is the source of much unnecessary controversy.  Historically, it stems from an idea that dates back to the days of the early church councils as they debated which books of scripture officially belonged in the New Testament collection, known as the canon.  They arrived at the idea that the ones they should hold to be authoritative should be those which could be shown to be the work of the first generation of apostles—those who had known Jesus face to face and could be considered primary sources.  Gradually, the idea of Apostle came to be associated with this additional requirement, and a new term came to be used for those who continued to plant new churches in new territories—missionaries.

            This concept lends itself to much misinterpretation in various ways.  The first and most relevant to our discussion is that it greatly restricts what the word apostle really means.  This is certainly not to say that those first generation apostles were anything less, but that the ministry continued and that more genuine apostles were raised up in the years that followed.  The later generations of apostles (or missionaries, if you must) certainly would not have comparable authority to apply to the area of writing Scripture, particularly because we see evidence in Revelation 22:18 that God “closed the canon” by its writing; in other words, the statement: “If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book” can be inferred to be applicable to the whole of the Bible, and does not allow us to make other writings that could be considered tantamount to those given to us up until then.

            The problem, then, with the idea that only the first century apostles can be called apostles has its basis in the change in how the word was used, not in the nature of the office itself.  How many of the original twelve did not write scripture?  Does Paul count, since his conversion happened after the original twelve had been chosen, and also after the choosing of Matthias as the replacement for Judas just before Pentecost?  These and other questions complicate the issue if we see the narrow definition as the only viable one; the wider, original idea of the meaning of apostle accommodates these potential objections as long as we maintain the understanding that a distinction still exists for the first generation, which can easily be illuminated by a simple maneuver with the first letter of the word.

            For the sake of keeping our semantics clear, let us make a distinction between the Apostles of the first generation and the apostles of the present day.  If we look again at the passage in Acts 14, we can see Apostles (capital A) planting the Church (capital C) during the initial generation, and how, by that example, other apostles (lower case a) are to continue to plant local churches (lower case c).  The first Apostles set the pattern for the churches then and now, and their authority was (and still is) very general over all of them; today’s apostles (call them missionaries if you like) have some local authority in the churches they plant, but it is a transitory covering and is intended to be turned over to the indigenous leadership that the Lord will raise up in due time.  Planting the Church gave the Apostles authority to make written records and instructions for the Church of all of history, but after that time no further writings were needed.  We must therefore trust the leadership of the early Church to determine which of the writings were valid because they knew that the authority of the writings was also the authority of the men who wrote them.  This distinction should help us to keep straight the wide and narrow ideas which apply to our understanding of who Apostles and apostles were and are.

II.  Prophets

            Scripture gives us very little to go on in the New Testament for understanding the role of the prophet.  Acts tells us of Agabus in 11:27-28 and 21:10-11, and of the four daughters of Philip the evangelist in 21:8-9.  Prophecy is also mentioned as a gift of the Spirit in First Corinthians chapters 12 and 14, but has a different contextual use in that section.  There are other references scattered throughout, and we are told of the value of this ministry in several places, but those do little to help us see what that ministry actually does.  For this we need the Hebrew Scriptures’ examples because the idea carries over culturally from there.  Our “job description” comes from Ezekiel 3:16-21 and is repeated and extended in 33:1-9, which is as follows:

Again the word of the LORD came unto me, saying, Son of man, speak to the children of thy people, and say unto them, When I bring the sword upon a land, if the people of the land take a man of their coasts, and set him for their watchman: If when he sees the sword come upon the land, he blows the trumpet, and warns the people; Then whosoever hears the sound of the trumpet, and takes not warning; if the sword come, and take him away, his blood shall be upon his own head. He heard the sound of the trumpet, and took not warning; his blood shall be upon him. But he that takes warning shall deliver his soul. But if the watchman see the sword come, and blow not the trumpet, and the people be not warned; if the sword come, and take any person from among them, he is taken away in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at the watchman's hand. So thou, O son of man, I have set thee a watchman unto the house of Israel; therefore thou shalt hear the word at my mouth, and warn them from me. When I say unto the wicked, O wicked man, thou shalt surely die; if thou dost not speak to warn the wicked from his way, that wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at thine hand. Nevertheless, if thou warn the wicked of his way to turn from it; if he does not turn from his way, he shall die in his iniquity; but thou hast delivered thy soul.

