Saturday 25 June 2011

An excellent wife is forged not found (Resurgence Post)

This post is taken from the Resurgence blog. You can read the post here.


An Excellent Wife Is Forged, Not Found

Jennifer Smidt » God Scripture Family Marriage Complementarian Gospel
An excellent wife who can find? She is far more precious than jewels. – Proverbs 31:10
I often believe my husband has not found an excellent wife. When he tells me I have been short with him lately, overreacting and snapping unnecessarily, I am discouraged at my lack of excellence. Impatience and disrespect have brought embarrassment to him on several occasions.
My task-oriented, performance-driven heart attempts to fix itself by making a list: An excellent wife cooks with organic food (not Velveeta), sews her own clothing (or at least irons her husbands shirts!), speaks only words dripping with grace (and not sarcasm) and reads her Bible for hours on end (okay, minutes?!).
The list brings more condemnation; concrete evidence that I cannot be an excellent wife on my own.

Forged not Found

While all of these things can be signs of excellence, they are definitely not requirements. Turning to Scripture for comfort and conviction, I am reminded: An excellent wife is not found but forged. No man goes out and finds a woman who is pure wife perfection and marries her. Neither of them truly know what that even looks like yet!  
It is the character of God, and not our husbands, that can be fully and firmly trusted. Our core identity must be anchored in Christ alone.
A godly woman becomes an excellent wife as she understands she is made in the image of God, re-made in the image of Christ, and formed over a lifetime of repentance and redemption. Excellence is not measured by a to-do list; it is manifested in the life of a wife who knows Jesus intimately.

Bringing Shame

An excellent wife is the crown of her husband, but she who brings shame is like rottenness in his bones. – Proverbs 12:4
When I humbly and honestly assess the times I bring my husband shame, I am sobered by its destruction. To bring rottenness to his bones means mine are already disintegrating with unbelief and bitterness. We bring shame as wives when we:
  1. Focus on our husband’s sin
  2. Think our way is better, prioritizing ourselves over him
  3. Speak harshly to him or derogatively about him to anyone 
  4. Withhold blessing, prayer, sex, or encouragement of any sort in an effort to punish, manipulate, or “get the message across”
The wife who brings shame to her husband is the daughter who does not truly know and trust her heavenly Father.
If the wife’s identity is centered around her man, she will certainly deliver shame when he disappoints – as he will inevitably do. It is the character of God, and not our husbands, that can be fully and firmly trusted. Our core identity must be anchored in Christ alone.

Made Precious by Jesus

We are made precious by Jesus. This heart transformation is the basis for any preciousness that our husbands experience in us. It is not about what we do but what our precious Savior has done for us that graces us with the power to be excellent wives. We are helpless on our own.
Excellence is not measured by a to-do list; it is manifested in the life of a wife who knows Jesus intimately.
A godly wife understands that she is nothing outside of the saving grace of Jesus Christ and has no excellence apart from him. Christ’s grace and love are precious to her. Fueled by his riches, she will become a glorious crown to her husband as she helps, nurtures, and loves him from the depths of Christ’s righteousness in her.
It takes a 10-minute ceremony to become a wife. It takes a lifetime to become an excellent wife – one who understands that Christ’s shed blood on the cross is needed to offer excellence to our husbands.

The Call of Moses - allowing God to prepare and refine us (over a long time)

This post is taken from the Resurgence blog. You can read the whole post here.


The Call of Moses

Greg Qualls » God Scripture Biblical People Church Calling
I’ve had several friends in my life who have had callings similar to Jesus’ disciples in their lives. They’ve all seemed to go like this:
  1. Receive a vision or hear a voice calling you to do something
  2. Drop everything to follow the calling
  3. Receive on-the-job training
  4. Live out your calling
I wish I could say the same for me, but the calling on my life has felt more like Moses’ than the disciples'. 
Most of us think Moses’ calling came when he heard God’s voice from the burning bush. The reality is, Moses knew he was supposed to free God’s people a lot earlier.

Even Moses Rushed God

Acts 7:25 tells us when Moses killed the Egyptian in Exodus 2:11-12, “He supposed that his brothers would understand that God was giving them salvation by his hand, but they did not understand.”  Moses knew what his calling was before he fled into the wilderness.  His problem wasn’t that he didn’t know what his calling was. His problem was he jumped the gun -- he didn’t wait for God’s timing.
Many of us rush into our calling without allowing God to purify and prepare us through the trials and fires of everyday life.
The beauty of the story is that even though Moses gave up on his calling, God didn’t give up on Moses. It was all part of God’s ultimate plan to prepare Moses for his mission. Moses spent 40 years shepherding sheep in the wilderness. Then God came to Moses and called him to free his people, which is only the beginning of Moses’ ministry. Moses ends up shepherding God’s people in the wilderness for another 40 years. God used Moses’ secular job experience to prepare him for his future ministry.

God Knows When You Are Ready

Many of us rush into our calling without allowing God to purify and prepare us through the trials and fires of everyday life. We have no life experience out of which we can minister to our people. We hurt a lot of people along the way due to our inexperience. We’ve rushed into ministry without asking God whether right now is the time to drop everything and follow our calling. 
This is my story. After fleeing Texas from a position as a youth minister, I spent the past 4 years doing sales for a large corporation. I know this isn’t ultimately what God has planned for me, but I know right now isn’t the time. I rest in the fact that when I come across my burning bush, I will know God has been using my everyday trials and fires to prepare me to minister to his people.

Are there apostles today? by Dave Devenish

Dave Devenish of Newfrontiers will soon release his new book Fathering Leaders, Motivating Mission:Restoring the Role of the Apostle in Today's Church  This is an extract of the book taken from Adrian Warnock's excellent blog. Read the whole post here.

