Shares of Apple (AAPL) - Get Report were climbing nearly 5% on the heels of issuing its first-quarter earnings beat on both the top and bottom line, while boasting an impressive amount of cash ($240 billion) on hand. Perhaps the metric most investors will key in on is the 18% growth in Apple's service revenue stream.

"This was one of those quarters where you change the narrative of what Apple is," TheStreet's Jim Cramer said on CNBC's "Squawk on the Street" Wednesday morning. Instead of being quantified by devices, "this was a service quarter."

The service revenue stream could prove so lucrative for Apple as the company has a robust installed base of about 150 million subscribers paying per month for services. That base, "generates a gigantic amount of money through a revenue stream," Cramer said.

That "lucrative" revenue stream stands to double over the next four years, he added.

"This is why you get a price to earnings multiple that is better than what Apple gets," Cramer noted. "If you add up what the company has given back to you and what the company has, its equivalent to the value of the stock a month and a half ago."

Another aspect of Apple's quarter Cramer came away impressed with, was how the company steered the services revenue narrative on last night's conference call.

"The last four calls were dictated by some analysts who didn't believe in the company or Tim Cook, really questioning where he was with the car and services," Cramer said. "Those dissidents have to eat crow."

(Apple is a core holding of Jim Cramer's charitable trust Action Alerts PLUS. See all of his holding with a free trialhere.)