The DNA of an Encourager
Unedited transcript of sermon delivered at Windsor Park Baptist Church
550 East Coast Rd, Mairangi Bay, Auckland, New Zealand, E-mail: bnw@wpbc.org.nz
Sunday 18/3/2001, Brian Winslade, All rights reserved
Unless stated otherwise, all Scripture quotations in this publication are taken from the HOLY BIBLE. NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Bible Publishers
I want to introduce you to a friend of mine. He is one of those guys who really inspires you in life. Whenever you hear anything about him or what he has done it motivates you to do something similar. His name is Joe. He’s a Jew by ethnic background although he actually grew up in Cyprus.
Really good mentors in life are like gold. To have a positive role model to look up to and follow is really helpful and Joe is one of those kind of people. Not only is his own life really encouraging but just noting the way he lives and goes about life inspires you to do something similar yourself. His attitude towards people kind of rubs off on you.
Actually I suspect a number of you know my friend Joe or at least you have heard about him. Some of the things he has done have made him rather famous. However, I suspect he wouldn’t want to accept much in the way of credit - he is more of a “behind the scenes” type of person.
In introducing my friend Joe I guess I need to come clean and admit to the fact that I have never actually met him personally. You see he lived 2000 years ago; he’s a character we read about in the New Testament. But the fact that we have never met face to face doesn’t diminish in any way the respect I have for him or the impact his life has on mine.
When I say that a number of you also know Joe, or at least about him, you may not recognise him by that name. Joseph was the name that his parents gave him but most people recognise him by the nickname that the leaders of the early church gave him. They didn’t call him Joe, they called him Barnabas. The term Barnabas was derived from two words or phrases: “bar” was like a personal pronoun meaning “son of…” and “nabas” referred to prophetic exhortation that encouraged or built people up. So Barnabas literally meant “son of encouragement”, and it was a nickname which stuck for Joe throughout a large chunk of his life.
To call someone the “son of something” in Jewish culture was a way of describing their character – as if they were the offspring or outcome of a particular behaviour. For instance, the disciples of Jesus, James and John, where from the Zebedee family but their nickname was “sons of thunder” – presumably because of their personality. Barnabas, or “son of encouragement”, was a way of describing or capturing the personality of a person who was extremely encouraging to be around. To be known as Barnabas was a huge compliment. It represented a reputation of incredible honour. People thought well of you. When your name was mentioned the muscles in the faces of people formed into a smile, rather than a grimace. To be known as Barnabas was to have an extremely positive reputation. People looked forward to spending time with you.
I would venture to suggest that the reputation of Barnabas is something that every one of us would aspire to. I am yet to meet anybody who genuinely wants to be disliked or hated by other people. All of us want to be loved and accepted, but also to have other people think well of us. Sometimes we might behave in ways that achieve the opposite but I doubt if any of us would turn down the offer of a reputation like our friend Joe had. To have people refer to us as an encourager or someone positive and uplifting to be around is a goal we would all aim to achieve.
So what was it about this character Barnabas that was so different? Are there elements in Barnabas-type DNA that we can clone or genetically modify into our personal genetic code that would somehow give us that kind of reputation? Can the character of Barnabas be duplicated to the extent that we too become “Barnabai”
I want to lead us on a journey of discovery into the life of Joseph, known as Barnabas, to see if there are any keys in his genetic code that we can impute into our personality. Let me initially suggest three things ;
1. Barnabas DNA is characteristically generous not tightfisted.
There are around 34 referenced to Barnabas in the New Testament; all but five of them appear in the Book of Acts. The first definitive reference we have to him is in Acts 4:36 where Luke, the author of the Book of Acts, had been writing about the incredible sense of community and fellowship that existed amongst the first Christians. People were sharing their excess or surplus wealth with others in the church in need and Luke gave a specific example ;
36 Joseph, a Levite from Cyprus, whom the apostles called Barnabas (which means Son of Encouragement), 37 sold a field he owned and brought the money and put it at the apostles’ feet.