Are there apostles today? A series by Dave Devenish

June 24, 2011
The following post is from Fathering Leaders, Motivating Mission by David Devenish, copyright 2011 reproduced with permission from Authentic Media.
Many years ago, my wife and I were leading a walking holiday in the Lake District (a beautiful region of northern England) with the youth group in our church. We had been joined by a lad, a friend of one of our young people, who had no previous knowledge of Christianity and certainly not of Christian jargon.
We held Bible studies each evening and had been looking at one of Paul’s letters. On one of the walks, this young lad asked to speak privately to me. We walked ahead of the others and I was excited by the prospect of him perhaps asking important questions about the Christian faith or even of my being able to lead him to the Lord. He said he had been trying to follow our Bible studies but had one major question: ‘What is the difference between an epistle and an apostle?’ He said he had become quite confused on this subject! Of course, I hid my disappointment and answered the question. (Praise God – a few weeks later he committed his life to the Lord and is still walking with God today.)
This teenager’s question is akin to one of the explanations often given of why we no longer have apostles today: ‘We have the Epistles, so we do not need Apostles.’ The argument is that one of the prime reasons for Christ appointing the apostles was so that the New Testament could be written, and once it was complete there was no further need for apostolic ministry. Obviously it is true that the final truths of Scripture were committed to the first-generation church and have been preserved for us in what we know as the New Testament. Jesus said to his twelve apostles, ‘When he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth.’1 While that Scripture by extension means that we can all know the help of the Holy Spirit to understand the truths of Scripture, nevertheless its primary meaning was that the Holy Spirit would lead those original apostles into all truth – all the truth we need now for our instruction, correction and training, and which is contained in the New Testament. However, it must be pointed out that most of the apostles did not contribute to the writing of the New Testament and that a significant part of it was written by Luke, who, although for a time part of Paul’s apostolic team, was never described as an apostle himself. Thus we can see from the outset that being an apostle is not synonymous with being a writer of Scripture.
Different Views
There are four views of apostles that I want to examine in this chapter. They are as follows:
1. Most of the gifts of the Holy Spirit described in the New Testament ceased after the first century, including the gift of the apostle.
2. The apostles were a very small group of people, comprising the twelve and the apostle Paul. (Some have even argued that the original eleven got it wrong in Acts 1 when they appointed Matthias, and should have waited for Paul.)
3. There were many more apostles in the time of the New Testament, and most spiritual gifts continue today, but not the gift or office of the apostle.
4. All the gifts of the Holy Spirit in New Testament times continue today, including the gift of the apostle.
No Longer Needed?
The first view, that the revelatory and sign gifts have ceased, is based on a particular interpretation of Paul’s teaching in 1 Corinthians: ‘But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears.’2 The Greek phrase translated ‘perfection’ (or ‘the perfect’ in some translations) is to teleion, which is an adjective related to the verb teleioo, meaning ‘to bring to an end, to complete’. It also carries the additional meaning ‘to make perfect’ or ‘to be perfect’. God is so described in Matthew 5:48, where it can only mean ‘perfect’. The same word, however, is used in Ephesians 4:13 in the context of the role of the leadership gifts to equip the church, where it is translated ‘mature’. This first view suggests that ‘the perfect’ in 1 Corinthians 13 refers to the full revelation given in the New Testament, and that once this was complete, there was no further need for the partial forms of charismatic revelation manifested in particular revelatory gifts such as prophecy. The classic exposition of this view was made by B.B. Warfield3 and is reflected in much contemporary reformed and dispensationalist theology.
The problem with this view is that it could not have been understood in this way by those to whom Paul was originally writing. Gordon Fee puts it this way: ‘Paul’s distinctions are between “now” and “then”, between what is incomplete (though perfectly appropriate to the church’s present existence) and what is complete (when its final destiny in Christ has been reached and “we see face to face” and “know as we are known”).’4 In other words, ‘the perfect’ is an eschatological reference to the time when Jesus returns and the final purposes of God’s saving work in Christ will have been accomplished. Spiritual gifts will then no longer be necessary for the building up of the church.
Another variant of this first view is that ‘the perfect’ does not refer to the completion of the New Testament but to the maturity of the church which occurred when more regular clergy had arisen and became the norm for established church life. Fee comments very astutely:
It is perhaps an indictment of Western Christianity that we should consider ‘mature’ our rather cerebral and domesticated – but bland – brand of faith, with the concomitant absence of the Spirit in terms of his supernatural gifts! The Spirit, not Western rationalism, marks the turning of the ages, after all; and to deny the Spirit’s manifestations is to deny our present existence to be eschatological, as belonging to the beginning of the time of the End.5
Maturity certainly implies not just ‘regular clergy’ etc. having been established, but the bringing to maturity of the church in every generation as a result of the equipping work of leadership gifts described in Ephesians 4.
A Limited Number of Apostles?
The second view confines the use of the term ‘apostle’ to the twelve and Paul, and regards the appointment of Matthias6 to replace Judas Iscariot as a mistake on the part of the eleven remaining apostles. However, the New Testament nowhere teaches that the eleven were wrong to appoint Matthias and should have waited for Paul. Although the casting of lots was not a normal means of obtaining guidance in the church after the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost (though it has been employed by some, for example, John Wesley), it could nevertheless be followed in faith at that time, on the basis of scriptures such as Proverbs 16:33. Furthermore, the qualification for being one of the twelve was not only having witnessed Christ’s resurrection, but also having been with Jesus from the beginning of his earthly ministry at the baptism of John until his ascension. It was important that there should be witnesses to Jesus’ life and ministry, as well as to his death and resurrection, all of which are now recorded for us in the four gospels. There is no evidence at all that Paul would have qualified for this. All we know of him at this time is that he was being taught at the feet of Gamaliel.7
The New Testament text itself refers to several others as apostles, and for some of these, too, there is no evidence that they witnessed Jesus’ ministry, death and resurrection. They are as follows:
  • Andronicus and Junias.8 ␣
  • Apollos.9 ␣
  • Barnabas.10
  • Epaphroditus (though this reference is usually translated ‘messenger’, a point that we will examine later).11
  • James – the half-brother of Jesus.12 ␣
  • Silas.13 ␣
  • Timothy (though some would argue that Paul specifically excludes Timothy from this role by his reference to him as a brother, but that is a moot point).14
‘All the apostles’ who received a resurrection appearance from Jesus are distinguished from the twelve and Paul.15 The fact that the church had to be on the lookout for false apostles would not have been an issue if the apostolate was restricted to the twelve and Paul.16 The visiting preachers who caused such problems to Paul in Corinth are described somewhat ironically as ‘super-apostles’,17 so it seems that they were taking the title of ‘apostle’ on themselves, relying on self-advertising oratory rather than the humility demonstrated by genuine apostles.18
Some would suggest that the seventy (or seventy two) sent out by Jesus were also apostles. Certainly the Greek verb apostello is used of the commission that Jesus gave the seventy, and there are considerable similarities in the mandates he gave to the twelve and the seventy. Of course, both were also symbolic numbers which would have been clearly understood as such by the people of that time. ‘The twelve’ recalled the twelve sons of Jacob, the forefathers of the twelve tribes of Israel, and were symbolic of Jesus’ formation of a renewed Israel. ‘The seventy’ is doubly symbolic: it was the familiar way in which the Jews of the time referred to the nations of the world, based on the seventy nations of Genesis 10; it would also have reminded them of the occasion in Moses’ time when the Lord put the Spirit on the seventy elders,19 which enabled a wider distribution of responsibility so that Moses would not have to carry it alone. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s commentary notes in relation to ‘all the apostles’ in 1 Corinthians 15 explain that ‘the term here includes many others besides “the Twelve” already enumerated (v5): perhaps the seventy disciples of Luke 10’.20 I am not fully convinced about this argument, but it helpfully illustrates the diversity of views concerning the number of apostles.
Again there is some excellent material available for further study on this point, in particular Herbert Lockyer’s book All the Apostles of the Bible and an excellent essay on the subject by J.B. Lightfoot.21

