Now that God has restored the office of the apostle to the Body of Christ, ministers are scrambling to find out where they stand, and they run to the dictionary to try to define an apostle. My new book, “The Apostolic Calling & Anointing” is a stand-alone personal account of God’s calling upon my life and what He has accomplished to restore the church to apostolic governance, as He turned the church back to the cross of Christ.

The reason behind limited definitions of an apostle is two-fold: first, ministers are trying to define the calling without first-hand experience, and second, they don’t understand the terms or articles of the new covenant for which Jesus shed His blood. The new covenant is Jesus Christ Himself.

Asking themselves, “what the word “apostle” meant to those living in the time the New Covenant was written”, reveals a basic fundamental fatal flaw in the reasoning about apostles, which invalidates Jesus Christ.

An apostle is not a “word” written on a piece of paper, but a living steward of God’s grace to whom God gives authority to teach the doctrine of Christ, to thus equip believers with the foundation of truth to discern the face of Christ.

Why did Jesus select apostles? Was it to keep Him company? No. He selected apostles to instruct the church (Acts 2:42). A believer of the first century was under the stewardship of the apostles and, therefore, learned what it meant to be in Christ (in covenant with God). The “writings” of the apostles was to set in order the terms and tools of the new covenant, as these are the conditions under which God would receive their faith and reciprocate with many gifts to confirm His love to them. They ensured that truth would remain pure, as God intended.

So a better question would be to ask, What did believers of the first century experience under the stewardship of living apostles? Noting, for example, that as believers received instruction in the new covenant law of grace and truth and were taught how to handle the tools of Christ, the Spirit of God taught them true holiness as a process of regeneration.

This is a strong contrast to past holiness movements and current efforts to revive holiness thinking and mindsets, whereas ministers provoke repentance apart from the new covenant. These challenges and strategies are not apostolic and lead the church into greater despair. The unsanctified steward recycles their frustrations to find equity.

As long as the apostles calling and anointing is in “word” only and not in deed, it will be impossible for ministers to gain clarity about the calling. Clarity follows obedience, not word study.

Apostles were the spearhead for God’s shift. They would no longer be leading believers to worship God with the tools touched by the blood of an animal (under the first covenant). That pattern was given to Moses (the steward of the first covenant).

The Old Covenant Blueprint: God gave Moses the pattern of all things He intended to give the children of Israel for their faith to be accepted. Moses was the voice of God to the people.

Exodus 25:9
“According to all that I shew thee, after the pattern of the tabernacle, and the PATTERN of all the instruments thereof, even so shall ye make it.”

Moses helped the people to understand the terms of God’s covenant and the connection between the blood and the tools and the exercise of their faith.

Hebrews 9:18-21
¹⁸ Whereupon neither the first testament [First Covenant] was dedicated without blood.

¹⁹ For when Moses had spoken every precept to all the people according to the law, he took the blood of calves and of goats, with water, and scarlet wool, and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book, and all the people.

²⁰ Saying, “This is the blood of the testament which God hath enjoined unto you.”

²¹ Moreover he sprinkled with blood both the tabernacle, and all the vessels of the ministry.

When we say that the first covenant was sealed with the blood of an animal, we can now understand what the word “seal” means. It means to bear the mark of God’s approval. For if the children of Israel did not know what God approves of (covenant, terms, tools) how could they commit their faith to it? We’re looking at this pattern here in the old covenant so that we can apply the same pattern to the new covenant when we look at the blood of Jesus Christ that God sprinkled upon the new covenant terms and tools.

The New Covenant Blueprint: God established that pattern in Moses to teach us what apostles do today. God gave the pattern (blueprint of truth) to the apostles to give to the people.

1 Corinthians 3:10
“According to the grace of God which is given unto me, as a wise masterbuilder, I have laid the foundation, and another buildeth thereon. But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon.”

The Lord did not just pour a bunch of bricks into this dimension and allow everyone to build and construct faith according to his own imagination. We don’t construct according to our imagination. We construct according to a pattern. That’s what a master builder does. Understanding what the pattern is, he has the oversight of the building project.

We learned in Hebrews 9:18-21 that Moses sprinkled the blood of an animal upon the things of the first covenant to sanctify the people and join their faith to God. God was setting a pattern for us to understand the new covenant. God sprinkled the blood of Jesus upon the commandments and tools of the second covenant (your menu) to sanctify and join your faith to God.

In the scriptures below we not only see a transition of faith from the old to the new covenant, but a repeat of history as God sprinkles the blood of Jesus onto the new covenant to sanctify and direct our faith to Him.

Hebrews 8:13
“In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away.”

Hebrews 12:24
“And to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling, that speaketh better things than that of Abel.”

1 Peter 1:2
“Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ.”

Colossians 2:20-22
“Wherefore if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances, (Touch not; taste not; handle not; Which all are to perish with the using;) after the commandments and doctrines of men?”

The apostles taught that we now use Jesus’ spiritual tools to be joined to Him. Every new testament epistle was written by an apostle. The apostles are called of God to teach the people just like Moses was called of God to teach the people. The apostles are like the waiter who hands out the menu God designed for the new covenant. They serve the food (the knowledge of Christ), they answers your questions about how your faith works (the terms of the new covenant) so that your spiritual diet is wholesome. They direct your attention to the menu (knowledge and spiritual tools) so that you are empowered to partake of Christ.

Jesus’ apostles helped the people transition from the covenant of Moses to the covenant of Jesus Christ and saw to it that no one was caught in the middle of two covenants. We can see the importance of apostolic stewardship. The apostle is also like the captain of a ship. God sends apostles to help believers navigate through the shallow waters of the flesh into the depth of Christ, which allows their confidence to grow through contact with Jesus. A believer does not make himself captain of the ship.