Acts 4:36
In other words one of the first pieces in the Barnabas DNA jigsaw is financial stewardship. Barnabas was a source of encouragement to the church by sharing in it’s finances. The implication is that although he originally came from Cyprus he had been living in Jerusalem for some time. Perhaps he came from a family with money and landholdings in Cyprus which he no longer needed. Now living in Jerusalem he saw huge need right in front of him – what was the point of hanging onto property that was surplus to requirements? So he sold it and gave the proceeds to the church. Barnabas obviously wasn’t the only one doing this kind of thing. There were other people placing money and resources at the feet of the Apostles too, he was merely singled out as one example of generosity.
Perhaps is was because of his generous heart towards people in need that the early church leaders called him “son of encouragement”. I am sure his sizable gift was a huge encouragement to the church and especially to those who were the recipients of its ministry. Perhaps another expression of his encouragement was his willingness to trust the leaders in the church to wisely distribute his gifts. V.37 talks about Barnabas and others laying their gifts at the feet of the Apostles and then leaving it to the church to disperse the proceeds according to where needs were most prevalent.
Some people in our day and age are only willing to give if they can personally track where the money is going. They don’t trust the church. Of course in some cases the church shouldn’t be trusted! There are more than a few cases where church leaders mishandle the gifts of God’s people. However Barnabas did trust the Apostles. He encouraged them by letting them determine where best finance was needed rather than tagging his giving according to his own limited experience. Whichever way you look at it the first piece of the Barnabas DNA jigsaw is generosity. Out of his excess he gave to the ministry of God’s people.
2. Barnabas DNA sees the potential in people that others miss.
It would seem that Barnabas had a sixth sense when it came to recognising people’s value. He saw what others couldn’t see, or perhaps what others refused to see, because of their prejudice. There are two particular occasions where Barnabas’ HR skills are noted in the development of the early church.
The first is in Acts 9. In the first part of Acts 9 it describes the dramatic conversion of a man called Saul. Saul was a devout Jew who began to mercilessly persecute followers of Jesus. He had believers arrested and tried and sentenced to death and there was huge fear amongst the early Christians about what Saul might do to them. Then the most amazing thing happened. En route to the city of Damascus Saul has a personal encounter with the Lord. Saul is blinded with a bright light and as a result himself becomes a follower of Jesus. The fierce persecutor of Christians all of a sudden becomes one of the people he has been trying to hunt down.
It’s not hard to imagine how the early Christians would have been a little bit suspicious about the validity of Saul’s conversion experience. Was it really genuine or was he just a ruse so that he could get access to the inside of the church?
Imagine how we might respond if someone who was mercilessly persecuting us all of a sudden wanted to join our community. How would you respond to an obnoxious neighbour who is attempting to sue you over a boundary dispute, and then all of a sudden sends you a dinner invitation. You would be really cautious.
That’s exactly what happened to Saul.
26 When he came to Jerusalem, he tried to join the disciples, but they were all afraid of him, not believing that he really was a disciple.
Acts 9:26
But there was one person in the Jerusalem church who saw beyond fear and skepticism.
27 But Barnabas took him and brought him to the apostles. He told them how Saul on his journey had seen the Lord and that the Lord had spoken to him, and how in Damascus he had preached fearlessly in the name of Jesus. 28 So Saul stayed with them and moved about freely in Jerusalem, speaking boldly in the name of the Lord.
Acts 9:27-28
Barnabas was an independent thinker. He didn’t conform to the values or prejudices or fears of the crowd. He saw in Saul the grace of God at work. We might say that Barnabas’ view of God was big enough to save or turn around the vilest of sinners, and he was willing to give Saul a second chance. Because of Barnabas Saul actually became accepted in the church. He encouraged Saul by helping him get across the doorstep of the church for the first time. He saw something new and possible for Saul and took the risk of giving him a go when others only wanted to write him off.