Footnotes:
1   John 16:13.
2   1 Cor. 13:8–10.
3  B.B. Warfield, Counterfeit Miracles (Cornell University Library, 1918).
4 Gordon Fee, God’s Empowering Presence (Hendrickson,1994), p. 208.
5   Fee, Presence, p. 207. See also Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology (IVP and Zondervan, 1994), Chapter 30.
6     Acts 1:21–26.
7  Acts 22:3.
8     Rom. 16:7.
9    1 Cor. 4:6–9.
10    Acts 14:14.
11    Phil. 2:25.
12   Gal. 1:18–19.
13   1 Thess. 1:1; 2:6 (apostles – plural).
14    1 Thess. 1:1; 2:6; 2 Cor. 1:1.
15   1 Cor. 15:7.
16      Rev. 2:2; 2 Cor. 11:13.
17 2 Cor. 11:5.
18    Barrett takes the view that ‘super-apostles’ was actually a reference to those described in Galatians 2:9 as ‘pillars’. C.K. Barrett, The Signs of an Apostle (Paternoster Press, 1996), pp. 37–8. Chrysostom, Calvin and Hodge also took this view. In this case the above comments would of course not apply!
19    Num. 11:25.
20 Jamieson, Fausset and Brown, quoting Chrysostom, Commentary (Zondervan, 1870 and 1999).
21    J.B. Lightfoot, Epistle of St Paul to the Galatians (Zondervan,1978), pp. 92–101.

Apostles today? Part Two – Do Ephesians 4 ministries continue?

June 27, 2011
The following post is from Fathering Leaders, Motivating Mission by David Devenish, copyright 2011 reproduced with permission from Authentic Media.


Only Some of the Ministries Continue Today?
We now turn to the third view: that the gifts of the Holy Spirit still continue today, but not the gift of the apostle. This view acknowledges that all five ministry gifts of Ephesians 4:11 were given by the ascended Lord Jesus to the church at the beginning, but contends that not all of those gifts continue today. Dr Martyn Lloyd-Jones, for example, taught that only the pastor/teacher continues today. He argued that not only did the apostle and prophet disappear after the first century, but so did the evangelist. The evangelist, he said,
‘supplemented the work of the apostles and extended it and caused it to spread and become established. Thus the evangelist was a man whose office was temporary, and as the churches were established and became more settled, this office likewise disappeared.’22
Those given a special call to preach the gospel today were not, in his view, ‘evangelists’ in the New Testament sense of the word but rather ‘exhorters’, as apparently they were known in the UK in the eighteenth century. It was necessary, he maintained, for an apostle to have witnessed Christ’s resurrection, to have been commissioned to his work by the risen Lord himself in person, and to be a man with supernatural revelation of the truth, so that he could speak not only with authority but also infallibly.
Wayne Grudem, in his book Systematic Theology, argues for the continuation of prophet, evangelist, pastor and teacher, but not apostle. He says:
‘The two qualifications for being an apostle were: (1) having seen Jesus after His resurrection with one’s own eyes (thus, being an “eyewitness of the resurrection”), and (2) having been specifically commissioned by Christ as His apostle.’23
J.B. Lightfoot, in his classic essay to which I have already referred, argues the same case. Wayne Grudem does point out:
‘Today some people use the word apostle in a very broad sense to refer to an effective church planter, or to a significant missionary pioneer (“William Carey was an apostle to India,” for example). If we use the word apostle in this broad sense everyone would agree that there are still apostles today – for there are certainly effective missionaries and church planters today.’
He proposes, however, that it is inappropriate and unhelpful to use the word, because it causes confusion between the roles of New Testament apostles and contemporary church planters and evangelists, and implies a desire for ‘more authority in the church than any one person should rightfully have’.24
So in the face of these strong arguments, why do I believe that the gift of the apostle continues today?

