[Evangelical]

Many protestants believe that the "bible replaced the apostles". Actually they are wrong because in history it was the Catholic bishopry which replaced the apostles. Nothing to do with the Bible. There is no Bible verse which says "the bishops of the Catholic church will now replace the apostles". This idea continued with the Lutheran and Anglican churches, unchallenged. Those bishops eventually became pastors or senior pastors in Protestant evangelicalism, unchallenged. This idea of bishopry replacing apostles has never really changed since the Catholics started it. Today the idea is that "pastors replaced the apostles". Pastors function in more or less the same way as Catholic bishops.

Today the function which most closely resembles the work that Paul and other early apostles did is the missionaries. Missionaries go to unreached places, preach the gospel, sometimes with signs and wonders, and plant and build churches. Today the word missionary is used to describe a person who probably would have been called an apostle in the Bible times. No one would call a missionary an apostle today because pastors who replaced apostles in the church believe "apostles don't exist anymore". Bishops, priests or pastors replaced apostles in the church. Missionaries replaced apostles in the field. But clearly the function and need for apostles remains.

It depends on whether we believe the Catholic bishops should have replaced the apostles or not. If the Catholics were right and the bishops replaced the apostles, then every denomination which is headed by a senior pastor is right. If the work of an apostle is still needed today, then to presume that apostles don't exist anymore or that God replaced them with anything or did away with them is very shortsighted and missing the bigger picture of God's plan. To say that we don't need or have apostles today is to also say that we don't need evangelism, miracles, planting churches etc.