Quote:
Originally Posted by Ohio
I'm surprised you said this.
Do you really think that my goal or ZNP's goal is to find an apostle, and fawn over them?
|
Absolutely not. But I do wonder just a little if the next logical step has been thought out completely. Not necessarily by any one person, but in the way almost every part of the discussion is going.
Apostles are mentioned. It is not a certainty that they continue on this day. But whatever they do or don't do, I would presume that they have been doing it for most of the 2,000 years without necessarily having any thought that they were such a thing. And most people have carried on as if it is not important to think about it.
So if we determine that there are some around, what are we supposed to do about it? Will it really change anything to discover that so-and-so is actually an apostle? It probably will change how closely I at least consider what he/she says.
But I doubt that Paul would simply say to just listen and accept. He would say to beware. And we are already doing that without adding "apostle" to the complexity of the analysis. If they fail at "teacher" then apostle is just right out. If they are acceptable as a teacher, to what extent? Some end out with supportive ministries, writing, etc., in a way that is not simply a big business. (BTW, it has been said by many that writing books is seldom a source of material income. Despite Lee and his slave-labor, you get no straw dungeon, most people just don't make much on writing books.) Maybe those that are helping beyond one local community or even one assembly are sometimes some kind of apostle. If their function is being realized and used, what would the public designation do? How would things really change?
I'm just wondering if we are going to be like the coyote after getting shrunk to the size of a mouse, when he grabs the road runner (full size) by the ankle and then looks at the screen, and raises a sign that says "Well, I've got him now. What am I supposed to do with him?"
In other words, if we have been going on this long with whatever kind of apostles there might have been, it begins to look like the ongoing benefit of an apostle is not that we identify them but that they are there doing whatever it is that they do.