Given to the Church in Each Generation?
One of the key passages to be debated is Ephesians 4:11–13:
It was he who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, to prepare God’s people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.
This chapter seems to speak to the continuing needs of the church throughout its history, and not just its initial first-century foundations. The five-fold ministries were given by the ascended Christ as love gifts to the church for a particular purpose, namely that God’s people would be equipped or prepared for works of service, so that the body of Christ might be built up. This need continues until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. The chapter defines maturity as not being like children (i.e. immature), tossed about by every strange doctrine, and it notes that the body of the church learns to build itself up in love as each member of the body functions as it should.
This equipping ministry is surely needed in every generation, and it is not a natural reading of the passage to assume that there is a distinction between gifts that should continue to perform this equipping function and gifts that should not. The differing views of Dr Martyn Lloyd-Jones and Wayne Grudem on this point illustrate the unsatisfactory results of attempting to make such a distinction. It is true, as Wayne Grudem emphasizes, that the word ‘gave’ in relation to the ascended Christ is past tense and refers to the outpouring of the Holy Spirit with his gifts when Christ ascended on high; but surely all gifts continue to come from the ascended Christ to his church and his ministers. It seems to me a more natural reading of Ephesians 4 to assume that the church in each generation needs the gifts of the ascended Christ, just as it needs and is promised the power of the Holy Spirit, similarly given from the ascended Christ. Though the day of Pentecost was the first pouring out of the Holy Spirit, it was not one single event for all time, as the verse ‘The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off – for all whom the Lord our God will call’25 makes clear, but an ongoing promise of forgiveness of sins and the gift of the Holy Spirit.
The whole tone of Ephesians 4 seems to suggest something both dynamic and normative for the church at all times. As Markus Barth writes:
In 4:11 it is assumed that the church at all times needs the witness of ‘apostles’ and ‘prophets’. The author of this epistle did not anticipate that the inspired and enthusiastic ministry was to be absorbed by, and ‘disappear’ into, offices and officers bare of the Holy Spirit and resentful of any reference to spiritual things. Ephesians 4 does not contain the faintest hint that the charismatic character of all church ministries was restricted to a certain period of church history and was later to die out.26
Footnotes
22 Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Christian Unity and Exposition of Ephesians 4:1–16 (Baker Publishing Group, 1981) p. 192.
23  Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology (IVP and Zondervan, 1994), p. 906.
24  Grudem, Systematic Theology, p. 911.
25    Acts 2:39.
26   Markus Barth, Ephesians 4–6 (Doubleday 1974), p. 437.

Apostles today? Part Three – Witnesses of the resurrection?

June 28, 2011

The following post is from Fathering Leaders, Motivating Mission by David Devenish, copyright 2011 reproduced with permission from Authentic Media.
Witnesses of the Resurrection?
What then about the claim that to be an apostle someone must have seen Jesus in his resurrection? This assertion is based on 1 Corinthians 9, where Paul is justifying his apostleship to a church that was beginning to question it. Paul there makes a series of four assertions of his apostleship to the Corinthian church: ‘Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are you not the result of my work in the Lord?’
Firstly, ‘Am I not free?’ is a reference not just to his apostleship but to his freedom from the Jewish law and also a freedom to conform to aspects of the Jewish law in order to win Jewish people. Secondly, ‘Am I not an apostle?’ must refer to the commissioning that he had asserted on several occasions. He then says, thirdly, ‘Have I not seen Jesus our Lord?’ It is hard to argue from this that this is the necessary proof for all time of somebody having the gift and ministry of an apostle. There were others who also saw Jesus’ resurrection but were not called apostles, for example, ‘five hundred brethren at once’. His last statement refers to the fruit of his apostleship. In this context he states that even though he may not be an apostle to others, he must be an apostle to the Corinthians because he founded their church. Surely if the main qualification was that he had seen the resurrected Jesus then he would be an apostle to all. As Gordon Fee points out,
‘Since others who saw the Risen Lord did not become apostles, what most likely legitimized his apostleship was the accompanying commissioning. Although he does not say so here, in Galatians 1:16 the revelation of the Son of God is accompanied by its purpose, “that I might preach him among the Gentiles”.’27
Gordon Fee goes on to add:
Can anything be said in our day about ‘apostles’? Given the two criteria expressed here [seeing the risen Christ and having effectively planted churches], one would have to allow that apostles do not exist in the sense that Paul defines his own ministry. But it should also be noted that this might be too narrow a view, based strictly on Paul’s own personal experience. His more functional understanding of apostleship would certainly have its modern counterpart in those who found and lead churches in unevangelized areas. Only when ‘apostle’ is used in a non-Pauline sense of ‘guarantors of the traditions’ would usage be narrowed to the first century.28
This is really the point. Evangelicals who believe, as I do, that apostles exist today, strongly affirm that the canon of Scripture is complete and establishes the full truth that God has revealed to us, but are also convinced that the ministry of church planting and laying good foundations in churches and the authority (as we will see later) to oversee those churches needs to continue – subject, of course, to the overriding authority of Scripture.
Furthermore, Ephesians 4 is not the only scripture which speaks of the apostle alongside other gifts in relation to the life of the church. Paul gives several lists of spiritual gifts. Sometimes these are the gifts to the church of a person or ministry or office, as in Ephesians 4; sometimes they are charismatic gifts of particular supernatural abilities, as in 1 Corinthians 12:8–10 – ‘To one there is given through the Spirit the message of wisdom . . .’ etc. In some cases, however, Paul mixes the two. For example, after he has explained the charismatic gifts in the context of the one body of Christ, he goes on to say that God has appointed certain people as gifts to the church: apostles, prophets, teachers, workers of miracles, etc. He then raises a question in relation to both categories of gift: Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all have gifts of healing? Do all speak in tongues? Do all work miracles? It would be strange if Paul listed apostles alongside all the other gifts in this context, if it was clearly understood that the only apostles were those who had witnessed the resurrection. Gordon Fee comments:
For Paul this is both a ‘functional’ and ‘positional/official’ term. In keeping with the other members on this list, it is primarily ‘functional’ here, probably anticipating the concern for the ‘building up’ of the body that is already hinted at in verse 7 and was stressed in chapter 14. Most likely with this word he is reflecting on his own ministry in the church; the plural is in deference to others who would have the same ministry in other churches.29
Flexible Usage in the New Testament
Another basis for my belief in the continuing ministry of apostles is that the term ‘apostle’ is used more flexibly in the New Testament than is sometimes taken into account. Those who justify the continuation of apostles today often see three different ways in which the term is used in the New Testament – three categories of apostle, if you like:
1. Jesus Christ himself is described as ‘the apostle and high priest whom we confess’.30 He was the Messiah, the One supremely sent to accomplish our redemption from sin and the restoration of everything lost through the fall and its effect on the whole of creation.
2. The twelve – the apostles of the resurrection and foundational to the whole church throughout history, whose names are symbolically on the foundations of the eschatological New Jerusalem.
3. The apostles of the ascended Christ, according to Ephesians 4:11, given (alongside other leadership gifts) to equip the church until it comes to maturity and unity. Terry Virgo helpfully clarifies the distinction from category 2 above: ‘They were not witnesses of His resurrection but gifts of His ascension.’31
C.K. Barrett extends this concept to ‘at least eight persons or groups of persons denoted with varying degrees of propriety, by the term “apostles” and probably all giving it somewhat different meaning’.32 Barrett’s categories include:
  • the original group called the ‘twelve’ founder members of the church in Jerusalem
  • the ‘pillars’ Peter, John and James (not one of the twelve)
  • Peter’s work away from Jerusalem – moving an understanding of apostleship for Peter in a Pauline direction
  • John similarly
  • those sent out by the Jerusalem leaders (the equivalent of the ‘agents’ of non-Christian Jewish leaders), with whom Paul had some problems 33
  • Paul himself
  • those in the Pauline circle, e.g. Barnabas, Apollos, Andronicus, Junias
  • the ‘apostles’ of the churches34
Of these categories, the penultimate one is of particular importance in our argument, as it includes Apollos and Barnabas, both of whom are described as ‘apostles’, but neither of whom is recorded as having seen the risen Lord; indeed it would have been impossible in the case of Apollos, who was in Corinth and Asia Minor, and most unlikely in the case of Barnabas. So there were apostles that we know about in Scripture who were neither part of the twelve nor a special addition with special qualifications, like Paul.
Furthermore, the fact that the word ‘apostle’ was used in Judaism and more widely in Greek (as we will see in the next chapter) can take away the ‘mystique’ of the word as applied to only a few. If, for example, we translated the term by the modern words ‘envoy’ or ‘messenger’, would that not help us? Sometimes the word apostolos is translated ‘messenger’ or ‘representative’. This is often explained as being a totally different category, but I would argue that it illustrates the flexibility with which the word is used to describe an office which is very important for the church – in all ages. Although I think his use of the term ‘prophetic’ is confusing, I believe Herbert Lockyer gives the correct slant on this when he says,
‘The apostolate, then, was not a limited circle of officials holding a well-defined position of authority in the church, but a large class of men who discharged one – and that the highest – of the functions of the prophetic ministry (1 Corinthians 12:28, Ephesians 4:11).’35
Given all these varied references to apostles in the New Testament churches, it is not justifiable, in my view, to deny the validity of apostolic ministry today. As Dave Harvey of Sovereign Grace Ministries, an apostolic network in the USA, expresses it:
Many evangelicals today resonate with the conviction and logic of O. Palmer Robertson, who said, ‘Nothing in scripture explicitly indicates that the apostolate ever would come to an end. Yet it is generally recognized that no one in the church today functions with the authority of the original apostles . . .’ To paraphrase this common perspective, present-day apostles may be unpopular, but they are not unscriptural. While Sovereign Grace Ministries heartily agrees that ‘no one in the church today functions with the authority of the original apostles,’ let us not hastily extrapolate on Dr Robertson’s phrase to conclude that no one today functions as an apostle of any kind. Such a conclusion inflicts considerable harm on attempts to build the church and preach the gospel.36

