Why Should/Shouldn’t My Church Embrace Change? Part XXVIII
Let’s examine how the teacher, prophet, and apostle can relate to the five fold to bring maturity to individual Christian growth and unity to the Body of Christ. Strong relationships are reciprocal, so lets see what the teacher, prophet, and apostle can give to the others and receive from them and why they need each other.
Teacher/Prophet: If there was ever two giftings that augment each other it is the teacher and the prophet because they both major in the Word of God, Jesus! The teacher’s passion is to study the written Word, the Logos Word, the Bible, which is foundational to everything he does. The prophet’s passion is to live out this written Word through the Rhema Word, the living word. Jesus, God in human flesh, “lived out the Word” because he was the Word. The question for the ages is how do we, as believers in Jesus, live out the Word? The living out the Word is central to the Jewish faith, but it has become legalistic. Man has failed to live out the Logos Word on his own; he needs the living Rhema Word and the Holy Spirit in order to live it out. The teacher and prophet working together is a powerful tool to help believers in Jesus to grow into a “mature” man in the image of Jesus.
Teacher/Apostle: The teacher and apostle can be a great duo as the teacher grounds the Church in foundational truths and the apostle sees the overall picture. The apostle must prevent the teacher from being legalistic or over zealous in his desire to live out the Word. Ask Saul of Tarsus, a Pharisee of Pharisee, taught under leading rabbis of his day, a zealous defender of his Jewish faith and the Torah. Only when he embraced both the written Word, the Torah, and experienced the living Word, Jesus, did he qualify to become an apostle for this new Church. Every teacher develops his own personal theology and methodology, but he needs an apostle to bring simplicity to the gospel. The restoration of the Apostle’s Teaching is mandatory to prevent doctrinal sectarianism that divided the church for so long.
Prophet/Apostle: You are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints, and are of God’s household, having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone, in whom the whole building, being fitted together, is growing into a holy temple in the Lord.” (Ephesians 2:19-21) The believer who sees the Big Picture of the Church as a whole is apostolic, while the believer who yearns to draw nearer to God, who seeks to commune with his God, who listens to the voice of the Holy Spirit is prophetic. What better foundation upon which to build the Church but on the vision of an apostle, the guidance of the Spirit, and Jesus as the cornerstone! The apostolic sees the strength of individual pieces and how they fit together in support and encourage one another. The prophetic hears the voice of God, senses his heart, and always leads himself and others toward Jesus. The two together become foundational.