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Conservative descriptions tend to domesticate the more offensive gifts
Conservatives [i.e. Shepherds and Teachers] would rather talk about “abiding,” discipleship, and community–all low-risk activities–and would rather describe the work of evangelists as simply being excellent neighbors who throw good barbeques. This is the domesticated version of what shepherds and teachers think evangelists should be. In truth, evangelists cause offense with frontline preaching of the gospel in public. If your evangelists don’t cause your leadership team occasional embarrassment, they are not evangelists.…
What is the five fold ministry
The acronym APEST describes five spiritual gifts that Christ embodied and distributed to humanity. It’s not the only list of spiritual gifts, but it’s the one that seems most to describe the architecture of a church community, since these are given for the building up of the Church. But what are they exactly? 5Q Central describes the five gifts by the question, “What would this gift do with a bar of chocolate?…
Apostles co-create with God
When I ponder the spiritual gifts listed in Ephesians, APEST, I think about function. What does an apostle do? How is it different/similar to the evangelist’s gift? Rarely do I consider the experience of using the gift with God. Jessie Cruickshank offers a beautiful homily on the parental feeling inherent in giving birth to God’s kingdom in the world. She meditates on Mary's experience as the God-bearer, the prophets of the LORD, and the artisans of the Tabernacle.…
Jesus fulfills the roles and gifts
I’m often struck by the upside-down way that Jesus represents the roles of prophet, priest and king and the gifts: apostle, prophet, evangelist, shepherd and teacher (APEST). He is a king, but he does not use his authority to wage war upon Rome as the insurrectionists planned or as King David did against the surrounding nations. Instead He used the kingly authority to deliver and serve. He is a prophet, and… well, actually, His prophetic acts seem identical to the prophets of old.…
All biblical roles and gifts express imago dei
The three dominant roles in the Hebrew Bible, prophet, priest, and king, are fulfilled in Jesus. I had originally thought because the Hebrew Bible used these roles to point towards Him (which it does), but had not realized that these three roles are subsets of the original Image of God role from Genesis 1. That’s so helpful to realize that humans are created to reflect, not only simply one of these roles, but all three combined, and that each demonstrate, albeit incompletely, what we are as Icons of God.…