The second incident when Barnabas saw the potential in a person that others were rejecting is found in Acts 15. As time went on Barnabas and Saul (or Paul as he came to later been known) formed a pretty formidable ministry team. They ended up travelling internationally preaching the gospel and planting churches. However in Acts 15 they experienced a serious dispute.
36 Some time later Paul said to Barnabas, ‘‘Let us go back and visit the brothers in all the towns where we preached the word of the Lord and see how they are doing.” 37 Barnabas wanted to take John, also called Mark, with them, 38 but Paul did not think it wise to take him, because he had deserted them in Pamphylia and had not continued with them in the work. 39 They had such a sharp disagreement that they parted company. Barnabas took Mark and sailed for Cyprus, 40 but Paul chose Silas and left, commended by the brothers to the grace of the Lord.
Acts 15:36-40
This character Mark is an interesting one in the early days of the church. We know that he and Barnabas were actually cousins (Colossians 4:10) and it is generally regarded that Mark was a young lad during the ministry of Jesus. He is the author of the second gospel in the New Testament. However he also made a very serious mistake. He had been part of Paul and Barnabas’ ministry team some years earlier but had whimped out when the going got tough. He ran away or left them in the lurch. As far as Paul was concerned Mark had done his chips. He was no longer credible as a servant of the Lord. He couldn’t be trusted.
But Barnabas saw something in Mark that Paul couldn’t. Yes, he had failed. He had really let them down and no doubt Paul had some justification at being angry at him. However, Barnabas also saw potential for good. Barnabas saw beyond failure or mistakes to future and restoration. Barnabas was willing to give him another go. The conflict between Paul and Barnabas was so severe over this issue that they ended up parting company.
So who had the right perspective? In the end I believe it was Barnabas not Paul. At some point further on in Paul’s ministry he must have come to that conclusion himself because Mark appears again in Paul’s letters as one of his trusted companions. Paul describes him as a faithful servant of the Lord. In other words Barnabas gave a “failure” a second chance and Mark went on to be a powerful servant of the Lord.
Let me ask you 2 questions in the light of Barnabas’ HR perspective :
Who are the people who believe in you when others wanted to write you off?
I suspect all of us can identify a Barnabas or two in our past who gave us a second chance. Maybe it was a parent or a relative or a teacher or a church leader or a close friend. Christianity means second chances. Every now and again when I want a bit of a laugh I read through some of my old sermons from when I first started out in pastoral ministry in 1979. What a long suffering and encouraging people there have been in my past that cheered me on and encouraged me to pursue a calling God had given me.
Who are we believing or investing in today whom others would like to write off?
In 2 Corinthians 5:16 there is an interesting statement by the Apostle Paul about how we view the character of people now that we are a Christian.
16 So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer
2 Corinthians 5:16
In the kingdom of God we see things about people that others don’t see. The world says things like “you can tell the character of a man by the strength of his handshake” or “first impressions in an employment interview are usually accurate”. We look at history and the track record of a person and say that they are no good for the future because of their mistakes in the past. However, in the kingdom of God we view people differently.
In 1 Samuel 16 the Prophet Samuel was scouting for a new king of Israel to follow after Saul. Samuel looked at a bunch of young men in one particular family and at one point he felt sure he had seen the man of best caliber for the job – only to find that he had missed the mark completely.
7 But the LORD said to Samuel, ‘‘Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The LORD does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.”
1 Samuel 16:7
I think one of the reasons they called Joseph Barnabas was because he looked at people like God does. The Christian army has a dreadful history of shooting it’s wounded. If a man/woman falls or fails we write them off. In contrast the DNA of Barnabas sees beyond failure to restoration and beyond restoration to future fruitfulness. People have done it for us in the past. God has put people now in our circle of acquaintance for whom he is asking us to be Barnabas towards them. What they need is someone who will believe in them and encourage them to try again.
