The Great (and Worrisome) Irony of APEST

The Great (and Worrisome) Irony of APEST April 28, 2017

There is an irony that might be missed by those who have embraced the APEST typology advocated by Alan Hirsch, Mike Breen, and others in the Missional Movement.

In our desire to overcome an overbearing leadership structure that was found in putting so much power in the Shepherd-Teacher, we are in danger of creating yet another overbearing leadership structure but with different leaders. We worry so much about the destructive nature of institutionalism that we shift the focus from 2/5 of the APEST typology to the other 3/5.

I see an irony here: With the emphasis on APEST, I believe that we are still not focused on what God ultimately desires. We are still talking solely talking about how Christians can serve within the local church. While it is important that Christians find their place of service within their local body, utilizing their gifts to do so, what we are called to do is articulated plainly in Ephesians 4:11-13: Equip the saints!

Equip them for what? For their work of ministry and for the building up of the body of Christ. Instead of equipping Christians for their work of ministry, church leaders are more interested in equipping Christians for the church leaders’ work of ministry. Instead of building up Christians so that they can live as disciples of Christ in every aspect of their lives, church leaders narrowly focus on the development of the church’s ministry, as if that is the only thing that matters. (Please don’t hear me saying that the local church is not crucial to discipleship – it is the gathering where we worship and encourage each other to live life out there in the world).

The Two Spheres Church Leaders Need to Tend

glassWhile there must be structures for church leadership so that believers can be made fit for their purposes in life, to say that therefore the goal is to help each believer fulfill their place in the APEST typology is a major misstep. The misstep is not in the desire to create a healthy church community, it is in presuming that Ephesians 4:11-12 is about developing every Christian to become one of these specific things within that community – either an apostle, a prophet, an evangelist, a shepherd, or a teacher. It remains solely focused on developing Christians for the sake of the local church rather than focusing on developing normal, everyday Christians in their vocational callings as the priesthood of believers.

Those in full-time church ministry too easily forget that there are two spheres that church leadership must constantly tend to: (1) The development and implementation of church leadership and (2) the development and implementation of regular, ordinary Christians in their work outside of the church context, utilizing their gifts for the common good.

The APEST typology may be in danger of not doing enough to shift the focus toward the Priesthood of All Believers and away from the authority figures in the church. The goal should be equipping and empowering Christians to be Salt and Light in every nook and cranny of the world in which they find themselves.

However, in an ironic twist, the effort to overcome one overbearing leadership structure may lead to another overbearing leadership structure. Why? Because APEST is still almost exclusively about the important sphere of developing the local church. It is still not about the main goal: the equipping of the saints for their works of ministry.

The Whole Counsel of Scripture

The problem stems from placing far too much emphasis on this one section of this one Epistle (Alan Hirsch actually calls Ephesians 4:11 the “Constitution” for the Church) without allowing the rest of Scripture to inform us as well. I already criticized APEST for falsely separating the Pastor-Teacher role that should not be separated and for ignoring the fact that the Pastoral Letters do not go into the need to develop all Christians into the typology of APEST but rather focus on the offices of “Elders” and “Overseers” who are able to teach people so that they can mature.

Other important Scriptures that are not dealt with nearly enough in the APEST typology are those that Paul uses to explain the other gifts that God gives his people in Romans 12:6-8, 1 Corinthians 7:7, 1 Corinthians 12:8-10, and 1 Corinthians 12:28.

When we look at the gifts listed in all these passages, we find that Paul does not attempt to be exhaustive in any one of them. In the lists that Paul provides in his letters, there are overlaps of the same gifts, and some gifts might actually be synonyms of gifts in another list. Sometimes there seems to be an order to the gifts (like in 1 Corinthians 12:28, where Paul puts apostles first and prophets second, but then, in a break from our Ephesians 4 passage, skips ahead to teachers). Mostly, it seems that Paul is just listing off random samples of gifts, without any desire for us to place too much emphasis on order or what’s missing or included.

Some scholars believe that the reason Paul doesn’t provide long, meticulous lists is that these gifts have so many different expressions in different Christians that to do so would be to make it appear that Paul is limiting the number and kinds of gifts the Spirit will bestow on any one Christian. No one Christian’s mix of gifts will be exactly like another Christian’s mix.

Here are the lists:

Romans 12:6–8

  • prophecy
  • serving
  • teaching
  • encouraging
  • contributing
  • leadership
  • mercy

1 Corinthians 7:7

  • marriage
  • celibacy

1 Corinthians 12:8–10

  • word of wisdom
  • word of knowledge
  • faith
  • gifts of healing
  • miracles
  • prophecy
  • distinguishing between spirits
  • tongues
  • interpretation of tongues

1 Corinthians 12:28

  • apostle
  • prophet
  • teacher
  • miracles
  • kinds of healings
  • helps
  • administration
  • tongues

Ephesians 4:11

  • apostle
  • prophet
  • evangelist
  • pastor-teacher

So, the questions raised to those advocating APEST are:

  • Why are we focused on just this one list of spiritual gifts?
  • What about all the other gifts that God’s Spirit freely gives to his people?

Do You See the Worrisome Irony?

The APEST typology has a danger of putting too much emphasis on one list of gifts given to the church, a list that they see as the constitution, or the key to church structure. They are even providing new “Spiritual Gifts Tests” (remember those?) but just focusing on the five gifts listed in Ephesians 4 rather than all of the gifts listed in the New Testament (let alone the even greater number of gifts found in the Old Testament!) – gifts that are meant to create in God’s people a deep reliance on God’s Spirit to provide the ability to do their work of ministry.

In the desire to spread the ministry of the church away from the exclusive grip of the Pastor-Teachers by emphasizing the Apostles, Prophets, and Evangelists of Ephesians 4:11, we ironically are simply moving from one narrow set of gifts to another narrow set.

It moves away from the plethora of gifts given to all of God’s people so that they can do the work of ministry. It mistakenly states that all believers must somehow fit into the APEST typology rather than relying on God’s Spirit to provide, in a vast and various ways, the power to do their ministry!


Image by Cindee Re. Used with permission. Sourced via Flickr.


Browse Our Archives

Follow Us!