Your Sons & Daughters Shall Prophesy - Prophetic Gifts Today In The New Testament Church

Christ's Continuing Voice in the Church

signs of an apostle" are miracles, but rather that "the signs of an apostle" are accompanied by signs, wonders and miracles. If Paul had meant that the signs of his apostleship were signs and wonders and miracles, then he would have used a different construction in the Greek language. 12 The vindications of Paul's apostleship were not his miracles but his suf fering, his blameless life, his endless care of the churches and the many conversions among those to whom he preached (2 Corinthians 6:3-10; 11:22-33). The miracles authenticated not himself but the message he preached.

4. Ephesians 2:20

[The church] having been built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone.

Farnell says, "Once that foundation had been laid by those in the first century who possessed the gifts of apostleship and prophecy, no further need to relay the foundation by subsequent generations is implied." 13 The early apostles and prophets certainly set a solid theological foundation that does not need to be laid again. (We do not, for example, need to have the Scripture reinvented.) The LB says, "What a foundation you stand on now: the apostles and prophets." The original theological and doctrinal foundation of the Christian Church was given by revelation and written through inspiration by the first-century apostles and prophets. Most commentators would agree. This was special and enduring revelation for the Church of all time. The activity of the apostles and prophets, however, was broader in the early Church than writing the canon of Scripture. There were other apos tles in the early Church in addition to the original Twelve, and there were prophets who wrote no Scripture. All these functioned according to the objective mentioned in Ephesians 4:11-13, the perfecting or maturing of the Church: "Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowl edge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ" (verse 13, KJV). The principle of apostles and prophets working together to establish the Church is illustrated in the appointment of a team of apostles, Paul and Barnabas (Acts 14:14), and prophets, Judas and Silas (Acts 15:22, 32), to bring the doctrinal verdict of the Jerusalem Council to the Gentile churches. The theologicalfoundation is truly set in place, but the growing, matur ing body of Christ must have the ongoing fivefold ministries mentioned in this text to maintain the spirit and correctness of what was instituted in the first century. Ephesians was written at that time in history, but its

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