Footnotes
27 Gordon Fee, NICNT: The First Epistle to the Corinthians (W.B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1987), p. 395.
28  Fee, Corinthians, NICNT, p. 397.
29  Fee, Corinthians, p. 620.
30    Heb. 3:1.
31 Newfrontiers Magazine, Issue 04: September–November 2003, p. 8.
32  Barrett, Signs, p. 72.
33   Gal. 2:12.
34   2 Cor. 8:23; Phil. 2:25.
35    Herbert Lockyer, All the Apostles of the Bible (Zondervan, 1972), p. 183.
36    Dave Harvey, Polity – Serving and Leading the Local Church (Sovereign Grace Ministries, 2004), pp. 17–18.

Apostles today? Part Four – What do they look like in practice?

June 29, 2011

The following post is from Fathering Leaders, Motivating Mission by David Devenish, copyright 2011 reproduced with permission from Authentic Media.
Those who are recognized as apostles by particular church networks are sometimes accused of making themselves equivalent to Paul or Peter, but this is not the case. In the similar context of prophets today, Jack Deere says:
It is simply not reasonable to insist that all miraculous spiritual gifts equal those of the apostles in their intensity or strength in order to be perceived as legitimate gifts of the Holy Spirit. No one would insist on this for the non-miraculous gifts like teaching or evangelism. For example, what person in the history of the church since Paul has been as gifted a teacher to the body of Christ? Luther? Calvin? Who today would claim to be Paul’s equal as a teacher? I do not know of anyone who would make such a claim for the past or the present. Therefore, since no one has arisen with the gift of teaching that is equal to the apostle Paul’s, should we conclude that the gift of teaching was withdrawn from the church? Likewise, should we assume that everyone who has a gift of evangelism is going to evangelize like the apostle Paul? Who has planted as many churches or started as many new works with the depth and the authority that the apostle Paul did? We can admit to varying degrees of intensity and quality in gifts of evangelism, in gifts of teaching, and in other gifts. Why can’t we do that with the gift of healing? Or the gift of miracles? Or the gift of prophecy?37
To be fair, Jack Deere does not make the connection, but surely we could add ‘or the gift of an apostle?’.
Another factor to consider is that the New Testament warns against receiving ‘false apostles’. If it was known and accepted that there was a fixed group of apostles, then this warning would hardly have been necessary.
Clearly there were more apostles and prophets than just the twelve and Paul, and so churches needed to be able to distinguish between genuine and false ones. This was also the case a little later in church history, as the Didache (dating from the end of the first century or beginning of the second) records:
‘Concerning apostles and prophets, act thus according to the ordinance of the gospel. Let every apostle who comes to you be received as the Lord . . . But let him not stay more than one day, or if need be a second as well; but if he stay three days he is a false prophet.’38
I do not know why length of stay was taken as a measure of an apostle or prophet’s genuineness, and I am not suggesting that in a relational context such guests should only stay for two days! This quotation, however, does indicate that the ministries of apostles and prophets continued after the completion of the New Testament, and that there was an ongoing need to discern between the false and the genuine.

