Be A Barnabas

“But Barnabas took him, and brought him to the apostles, and declared unto them how he had seen the Lord in the way, and that he had spoken to him, and how he had preached boldly at Damascus in the name of Jesus.”

Acts 9:27

This is an amazing example of why we should never judge a book by its cover. Saul is who Barnabas is taking up in this passage. If you know anything about Saul, he was an evil man. He persecuted and was killing Christians. In fact, Saul was on his way to Damascus to do that very thing. Until he met Jesus on Damascus Road. He then has his eyes covered with scales and one man, Ananias is God’s chosen man to remove those scales from Saul’s eyes.

What obedience by Ananias. