The ManicaPost
Pastor Ocean Hamandishe—
ISAIAH 53:1 Who has believed our report? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? NKJVThe scripture above suggests that the Lord has an arm (a hand).This certainly confirms that God can use His hand to do certain work here on earth. Prophet Isaiah was prophesying about the Messiah in this whole chapter of Isaiah53. The scripture was already fulfilled. However, I want to borrow this scripture to build my teaching about the hand of God which He sets to function in the Church today.
The hand of God which I am referring is based on :Eph 4:11 And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, 12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, 13 till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; 14 that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, 15 NKJVThe above scripture talks about the five fold ministry, (the hand of God). This five fold ministry is build by five ministerial gifts given by Christ that is: Apostles, Prophets, Evangelists, Pastors and Teachers. Although there are ranks in the church today, these gifts are all important before God and for the church. The palm of a person is build by five fingers, the fingers work in union assisting each other to bring grip to anything a person could hold. Similarly the church needs the grip of each ministry gift.
Every ministerial gift is very important for the building up of the church. God designed his work in such a way that the Church can not lack any gift. The Apostles are given a mandate to reinforce the foundation of Biblical doctrines, while prophets are there to give direction to the church at any given season. Evangelists were never called to fish out from the fish pond (from other churches) but should go out there to bring lost souls into the church (body of Christ).I am glad that Zimbabweans recently witnessed one example of the function of the five fold ministry in our Nation. An Evangelist sent by God to come to Zimbabwe and worked with different denominations to bring lost souls into the Kingdom of God. He worked tirelessly for 30 nights preaching and reached 14 Cities of Zimbabwe without any intention of building his own church. Pastors and teachers are then supposed to shepherd and ground new believers (those who are called out) to be strong believers in Christ. T However, we can have a glimpse of the whole picture from this little explanation. Each ministry gift should do its work complementing each other. Fulfilling this command of Christ that is : “equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, 13 till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; 14 that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting,
The scenario we are seeing today is that the finger that should be part of the ministerial gift is trying to function in isolation. You can not compare a Prophet and Teacher or an Evangelist with a Pastor, all are anointed in their different capacity and they are all equally important before God as far as his work is concerned.
Pastor Ocean Hamandishe is an Author, entrepreneur & Senior Pastor of Christian Walk Ministries. He oversees churches in Zimbabwe & Mozambique. He holds a Diploma, B A in Theology and Master of Christian Counseling. He Ccan be contacted on +263 -772 602 471/ or [email protected] pastorocean@Apostolic Word Foundations (Knowledge Series)