Needed for the Church Today
Pragmatically, there is an evident need for the continuation of many of the functions of the original apostles. This would include church planting, laying good foundations in churches, continuing to oversee those churches, appointing the leaders, giving ongoing fatherly care to leaders, and handling difficult questions that may arise from those churches. There are really only three ways for churches to carry out these functions:
1. Each church is free to act totally independently and to seek God’s mind for its own government and pastoral wisdom, without any help from outside, unless the church may choose to seek it at any particular time.
When we started the church which I am still a part of, for example, we were so concerned to be ‘independent’ that we would not even join the Fellowship of Independent Evangelical Churches, although we adopted their trust deed and constitution because that would prevent us being purely independent. We were at that time very proud of our ‘independence’!
2. Churches operate under some sort of structured and formal oversight, as in many denominations today, where local church leaders are appointed by and accountable to regional leadership, whether ‘bishops’, ‘superintendents’ or ‘overseers’. It is hard to justify this model from the pages of the New Testament, though we recognize that it developed very early in church history. Even the word episkopos, translated ‘bishop’ or ‘overseer’, which came to be used of those having wider authority and oversight over other leaders and churches, was used in the New Testament as a synonym for the local leaders or elders of a particular church.
The three main forms of church government current in the institutional church are Episcopalianism (government by bishops), Presbyterianism (government by local elders) and Congregationalism (government by the church meeting). Each of these is only a partial reflection of the New Testament. Commenting on these forms of government without apostolic ministry, Phil Greenslade says,
‘We assert as our starting point what the other three viewpoints deny: that the apostolic role is as valid and vital today as ever before. This is to agree with the German charismatic theologian, Arnold Bittlinger, when he says “the New Testament nowhere suggests that the apostolic ministry was intended only for first-century Christians”.’39
3. We aim to imitate the New Testament practice of travelling ministries of apostles and prophets, with apostles having their own spheres of responsibility as a result of having planted and laid the foundations in the churches they oversee. Such ministries continue the connection with local churches as a result of fatherly relationships and not denominational election or appointment, recognizing that there will need to be new charismatically gifted and friendship-based relationships continuing into later generations.
This is the model that the ‘New Apostolic Reformation’ (to use Peter Wagner’s phrase) is attempting to follow. Though mistakes have been made, including some quite serious ones involving controlling authority, and though those of us involved are still seeking to find our way with the Holy Spirit’s help, it seems to reflect more accurately the New Testament pattern and a present-day outworking of scriptures such as 1 Corinthians 12 and Ephesians 4.
‘Is the building finished? Is the Bride ready? Is the Body full-grown, are the saints completely equipped? Has the church attained its ordained unity and maturity? Only if the answer to these questions is “yes” can we dispense with apostolic ministry. But as long as the church is still growing up into Christ, who is its head, this ministry is needed. If the church of Jesus Christ is to grow faster than the twentieth century population explosion, which I assume to be God’s intention, then we will need to produce, recognize and use Pauline apostles.’40
In summary, I believe that a strong case can be made for apostolic ministry continuing today, while also recognizing the unique role of the original apostles who witnessed the resurrection, and while thoroughly submitting to the truth revealed in the pages of the New Testament and seeing that truth as God’s final revelation. There is surely more support in the pages of the New Testament for relational oversight of churches than for denominational structures, and it seems to me preferable to use the Ephesians 4 terminology of the fivefold ministries equipping the churches, rather than to resort to Episcopal designations or their equivalents in other denominations.
If, however, my thesis has not yet convinced the reader, please read on. Even if some of my readers cannot share my convictions about the continuing relevance of apostolic ministry gifts, I believe that the principles contained in this book for the planting and oversight of churches are very important for the future of the church and of world mission.

Footnotes
37   Jack Deere, Surprised by the Power of the Spirit (Kingsway, 1994), p. 67.
38 Quoted in Michael Green, I Believe in the Holy Spirit (Hodder & Stoughton, 1978), p. 190.
39  Philip Greenslade, Leadership (Marshalls, 1984), pp. 142–3.
40 Greenslade, Leadership, p. 143.

Video: Explosions in the Sky video 'Last Known Surroundings'

This is from their new album Take care, take care, take care. It's their first ever music video.

Last Known Surroundings from Explosions in the Sky on Vimeo.

Friday 24 June 2011

Questions a husband and wife can ask each other to encourage each other

Post taken from Brian Croft's excellent Practical Shepherding blog. You can read the post here.

Questions a husband can ask his wife to encourage needed discussions.
Posted by briancroft on May 25, 2011 in Home and Family |
 My post a few weeks back on what might be a surprising way to love your wife,brought requests of other additional questions that could be good discussion starters for a husband and wife.  One request came from a dear pastor friend of mine preparing for a special vacation with his wife and wanted to engage her in some fruitful discussion while on it.  Here is what I sent him and thought I would make it available to those of you who were requesting other questions of a similar spirit. 
Here are 10 additional questions that husbands can and should be asking their wives if they desire to study, learn, and understand how to best love and care for them.  You will notice some are more specific for a pastor and his wife.
- What can I do to make you feel like I enjoy being with you more than anyone else?
- What are some things I can do to encourage you, spiritually?
- What can I do to help relieve the stress of life responsibilities?
- How can I best serve you in dealing with our children?
- What can I do to heighten your desire for physical intimacy?
- What can I do to make you feel our family is the priority over ministry?
- What can I do to help you grow in a love to serve our church?
- What kinds of moments when our family is together do you cherish the most?
- What do you love most about serving in ministry together?  Greatest challenge?
Husbands and pastors, I hope these questions provoke much helpful and fruitful discussions that will lead you to a greater love and enjoyment of the wife of your youth as well as to equip you to love her in such a way that she feels loved and care for.