            From this it is easy to see how the prophet is as a town crier, burdened with a great responsibility to give warning of things he sees coming.  The weight of that duty is expressed in this manner by Amos: “The lion hath roared, who will not fear?  The Lord GOD hath spoken, who can but prophesy?”  This sense of urgency serves the prophet as a confirmation that the word received is a word from God.  A common thread of the prophetic ministry that runs through both the Old and New Testaments is the burden to speak authoritatively and accurately that received word.

            Again, we have a word before us that was not translated, but transliterated.  The Greek prophetes means to “speak forth” or to say outwardly whatever has been put within you.  And again, like apostle above, it can be subject to a wide range of definitions due to the general nature of the source word; yet here we can easily get into trouble if we allow the widest possible definition without at least some restrictions of its meaning if for no other reason than that of clarity.  First we need to maintain that the message that is spoken forth has its source in God, because this is the consistent example of its historical and Biblical usage.  However, we need not assert that the message must necessarily be futuristic, since there are several examples that the revelation of a prophet can be about events already past, such as Nathan’s disclosure to King David concerning his affair with Bathsheba (many teachers distinguish between “foretelling” and “forthtelling” prophecies).  We also do not need to consider an utterance to be prophetic only if it is direct, that is, if it is being spoken forth at the very time it is being revealed to the prophet; there are times in scripture when a message is not to be given out until it can be written down or perhaps delivered to a group or an individual.

            Another similarity with the term apostle is the question which arises about its applicability for today.  If we accept the statements in the above paragraph as a norm we have a wide enough definition which could be applicable in today’s Church.  If we insist on prophecy being future-oriented only, we minimize it significantly.  An even greater restriction is applied when a cessationist theory is invoked, which states that the gift of prophecy was one which ceased to function at the end of the apostolic age, allegedly because it was no longer needed.  Cessationism places unnecessary limitations on this and other functions of church ministry with its “God doesn’t do it like that these days” attitude.

            As for the consideration of the validity of the prophet and the message, the book of Deuteronomy plainly instructs that if a prophet speaks and his words do not “come to pass,” his ministry is not legitimate.  This is true, but there is more to the story.  Some prophecies are for a point so far into the future that the speaker need not worry about facing any judgment for his sayings.  We also are warned in Deuteronomy that false prophets are capable of fake signs and wonders, therefore such tricks in themselves are insufficient for judging the soundness of the messenger.  In the New Testament we are given a picture of church worship in I Corinthians 14:29 which says that when prophets speak, let the others judge; this apparently happened on the spot without waiting for a future fulfillment, and thus it would apply to all messages.

III.  Evangelists

            The word evangelist simply means “a bearer and/or proclaimer of good news;” historically, since we have here yet another transliteration, this “good news” is defined as the Gospel.  The activity of proclaiming the Gospel is certainly not limited to specialists in this area, since there are many places in Scripture which refer to this proclamation being given by all Christians and also by the Church as a whole when it acts in unity and love.

            Much study has rightfully been done about Philip as a functioning evangelist as described in Acts chapter eight.  We see him with both a large number of people and with a single individual, and we see the extent and limitations of his ministry.  There are other New Testament examples as well, including Jesus with the woman of Samaria and Paul evangelizing many cities during his apostolic journeys.  But there was much good news proclaimed in Israel from time to time even before the days of Jesus.

            During the reign of King Jehoram the son of Ahab, a story is related in II Kings chapter 7 about God’s deliverance from a famine in Samaria.  They had been in a state of famine for a very long time, and now the Israelites were in dire straits.  To make matters worse, the Syrian army had made their camp nearby and was planning to attack and conquer the weakened region of Samaria.  Four men with leprosy decided to go to the Syrians and surrender themselves, reasoning that if they did so they might receive mercy, but that there would certainly be no hope of surviving if they stayed in famine-ravaged Samaria.  When they arrived at the camp, they discovered that it had been abandoned and that all the food and supplies that the Syrians had brought was left behind.  They joyfully helped themselves to all that they wanted, then they went back to the gate of Samaria and told the gatekeeper.  After checking out their story thoroughly, all the Israelites partook of the booty that God had provided for them supernaturally.

