Building up the “Body of Christ”
Apostles, prophets, pastors, teachers, evangelists, are the gifts of the risen Christ to His Church. There should be no rivalry among them. Each has his own work to do, as each wheel in a watch has its special function. None can do the work of another, and none should try to do it. The Apostles laid the foundations of the City of God, and the work of each is represented by a different stone. The pastor prepares the ground and sows the seed for the harvest which the evangelist reaps; but God will proportion the reward between them. The teacher is as much needed as the evangelist, but neither is so essential as God, who giveth the increase. Without that all labor would be in vain.
We learn from Ephesians 4:12 that the prime duty of all these agents is not to baptize, marry, and bury the saints, to comfort and console them, and to get them somehow into heaven, as the Arab guides get travelers to the top of the Pyramids. Their duty is to perfect, that is, to adjust the saints for the work of ministry, that they may contribute to the building up of the Church. A minister is a failure if he does all the work himself. The people must all be at work-in the quarries, or shaping the stones, or fitting them into their places.