I am grateful that my previous post for husbands has brought with it the same request from the wives.  Since I feel much more qualified to write the questions that wives can ask their husbands to encourage us…here are 10 questions for you:
- What is something I can do that makes you feel loved by me?
- What are some things I can say in front of our children that would make you feel respected and honored?
- How can I make your time when you come home from work more restful and relaxing?
- What are some things I say or do that make you feel like I am being disrespectful?
- What is your desired expectation for physical intimacy?
- What can I say or do that makes you feel I support your ministry?
- How can I spiritually encourage you?
- How can I best care for you when you are discouraged?
- What is the best way to approach you if I feel our schedule is out of control?
- How can I support you in the discipleship of our children?
A few of these questions will be more for pastors and their wives, but I am confident most of these questions will be accurate in touching any Christian husband’s heart and provoke him to share about the things that are important to him.

Thursday 23 June 2011

The Gender Neutral NIV 2011: Does it matter? (Thoughts on TNIV by Wayne Grudem & thoughts on NIV 2011 by CBMW)

In an article on the TNIV Wayne Grudem points out a number of problems with the TNIV. This article is taken from the CBMW page. You can read the article here. As for the NIV 2011 there's another article on the CBMW page where they say that much of the content that Grudem was concerned about has remained the same. You can read their article on the NIV 2011 here.

The "Gender-Neutral" NIV: What Is The Controversy About?

Wayne Grudem
Many Christians still remember the huge public outcry in 1997, when people discovered that the IBS and Zondervan were about to release a gender-neutral edition of the New International Version (NIV), the largest-selling Bible in the English speaking world. The controversy ended May 27, 1997, when the IBS, under immense public pressure, announced that they had "abandoned all plans for gender-related changes in future editions of the NIV."
On that same day, May 27, 1997, at Focus on the Family headquarters in Colorado Springs, I had been part of the original group who drafted the "Colorado Springs Guidelines for the Translation of Gender Language in Scripture." So when I received a certified letter on January 24 of this year, telling me IBS was withdrawing from their 1997 commitment to abide by the Colorado Springs Guidelines, I was surprised and disappointed. I knew that this letter meant that the IBS, as copyright holder for the NIV, and Zondervan, as the exclusive publisher of the NIV, had now decided to go ahead with a "gender-inclusive" version, in spite of the 1997 agreement.
I did not have to wait long to hear what they had done. The next Monday, January 28, 2002, national TV and radio networks proclaimed that a "gender-neutral" NIV was being published, the New Testament this April and the Old Testament to follow in 2003. The marketing campaign included about 40,000 advance copies of the New Testament that were being mailed to Christian "gatekeepers." The new edition would be called Today's New International Version (TNIV), and the IBS gave assurances that the current NIV would also remain in print as long as there was still demand for it.

What is the controversy about, and why should we be concerned?

