This is one of the many questions that come to our desk and we wish to give you a biblical answer with all respect and reverence to the infallible word of God.

To answer this question we will have to answer two related questions:

1) What does the word apostle mean?     

2) What were the requirements to be an apostle?

What does the word apostle mean?

The word in Greek is apostles and means delegate, messenger or envoy. In the Bible the term is used in three different ways:

In a unique sense – The Bible refers to Christ as the “apostle and high priest of our profession” (Heb. 3:1). In this sense Jesus is not only an apostle but The Apostle. Only of Jesus can it be said that he was sent by the Father to give his life for the sins of the world (John 3:16-17, 34, 5:36-38, 8:42).

In a specific sense – Scripture uses the word apostle in a specific sense to speak of a special group of people, the twelve, Matthias, and the apostle Paul (Mt. 10:2-4; Luke 6:12-16; Acts 1:26; Gal. 1:1). They were chosen by God to be his special representatives to the world. We will explain this in more detail later.

In a general sense – Certain leaders chosen by the churches with a specific task were also considered apostles, in a different sense than the one mentioned above. 2 Corinthians 8:23 A group of brothers are called “messengers” (in Greek, apostles). Philippians 2:25 Epaphroditus is called “messenger” (Greek for apostle). These brothers were apostles, though not in the specific sense of the twelve, Matthias and Paul. They had simply been chosen by a group of believers with a commission. The brothers mentioned in 2 Corinthians 8:23 They had been chosen by the churches to bring an offering to the poor believers in Jerusalem (2 Cor. 8-9) and Epaphroditus had been chosen by the church of Philippi to bring material help to Paul, who was imprisoned (Phil. 2:25, 4:18). It should be noted that they are not called apostles of Christ (1 Cor. 1:1; 1 Pe. 1:1), but apostles or messengers of the churches (2 Cor. 8:23; Phil. 2:25).

What were the requirements to be an apostle of Jesus Christ?

After the Lord ascended to the right hand of the Father, the apostles decided to recognize who had been chosen by God to replace Judas Iscariot. Some scholars maintain that the apostles were hasty in appointing Matthias since, they argue, it should have been the apostle Paul who replaced Judas. The position taken on this point is irrelevant for the purposes of this writing. What is essential to answer our question is to note that in the process of appointing Matthias we can see four requirements necessary for a person to replace Judas and be considered an apostle.

In Acts 1:21-22 we read the following:

^“It is necessary then, that of these men who have accompanied us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, beginning from the baptism of John until that day when He was taken up from us, one of these men should become a witness with us of His resurrection.

In this passage we can notice three requirements to be an apostle:

Being an eyewitness to the resurrection of Christ. All the apostles saw Christ with their physical eyes after His resurrection, including the apostle Paul who was an eyewitness to His resurrection on the road to Damascus (1 Cor. 9:1, 15:8; Acts 9:3-5; 26:16). That is why he defends his apostolate before the Corinthians with the words “…have I not seen Jesus our Lord?” (1 Cor. 9:1). Some claim to have seen Jesus in vision. This does not meet the requirement of being an eyewitness of Christ's resurrection. Paul saw Christ ocularly and yet he considers his call to the apostleship to be unique and abnormal, for he was the only and last of the apostles to see Jesus ocularly. That is why he wrote that the Lord appeared to him “last of all, as to one untimely born” (1 Cor. 15:8).

Having learned and received the doctrine directly from Jesus, not from other believers. The apostles learned the doctrines related to the New Testament directly from Christ. They spent three years learning from Him during His earthly ministry and after His ascension they continued to learn from Christ through direct revelation from Him. The apostle Paul emphasizes this requirement in defending his apostleship in his epistle to the Galatians. “Now I make known to you, brothers, that the gospel which was preached by me is not according to man; for I neither received it from man nor was I taught it, but I was taught it through a revelation from Jesus Christ.” (Gal. 1:11-12).

An apostle did not learn the teachings of the New Testament from any man, not even from other apostles (Gal. 1:16-17), but directly from Christ.

The apostles were to give evidence of their apostleship with miracles. The apostles gave evidence of their calling with miraculous signs (Acts 3:1-10, 4:33, 5:12-16, 9:32-43, 13:11, 14:3, 8-9, 16:18, 19:6, 11-12, 20:9-10, 28:3-10). That is why Paul also defends his apostleship by referring to the miracles performed by him: “But the signs of an apostle were accomplished among you with all perseverance, in signs and wonders and miracles.” (2 Cor. 12:12). Although some today claim to perform the miracles that the apostles did, the reality is that such claims are not true. The apostles healed in extraordinary, immediate, complete, irrefutable, and continuous ways. After the apostles, there has never been a time of abundant miracles comparable to that of the early church.

Being chosen by God as an apostle. Having learned the doctrine directly from Christ, having seen him with his eyes and performing miracles was not enough to be considered an apostle of Jesus Christ. Many people heard the Word of God directly from the lips of Jesus, more than five hundred brothers saw him after he was resurrected (1 Cor. 15:6) and people who performed miracles were not considered apostles (Acts 7:5-8). An apostle was a person personally chosen by Christ for that position (Acts 1:2; Gal. 1:1, 15-16).

Considering these requirements is enough to conclude that we do not have apostles today. No one today has seen Christ with the eye, no one today is performing miracles like those performed by the apostles, and no one today learns their doctrine by direct revelation from Christ without the need of teachers and the New Testament, and this is enough to conclude that there are no apostles today. God does not call people apostles who do not meet the requirements that He Himself established.

The Apostle Paul clearly said that he was the last of the apostles and never ordained apostles in the churches. In Revelation 2:2 it is also said that there were people who gave themselves that title as well as today.

In Ephesians 2:20, apostles are referred to as “foundation” men. A foundation is laid only once, at the beginning of the building project. Apostles were needed at the beginning of the church age to carry out their special “foundation” ministry.

Today no one meets the requirements of an apostle, because an apostle had to have SEEN the RISEN CHRIST (1 Corinthians 9:1; 15:8-9 and Acts 1:22—when they were looking for a replacement for Judas).

Christ does not appear to men today (1 Peter 1:8; John 16:10).

Application: see Acts 2:42. Today we do not have apostles, but we have the DOCTRINE or the TEACHING OF THE APOSTLES.

I hope it has been edifying to your spiritual life.

God bless you

Pastor Martin Wolf

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