Barnabas The Encourager Series

Words are powerful tools of influence. All of us can speak words and so all of us have the power to

encourage or discourage others. The life of Victor Sirebianca is a radical illustration of the power of

words. His teacher said to him, "You are a dummy. You will never graduate. You will always be a

dummy. Go get a vocation and stop wasting your time and everybody else's." Victor figured she

should know what she was talking about, and so he dropped out of school. For the next 16 years he

just bummed around the country working at different jobs.

He was 32 years old and going nowhere as a dummy. Then an acquaintance said to him, "You

should go and get tested to see just what you potential is. You could amount to something." With

this encouragement Victor went and got tested. He discovered that he had an IQ of 160. He was a

genius. He decided to act like a genius and he began to invent things and get patents on them. Then

he wrote a best seller book. He became the International Chairman of the Amenza Society where

you have to have an IQ of 140 to be a member. Because somebody encouraged him to be what he

could be he stopped being a dummy and became the genius he was. He was always a genius, of

course, but the fact is, he was also a dummy for believing the words of discouragement.

We believe what we tell ourselves about ourselves, and if we are influenced by negative people,

we will have a negative self-image. If we believe the encourager we will have a positive self-image.

That is why every person is truly blest if they have a Barnabas in their lives, for Barnabas was an

encourager. He always saw the good side of people. He saw past their failures to their potential for

good. It is amazing we do not know Barnabas better, for he is one of the most influential men in the

New Testament. He played a major role in the early history of the church, and a major role in the

lives of the men who wrote the New Testament. Yet he seems like an obscure person because we do

not know much about him compared to Matthew, Mark, Luke and Paul. He was a man behind the

scenes who encouraged great men like them to be all they could be.

The first man he greatly encouraged was Paul. When Paul was first converted Christians were

afraid of him. He had been a brutal enemy of the Christian faith. He had arrested many and had

even aided in their deaths. The Christians in Jerusalem were fearful when he came. Acts 9:26 says,

"When he came to Jerusalem, he tried to join the disciples, but they were afraid of him, not believing

that he really was a disciple." This was a very strange situation for Paul. He wanted to be their

friend, but they were suspicious. The next verse provided the solution. Verse 27 says, "But

Barnabas took him and brought him to the Apostles." Barnabas took him right to the top and made

it clear that Paul was truly converted and was a great messenger of the Gospel. After this Paul could

move about freely and speak boldly in the name of Jesus. Barnabas was the friend that helped Paul

overcome his bad image and become an accepted spokesman of the faith.

Barnabas went on to play a major role in the history of Paul In Acts 11 we see the church at

Jerusalem sending Barnabas to Antioch where many were coming to Christ. Verse 23 says that

when he saw the great work he was glad and encouraged them to remain true to the Lord with all

their hearts. Verse 24 describes Barnabas: "He was a good man, full of the Holy Spirit and faith.."

People were coming to Christ under his ministry. He could have had all the glory of this great work,

but verse 25 says that he went to Tarsus to look for Paul. He brought him back to Antioch, and for

a year they taught the faith to great numbers of people.

It was there in Antioch that disciples were first called Christians. Paul never would have been

there for that great experience had Barnabas not gone to get him. Barnabas was the great

encourager of Paul. He was back in his hometown of Tarsus when Barnabas came to him. Who

know what was going on in his mind at that time? Was he fading out of the picture? Was he going

to settle down in his hometown and become a professor? We don't know what his plans were. All

we know is that Barnabas went and got him and took him into active ministry that changed his life