            These four lepers were evangelists in the best sense of the word.  They began as hopeless men bound for death until they partook in a great deliverance from God.  After they had been filled, they told others of their bounty.  These others were skeptical at first, but soon all were taking part in the blessing.  The lepers were proclaiming a great deliverance from famine and poverty, which was undoubtedly very good news to the hapless Israelites.  In our endeavors to spread the Gospel, let us remember that our attitude must be as that of one beggar telling another beggar where to find bread.

IV.  Pastors

            Finally we have a word that is not a mere transliteration from Greek; the English term is taken from the Latin word for shepherd, and the related Greek term poimen is unusually direct in its meaning.  Jesus refers to Himself as the Good Shepherd in chapter ten of John’s Gospel, who would lay down his life for the sheep; but God still calls others to act in the role of shepherd to a local flock.  Interestingly, to find out more of the details about the requirements for fulfilling such a job description, we can look at a passage describing things that God will chasten a shepherd for not doing.  The prophet Ezekiel in chapter 34:2-16 gives it this way:

Woe be to the shepherds of Israel that do feed themselves! Should not the shepherds feed the flocks? Ye eat the fat, and ye clothe you with the wool, ye kill them that are fed: but ye feed not the flock  The diseased have ye not strengthened, neither have ye healed that which was sick, neither have ye bound up that which was broken, neither have ye brought again that which was driven away, neither have ye sought that which was lost; but with force and with cruelty have ye ruled them. And they were scattered, because there is no shepherd: and they became meat to all the beasts of the field when they were scattered. My sheep wandered through all the mountains, and upon every high hill: yea, my flock was scattered upon all the face of the earth, and none did search or seek after them.

Therefore, ye shepherds, hear the word of the LORD; as I live, saith the Lord GOD, surely because my flock became a prey, and my flock became meat to every beast of the field, because there was no shepherd, neither did my shepherds search for my flock, but the shepherds fed themselves, and fed not my flock; therefore, O ye shepherds, hear the word of the LORD; thus saith the Lord GOD; behold, I am against the shepherds; and I will require my flock at their hand, and cause them to cease from feeding the flock; neither shall the shepherds feed themselves any more; for I will deliver my flock from their mouth, that they may not be meat for them. For thus saith the Lord GOD; behold, I, even I, will both search my sheep, and seek them out. As a shepherd seeketh out his flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered; so will I seek out my sheep, and will deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day. And I will bring them out from the people, and gather them from the countries, and will bring them to their own land, and feed them upon the mountains of Israel by the rivers, and in all the inhabited places of the country. I will feed them in a good pasture, and upon the high mountains of Israel shall their fold be: there shall they lie in a good fold, and in a fat pasture shall they feed upon the mountains of Israel. I will feed my flock, and I will cause them to lie down, saith the Lord GOD. I will seek that which was lost, and bring again that which was driven away, and will bind up that which was broken, and will strengthen that which was sick.

            Here we see several aspects of the work of a shepherd.  They must feed the sheep, administer healing to any who are diseased or sick in some way, bind the injuries of the ones who are wounded, seek the lost, and keep the flock together and safe from predators.  Therefore, like the apostle, the pastor is a “package deal.”  Teaching is only the beginning—correcting a troublemaker, rebuking a wolf in sheep’s clothing or bringing repair to a damaged soul is often a necessity.  Most pastors will be called upon to give basic counsel even if their training is limited; not all earthly shepherds have a veterinary degree, although occasionally they must perform first aid on an injured sheep.  And even though a pastor is not the same as an evangelist, there is still the responsibility to seek the lost and those who have strayed away, just as Timothy was to “do the work of an evangelist” as instructed in Second Timothy 4:5.

            Several other Scripture passages are classics for learning about the function of the shepherd, including the “pastoral epistles” (I & II Timothy and Titus).  Moses and David spent much time tending sheep in their early careers, as did Amos; however, their biographies provide little in helping us understand their role as shepherds but much about how their duty to the flocks made them into the leaders of men that they became.  And finally, let us not forget Psalm 23, which depicts our Lord fulfilling all of these aspects in our lives and then some.

