Apostolic Ministry in the 21st Century

Praise the Lord. It's so good to be with you this afternoon in this General Conference seminar session, and I'm thankful for the opportunity to speak to all of you. Thank you to our General Superintendent, Brother David Bernard, and the committee who have put this seminar together. And our topic today is apostolic ministry in the 21st century. And with all that we are going through on an international level, with global pandemics, I think that we're all learning to do ministry a little different. I believe it is our goal; I believe it is our desire to have apostolic ministry. And I will go a little deeper into that, but I want to start with Ephesians chapter 4, verses 11 and 12 — and I will reference the Scripture, and then I'll come back to it at the end. A very familiar portion of Scripture. It says: "And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers" — verse 12 — "for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ."

I believe that it is the will of God that we see a demonstration of the miraculous by the hands of the people of God on a daily basis. I believe — I truly believe — that we can see everything that the New Testament apostles saw in their ministries. I believe that we can see it in our ministries. And just because I have not seen everything, that does not mean that I will lower the standard of Scripture to my level of experience, just so that I can feel good about myself. But many times we do not have a problem believing that God can do the miraculous, or we can see a divine demonstration overseas. But I believe at times we struggle with the idea that God wants to demonstrate His power in the North American church. We believe that God will do it elsewhere; we believe that God is willing to do it through our missionaries, through evangelists who go overseas. But when it comes to seeing a demonstration of the power of God in our local assemblies, in the North American church, at times we struggle with that idea.

However, we want to see apostolic demonstration in our ministries and our churches; we are not always willing to do what the apostles did. And one of the questions that many people ask is: "Why don't we see more miracles? Why don't we see more of the miraculous in our churches?" And really, I believe the simple answer is this. The simple answer is: we are preaching to the wrong people. Or we could say, we are praying to the wrong people. Because we want God, many times, to give us many miracles in our church buildings. When we speak of the church, and the concept of the church, many times it has been speaking of our buildings. And I think one thing that COVID-19 has done throughout the world has caused every one of us to look outside of our buildings. We've said it for years, that we are the church, that the building is not the church. But now more than ever we have had to go outside of the church. And I believe that when we want to see the miraculous, many times we have focused only on the buildings, because we have built our church culture around our buildings: the building is where we go; it is where we go on Sunday; it is where we go on Wednesday. And many times the majority of the people are not changed between the Sunday services.

But the Word of God is very clear on this point, and the Bible says that He worked miracles to confirm His Word — or confirm the word that was preached. So I believe that we need to make sure that we are preaching to the right people in order to see the miraculous. The Bible says in Romans chapter 15, verse 18 and 19 — the apostle Paul, he says: "For I will not dare to speak of any of those things which Christ hath not wrought by me, to make the Gentiles obedient, by word and deed, through mighty signs and wonders, by the power of the Spirit of God; so that from Jerusalem, and round about unto Illyricum, I have fully preached the gospel of Christ." The Bible says that the apostle Paul made the Gentiles obedient to the gospel by word and deed, through mighty signs and wonders. We see that this was the way that Paul evangelized: he went out and he preached the Word of God, and then the Lord confirmed His Word with signs following. I believe that if we will begin to look outside the four walls of our church and begin to preach the gospel, God will confirm His Word. Because the purpose of signs, wonders, and miracles is not just for our entertainment; the purpose of signs, wonders, and miracles is not just to entertain the body of Christ; but it is so that the Word of God can be confirmed in the hearts of people. So, as we begin to speak to unbelievers, as we begin to preach to them, as we begin to teach them, I believe that we will see many signs and wonders happen when we pray for them. I believe the majority of the miracles that I have seen personally — the majority of them — have been either to new converts or people that have just come in contact with the gospel. And as they have heard the gospel preached, God has confirmed to them, through miracles, signs, and wonders.

The Bible also tells us in Mark chapter 16, and verse 15 through 20, it says: "And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned. And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; they shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover. So then after the Lord had spoken unto them, he was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God." And they went forth — verse 20 says — "and they went forth, and preached every where, the Lord working with them, and confirming the word with signs following. Amen." The Bible says that He worked with them. How did He work with them? By confirming the word with signs following. So we see that the first thing that the apostles did: they go out, they begin to preach; the Lord works with them through signs following.

But however, many times within our culture and our traditions as Pentecostals — many times our church services do not facilitate a way through which the Lord can work with us or work through us. We have allowed our Pentecostal culture, our Pentecostal traditions, to take precedence over an apostolic move of the Spirit of God. And let me be very clear when I speak of traditions: I am not speaking of holiness principles. There have been some that have used the word "traditions" to refer to holiness. I'm not talking about holiness; we believe holiness. But we, as Pentecostals, we have allowed at times traditions or customs in how we do church. We have celebrated our Pentecostal services because of our worship sets, and because we really have a limited move of the Holy Ghost — but we are quick to make sure that that move of the Spirit will fit inside of our hour-and-a-half service. And we have tailored our services to be seeker-friendly. And when we speak of seeker-friendly — the seeker-friendly or seeker-sensitive movement that has gone around the world — it seeks to evangelize people through the application of the latest marketing techniques. They mimic what is popular in our culture: the top-40 performance-style music, the theatrical productions, and the thirty-minutes-or-less positive messages. And those messages, many times centered in self-fulfillment: how the Lord can meet one's need and help solve one's problems. And so the reason we have had to rely on certain techniques, or marketing techniques, is because at times we have lacked a demonstration of the power of God. We have said what we want God to do in a certain amount of time, and we have perfected our sermons enough to entertain the saints, where they can put their time in on Sunday and not be changed on Monday.

And because of our traditional view of the role of pastor, we have not released the saints into the ministry that they have been called to do. In our tradition, our culture as Pentecostals, many times it says that the pastor — he preaches to us; he preaches to us on Sunday morning; he teaches us the Word of God on Wednesday night Bible study. Yet the majority of the saints of God have not been released into the ministry of the saints.

Now that we are here in the year 2020, and we are faced with a worldwide pandemic that has exposed the weaknesses in our church model — at times our pastors recently have tried to connect to people through Zoom meetings and online Bible studies. And we have done the same thing throughout Spain: we have used the technology that has allowed us to connect with our people. And pastors have been running like crazy, trying to teach Bible studies to those who have been faithful because of programs that we have offered, but have fallen away — and left the pastors and leaders really frustrated by people's lack of commitment in these last few months. And because our church culture has been a pastor-centered model, 2020 has been a year of trying to juggle everything: trying to preach, trying to teach, trying to encourage, trying to make phone calls, trying to record devotions — but mostly with a maintenance focus. But I believe that the Lord has been using this time to cause the church to reevaluate what we are doing and why we are doing it. It's been said that COVID-19 has not killed any churches; it has only revealed those that were already dead.

But as we look at the Word of God, and we see the plan of God and the apostolic model, we see in Ephesians 4 and 11, again it says: "And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ." Like in everything, Jesus is the perfect model. Jesus — He should be the center of attention — yet He empowered His disciples and gave them important responsibilities. Jesus: He could do the work better than others; He is the best equipped. But He equips His disciples to do the work, sending them out two by two. One example of the way that Jesus equipped and trained the disciples: this baptism in John chapter 4, verse 2 — it says, "Though Jesus himself baptized not, but his disciples." So Jesus — God manifest in the flesh; all authority and power belongs to Him — yet He gave this job to the disciples. Why? To equip them; to be a model that a leader does not need to do everything himself. Jesus was going to leave, and He had to train up the disciples to do the work. So I believe that we must release the ministers, release the leaders that are in our church, to do the work of the ministry in this last day.

During Pentecost Sunday, just a couple of months ago — when everything was shut down in our church; we were still not allowed to have services; we were not allowed to have buildings — and so I talked to our leaders and I said, "We have got to look for the way to make sure that we can still have people receive the baptism of the Holy Ghost on Pentecost Sunday. We've got to make sure that we have a way that we can still baptize people in the name of Jesus on Pentecost Sunday. They can't come to the building; we're not allowed to come because of the pandemic that is going on. What is it that we can do?" And we just came up with a plan. And on the Saturday before Pentecost Sunday we had a training session — an altar-working training session, online. And then I told our leaders that we're going to go out to the homes, and to the people, of those who need the baptism of the Holy Ghost and the desire to receive the Holy Ghost, and we're going to pray for them. After they hear the preaching of the Word of God from our online service, then you are going to lay hands on them, and they're going to receive the baptism of the Holy Ghost. Well, we sent people out all throughout our city, and this happened all throughout the nation of Spain. And people went into their homes; they began to watch the online services. And as soon as we got done with the online services and we spoke the word of faith, we told the believers that were in their homes now to lay hands on those that wanted to receive the Holy Ghost, and that they would begin to speak in other tongues as they laid hands on people. Throughout the nation of Spain we had 79 people filled with the baptism of the Holy Ghost, and then 50 people were baptized in the name of Jesus. Many miracles were reported at the hands of believers that had been released into the ministry.

I believe that if we are going to be effective in this last-day church, the end-time revival cannot be confined to a building. We do not have enough buildings; our buildings are not large enough. And though we have had a building-focused culture within North America and within Europe, I believe God has used the current situation to cause us to look outside, and to release the saints to do the ministry.

Another thing that we have just begun to do in our church here in Barcelona, Spain, just over the last couple of months — as we have still not been able to have a full-capacity crowd — we decided that we would divide our church up into ten zones. And we divided our church into ten zones, and we put leaders, or supervisors, over each of those zones. And we decided on Sundays we would have ten services, so that everyone would have the opportunity to come into the building. And so we implemented our plan. And so our plan has become that on Saturday nights, as pastor, I preach to the supervisors and the ministers of the church. And at the end of that Saturday evening service, I lay my hands upon those ministers; I lay my hands on those supervisors, and I tell them: "Tomorrow, on Sunday, you're going to have a powerful service. Tomorrow, on Sunday, people are going to receive the baptism of the Holy Ghost under your ministry." And God is using people that have never been used before. God is using them to lay hands on the sick, and the sick are recovering. God is using them to lay hands on those that need to receive the baptism of the Holy Ghost, and God is filling them with the baptism of the Holy Ghost. We are baptizing people almost every Sunday, because people have been released into the ministry.

We have got to understand that God has given to the church — He has given apostles; He has given prophets; He's given evangelists; He has given pastors and teachers — for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry. And so, if we are going to experience apostolic ministry now, in this 21st century, we as the people of God — as the ministry, as teachers, as pastors, as missionaries — we have got to empower people, lay hands upon them, and begin to speak the word of faith, and send them out. And as we send them out, the Lord will work with them. I mean, the Bible says that as they went out, when Jesus sent them out, the Lord worked with them, with signs following. The majority of the miracles that have happened even in our church here in Barcelona have not happened in our services here, as the local assembly gathers together; but they have happened in cell groups. They have happened as leaders, as new converts, have begun to lay hands on the sick, and they have begun to recover. Why? Because they are preaching the gospel — and as they are preaching the gospel, God is confirming His Word through signs following.

I'm thankful for the buildings that we have; I'm thankful for the technology that we have. But I believe, at the same time, as a church, we need to not be so quick to try to get back into our buildings. I know many people are having full services; others are still limited. But we don't need to be so quick to try to get back to normal. We need to allow the Lord to give us direction on what we are to do. I believe this last-day church — we must be more focused on hearing the voice of God and following the leading of His Spirit, on what we are to do to reach this current generation and to have apostolic revival. What has worked for someone else may not work for me. But if I will follow apostolic principles, if I will follow what the apostles' doctrine teaches, and I will follow the voice of the Holy Ghost, He will lead us, and He will tell us what we are to do for our city, for our situation, and for our ministry. So thankful to have been able to be with you. May God bless you this evening. Amen.