3. Barnabas’ DNA is open to change
To put that another way the Barnabas encourager is not a stick-in-the-mud. They have an open mind of what God is doing. In Acts 11 there is a record of an interesting development in the life of the church. Up until this point in time the growth and spread of Christianity had basically been amongst Jewish people. The gospel had spread internationally but it was primarily amongst Jews. However in Acts 11 the gospel jumped the ethnic fence and a whole heap of Gentiles became Christians.
With our sense of history and perspective we see this as a wonderful thing. You and I are actually the byproducts of the gospel spreading beyond the borders of Judaism. However, for the leaders of the early church this was all a bit of a concern. Would these non-Jews do things right? Without having the background knowledge of God’s dealing with the Jewish race for thousands of years would their theology be orthodox? Was this truly something God was doing or was it a distraction from the right path?
To sort this out the leaders of the church decided to send one of their number to check what was actually going on in these Gentile churches. Guess who they selected? Barnabas! We pick up the story in Acts 11:19 :
19 Now those who had been scattered by the persecution in connection with Stephen traveled as far as Phoenicia, Cyprus and Antioch, telling the message only to Jews. 20 Some of them, however, men from Cyprus and Cyrene, went to Antioch and began to speak to Greeks also, telling them the good news about the Lord Jesus. 21 The Lord’s hand was with them, and a great number of people believed and turned to the Lord.
22 News of this reached the ears of the church at Jerusalem, and they sent Barnabas to Antioch. 23 When he arrived and saw the evidence of the grace of God, he was glad and encouraged them all to remain true to the Lord with all their hearts. 24 He was a good man, full of the Holy Spirit and faith, and a great number of people were brought to the Lord.
Acts 11:19-24
It is interesting to note who they selected to go and check out these “new Christians” in Antioch. They sent someone who was deeply steeped in Jewish thinking. Acts 4:36 tells us that Barnabas was a Levite and the Levites were the priestly class within Judaism. They were thoroughly immersed and trained in the ways of the law. They were the Jews of Jews. Here we read of a Levite going to check out a bunch of non-Jews who were becoming followers of Jesus. Barnabas would have had to step over generations of ingrained thinking and racial prejudice; what was happening at Antioch was somewhat different to how Barnabas would have been taught or brought up.
But the text says that when he got there and observed what was going on he “saw the evidence of the grace of God, he was glad and encouraged them all to remain true to the Lord with all their hearts”.
Barnabas had an open mind for something new that God was doing. Jewish boys and girls had been brought up believing that the only reason God created the Gentiles was to fuel the fires of hell, but here Gentiles were worshipping and following the same Messiah as the Christians in Jerusalem. Barnabas’ mind was open to see and accept something new that God was doing.
In our day and age it is difficult to fully grasp the paradigm shift that was going on in the church in these days. The gospel jumping the ethnic fence was a major shift of focus for the church. This was unchartered waters. Jews and Gentiles did not sit down and eat together let along worship together. But Barnabas had eyes to see something new that God was doing. He wasn’t locked up in the past nor was he entrenched in the old ways of doing things.
Whenever change occurs, in whatever context, there is always a range of responses. There are a small number of innovators who initiate the need for change, there are early adopters who come on board with the reasons for change fairly quickly, then there are the early and late majority of change adopters, but there are always a bunch of laggards. They are the ones who resist change at all costs. They are wedded to the old ways and don’t want to try things new. Barnabas was obviously an early adopter. God was doing something new and he was quick to recognise it and bless it. All his Levitical training would have screamed at him that this was wrong but Barnabas had a view of God that was contemporary and fresh. He didn’t have God in a cultural box.
How often do you and I miss something new that God is doing because we wrongly assume that the things we grew up with were somehow more especially God’s way than these modern adaptations.
The church throughout the ages has a shocking history of squashing new or contemporary initiatives of the Holy Spirit. Music would be a classic example. In every generation we tend to assume that new or modern songs are rubbish or nowhere near as good as the old faithful hymns of a previous century. We fail to recognise how our old hymns were once very contemporary ballad tunes (typically originating in the pubs and taverns of the day) and they too were severely criticised by the church of their day.