The heart of the controversy is this: The TNIV people have decided to translate the general idea of a passage and to erase the male-oriented details.
They do two things to erase the male-oriented details: (1) they eliminate them (changing "man" to "mortals," "father" to "parent," "son" to "child," "brother" to "fellow believer," and "he" to "they," so that all male meaning is gone), or else (2) they add female-oriented details that are not found in the original text (such as changing "brother" to "brother or sister," so that the male emphasis in the Bible's examples is gone).
We can look at some examples of these changes from the 1984 NIV to the 2002 TNIV.
NIV Hebrews 2:6 What is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?
TNIV Hebrews 2:6 What are mere mortals that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them?
What's wrong? The TNIV removes the possibility of connecting this verse with Jesus, who called himself "the Son of Man." It mistranslates the singular Greek words huios ("son") and anthropos ("man"). It no longer refers to the human race as a unity named "man" (the name given by God in Gen. 5:2), but "mere mortals." This adds the idea of mortality that is not in the Greek text. (Note that man as created by God was not mortal, and this passage has creation language in it.) But the TNIV's goal has been achieved: The male-oriented details are erased.
NIV Hebrews 12:7 Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons. For what son is not disciplined by his father?
TNIV Hebrews 12:7 Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as his children. For what children are not disciplined by their parents?
What's wrong? The TNIV mistranslates the Greek terms huios ("son") and pater ("father"), which in their singular forms cannot mean "child" or "parent." It also obscures the parallel with God as Father in this passage. Again, the male-oriented details are erased.
NIV Revelation 3:20 I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me.
TNIV Revelation 3:20 I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with them, and they with me.
What's wrong? The TNIV mistranslates the Greek masculine singular pronoun autos ("he, him"). Therefore it loses the teaching of fellowship between Jesus and an individual believer. The plural pronoun "them" naturally refers to "those whom I love"in the church of Laodicea in the previous verse. So in the TNIV, if any one person in the church opens the door, Jesus will come in and eat with a group, with the whole church. What is lost is the teaching that Jesus will fellowship with one person individually and personally. For what reason? To eliminate the unwanted male-oriented details.
We should note that in order to avoid "he" used in a generic sense as it is in this verse, the TNIV has to change hundreds of verses in similar ways, and the cumulative effect is a significant loss of the Bible's emphasis on individual responsibility and individual relationship with God. (I do not yet have an exact count for the TNIV, but the NRSV, an earlier gender-neutral Bible, had to eliminate about 3400 uses of "he" in order to rid itself of such masculine generic statements.) The TNIV preface says their changes include "the elimination of most instances of the generic use of masculine nouns and pronouns." But Jesus and the New Testament authors used masculine nouns and pronouns in a generic way like this hundreds of times. Should we try to conceal their usage from the public today?
NIV Acts 20:30 Even from your own number men will arise and distort the truth in order to draw away disciples after them.
TNIV Acts 20:30 Even from your own number some will arise and distort the truth in order to draw away the disciples after them.
What's wrong? In the TNIV, Paul no longer says that "men" will arise from among the elders of the church at Ephesus, but "some" will arise, suggesting that there could be women elders at Ephesus. It mistranslates the Greek word aner, which means a male human being (this is not the word anthropos, which often means "person"). The male-oriented details are erased.
(I could add a note here on the Greek word aner: Greek scholars for hundreds of years have known that aner means "man" not "person." Recently, with no new evidence, but under cultural pressure, some have discovered a new meaning, "person." But no scholar has produced any convincing examples among the 216 uses in the NT. Even if it could mean "person" in rare cases, is would require compelling evidence from each context to overturn normal use. But with no compelling evidence, the TNIV translates aner in a gender-neutral way 31 times.)
NIV James 1:12 Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial, because when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.
TNIV James 1:12 Blessed are those who persevere under trial, because when they have stood the test, they will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.
What's wrong? The TNIV mistranslates the Greek word aner, which means a male human being. Thus it loses the probable allusion to James' brother Jesus, "the man" who truly persevered under trail. It also loses the allusion to the example of the "blessed man" in Old Testament wisdom literature (Psalm 1:1; 32:2; 40:4, etc.). It changes Greek singulars (for "man" and "he") to plurals ("those," "they"). The singular "the crown of life" suggests one crown to be shared among a group. This loses the focus on individual reward for endurance under trail. But what is gained? The male-oriented details are erased.
NIV John 19:12 Pilate tried to set Jesus free, but the Jews kept shouting, "If you let this man go, you are no friend of Caesar..."
TNIV John 19:12 Pilate tried to set Jesus free, but the Jewish leaders kept shouting, "If you let this man go, you are no friend of Caesar..."
What's wrong? The TNIV inserts the word "leaders," which is not in the Greek text. This tends to remove responsibility from the common people. (Similar changes are made several times in John in passages talking about those responsible for Jesus' death.) Note that John can specify the leaders when he wants to, because six verses earlier, John specifies that "the chief priests and their officials ... shouted" (John 19:6). This is not a case of eliminating male-oriented meaning, but of adding meaning that is not there to avoid language that seems offensive today.
NIV Luke 17:3 If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him.
TNIV: Luke 17:3 If any brother or sister sins against you, rebuke the offender; and if they repent, forgive them.
What's wrong? (1) The TNIV inserts "or sister," which Jesus did not say. Jesus is using a single male individual ("your brother") as an example of a general truth, but the TNIV will not let him do this. (Greek can say "brother or sister" when it wishes, as in James 2:15 "Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food.") (2) It translates the Greek singular pronoun autos ("he, him") as "them," which is fuzzy grammar in written English and puzzles readers who will wonder if Jesus meant that plural people ("they") had to repent. (This change to what the TNIV preface calls "singular ‘they/their/them'" has been done throughout the whole New Testament.) The result? The male-oriented example is made gender-neutral by adding a female-oriented meaning that was not in the original.
NIV James 3:1 Not many of you should presume to be teachers, my brothers.
TNIV James 3:1 Not many of you should presume to be teachers, my brothers and sisters.
What's wrong? The TNIV inserts "and sisters," which is not made explicit in the Greek text. (The plural Greek word adelphoi can mean "brothers" or "brothers and sisters," according to context, but in this case adding "and sisters" implies that James thought women could be Bible teachers for the early churches. The Greek text does not require that idea, but the TNIV does.) The male-oriented meaning has been neutralized.
NIV Hebrews 2:17: For this reason he had to be made like his brothers in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people.
TNIV Hebrews 2:17: "For this reason he had to be made like his brothers and sisters in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people"
Comment: Did Jesus have to become like his sisters "in every way" in order to become a "high priest in service to God"? All the OT priests were men, and surely the high priest was only a man, descended from Aaron. The TNIV translators have taken a possible meaning of a word ("brothers and sisters" is a possible meaning of the term adelphos when it is plural and when it fits the context) and imposed that meaning on a context where it will not fit, so that Jesus has to become like a sister in order to become a high priest. This text does not quite proclaim an androgynous Jesus, but it surely leaves open a wide door for misunderstanding, and almost invites misunderstanding. Meditate a bit on that phrase "in every way" and see if you can trust the TNIV. The emphasis on Jesus as a male has been neutralized.
NIV 1 Corinthians 14:28 If there is no interpreter, the speaker should keep quiet in the church and speak to himself and God.
TNIV 1 Corinthians 14:28 If there is no interpreter, the speaker should keep quiet in the church and speak to God when alone.
What's wrong? There is nothing that says "when alone" in the Greek text. It just says (in Greek) "to himself." Prior to the TNIV, people have differed over whether Paul allowed uninterpreted prayer in tongues in groups of two or three outside the church meeting, but with this insertion the TNIV settles the question: someone praying in tongues must be "alone." This is an example of what happens when translators are willing to allow "only a small change in the sense" of a passage. Too often, I suspect, they do not even realize all the implications that will follow from such changes to the words God gave us. But they make these changes to remove the male-oriented details of the text.
In summary, what are the words that are removed in these examples? "Man," "father," "brother," "son," and "he/him/his" are the main ones that are removed or neutralized. And there are dozens and dozens of other examples like these. I have no objection to removing these words when there is no male-oriented meaning in the original Greek or Hebrew text. But when there is a male-oriented meaning (as in these verses and many like them), then we dare not under-translate and conceal that male-oriented meaning, just because that emphasis is unpopular today. Of course the Bible treats women as equal in value and dignity before God from the very beginning (Gen. 1:27), and it towers over all other religions and world cultures in affirming the true equality of women and men in the image of God. But when the Bible has more numerous uses of male examples of general truths than female ones (as it does), then we should leave it, translate it truthfully, and not tamper with it.
Is this a serious matter? I take it very seriously. The NIV is the largest-selling Bible in the English speaking world. If this TNIV, backed by the massive marketing capabilities of Zondervan and the IBS, should gain wide acceptance, the precedent will be established for other Bible translations to mute unpopular nuances and details of meaning for the sake of "political correctness." The loss of many other doctrines unpopular in the culture will soon follow. And in every case readers of the English Bible will never know whether what they are reading is really the word of God or the translators' ideas on something that would be a little less offensive than what God actually said. As Moses warned the people of Israel, so we must hear the warning today, "You shall not add to the word that I command you, nor take from it, that you may keep the commandments of the LORD your God that I command you" (Deut. 4:2).