The Granville Sharp rule

            Granville Sharp (1735-1813) was a British abolitionist and self-taught Greek scholar who in 1798 proposed a principle of translation which has come to be known by his name.  According to this rule, if two Greek nouns are preceded by a definite article and separated by only the word kai (which means and), they should be understood to refer to the same person or thing.  For example, by this rule Titus 2:13 would not end by saying “the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ,” but instead “our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.”  Theologically in this passage, either rendering is possible and explicable by appealing to the doctrine of the Trinity.

            But a problem arises when one applies this principle to our text from Ephesians, rendering the end of verse 11 as “pastor-teacher.”  As we have seen above, the ministry of a pastor involves more than simply teaching or “feeding the flock;” there are other “people-person” skills implicated.  Upon closer examination, the definite article used (tou) appears to have a different grammatical function in the two passages: in the example from Titus it is in the genitive case implying a possessive use, but in Ephesians it is in the accusative case indicating a direct object is to follow, and also carries an adjectival function denoting that the object is a descriptive one (this grammatical analysis is adapted from the Analytical Greek New Testament edited by Barbara Friberg and Timothy Friberg—for the full citation, see the link below to the citations page and then scroll down to: “Cited on the References and Tools page”).  This distinction is perhaps somewhat trivial, but it raises a fair question about the across-the-board applicability of Granville Sharp’s rule.  As far as I can tell, modern Greek does not hold to this rule of translation in such cases either.

            Rather than getting tripped up on minute points of grammar, it is generally wiser to let the larger context govern the direction of our studies and bring us to the general conclusions that the Scriptures put forth.  The implication that pastor and teacher are roughly synonymous too greatly narrows the extent of the pastoral ministry.  Another argument might be that the idea of combining these actually expands the teacher’s role to a larger one, but as we are about to see, the task of teaching does not necessarily encompass everything that a pastor might be called upon to do.  To borrow from the language of mathematics, teaching ministry is a subset of the pastoral ministry, but it is not the sum total.  Therefore we must take issue with those who invoke the Granville Sharp rule in an attempt to misinterpret these roles, regardless of how it may or may not apply elsewhere.

V.  Teachers

            Some have questioned the necessity for any sort of teaching ministry directed toward New Testament believers, citing First John 2:27: “But the anointing which ye have received of him abideth in you, and ye need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in him.” and John’s Gospel 16:13: “When He, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth …”  Yet the teaching ministry is called forth, not only in our text in Ephesians, but in other places such as First Corinthians 12:28-29, Romans 12:7, and Second Timothy 1:11.

            This seeming paradox is easily resolved when the role of the teacher is clearly expounded from the example of Ezra.  It is true that only the Holy Spirit can bring our hearts to a full understanding of spiritual truth, but the information that He uses for this purpose very often comes through human agency.  In other words, people can put facts into the mind, but the Spirit—and only the Spirit—can illuminate their application to the inner man.  Ezra’s role in this process is illustrated to us in two places, Nehemiah 8:1-3,7-8 and Ezra 7:10:

And all the people gathered themselves together as one man into the street that was before the water gate; and they spoke unto Ezra the scribe to bring the book of the law of Moses, which the LORD had commanded to Israel. And Ezra the priest brought the law before the congregation both of men and women, and all that could hear with understanding, upon the first day of the seventh month. And he read therein before the street that was before the water gate from the morning until midday, before the men and the women, and those that could understand; and the ears of all the people were attentive unto the book of the law.  … [He] and the Levites, caused the people to understand the law: and the people stood in their place. So they read in the book in the law of God distinctly, and gave the sense, and caused them to understand the reading.

            For Ezra had prepared his heart to seek the law of the LORD, and to do it, and to teach in Israel statutes and judgments.

            Ezra’s instructive function is spelled out here, as well as his attitude toward the personal example he would be setting.  His concern for showing integrity when it came to living the law just as he taught the law is obvious from this, and such integrity must be our paradigm as well.

            It is true with any teaching ministry that a living example is the most effective way to bring truth to another person.  Ezra’s intention was to do exactly that—for he knew that before any truth can be passed on, it first must be acquired through diligent study and then set forth by illustration in real life.  Only then could he consider himself qualified to share his knowledge, because from that point it was up to the Holy Spirit to cause the hearers to gain the understanding deep within their hearts and begin to apply the things they had both heard and seen.  Ezra’s next concern became that of knowing how to apply his skills in communicating that knowledge so that his audience could really get the point when he and his colleagues “gave the sense.”

Living object lessons