According to the Bible the God of the Christians is perpetually doing a new thing and inspiring new songs of worship and new initiatives in ministry.
19 See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland.
Isaiah 43:19
People with Barnabas DNA have an open mind and can see what God is doing. They see the grace of God at work in the lives of people and they bless it and encourage it.
In 1 Chronicles 12 there is an interesting list of fighting men of all the tribes of Israel who are willing to stand with David against the army of King Saul. Amidst this long list is a fascinating statement about the men of one tribe in particular.
32 men of Issachar, who understood the times and knew what Israel should do…”
1 Chronicles 12:32
I think Barnabas was like the men of Issachar. He didn’t prejudge the future of the church according to the patterns of the past. He recognised the changing times in which he was living and knew what the church should do. If God was doing something new he wanted to be part of it.
I don’t know what the future holds in terms of genetic engineering and cloning - I guess it is only a matter of time before a human being is cloned. Regardless of where we stand on that particular ethical issue wouldn’t it be great if the DNA of someone like Barnabas could be reproduced and the church filled with people who encourage us in our journey with Jesus. Maybe that process of genetic engineering needs to start with you and me.
Let me close with a story.
One day, in my first year at high school, I saw a kid from my class walking home from school. His name was Kyle. It looked like he was carrying all of his books. I thought to myself, "Why would anyone bring home all his books on a Friday? He must really be a nerd." I shrugged my shoulders and went on. As I was walking, I saw a bunch of kids running toward him. They ran at him, knocking all his books out of his arms and tripping him so he landed in the dirt. His glasses went flying, and I saw them land in the grass about ten feet from him. He looked up and I saw this terrible sadness in his eyes. My heart went out to him. So, I jogged over to him and as he crawled around looking for his glasses, and I saw a tear in his eye. As I handed him his glasses I said, "Those guys are jerks. They really should get a life." He looked at me and said, "Hey thanks!" There was a big smile on his face.
It was one of those smiles that showed real gratitude. I helped him pick up
his books, and asked him where he lived.
As it turned out he lived near me, so I asked him why I had never seen him before. He said he had gone to a private school before now. We talked all the way home and I carried his books. He turned out to be a pretty cool guy. I asked him if he wanted to play football on Saturday with me and my friends.
He said yes. We hung around together all weekend and the more I got to know Kyle, the more I liked him, and my friends thought the same.
Monday morning came, and there was Kyle with the huge stack of books again. I stopped him and said, "Boy, you are gonna really build some serious muscles with this pile of books everyday!" He just laughed and handed me half the books.
Over the next four years, Kyle and I became best friends. When we were seniors we began to think about University. Kyle decided on one in a the city where we lived, and I wanted to attend one several hundred miles away. I knew that we would always be friends, that the miles would never be a problem. He was going to be a doctor, and I was going for business and sports management degree. Kyle was the dux of our year and had to prepare a speech for prize giving. I was so glad it wasn’t me having to get up there and speak.
Prize giving day came around and Kyle got up to give his speech. He cleared his throat, and began. "Graduation is a time to thank those who helped you make it through those tough years. Your parents, your teachers, your siblings, maybe a coach, but mostly your friends. I am here to tell all of you that being a friend to someone is the best gift you can give them. I am going to tell you a story."
I just looked and watched with disbelief as my friend told the story of the first day we met. He had planned to kill himself over the weekend. He talked of how he had cleaned out his locker so his mother wouldn’t have to do it later and was carrying all his stuff home. He looked hard at me and gave me a little smile. "Thankfully, I was saved. My friend saved me from doing the unspeakable." I heard the gasp go through the crowd as Kyle told us all about his weakest moment. I saw his mum and dad looking at me and smiling that same grateful smile. Not until that moment did I realize it’s depth. Never underestimate the power of your actions. With one small gesture you can change a person’s life. For better or for worse. God puts us all in each other’s lives to impact one another in some way. Look for God in others.
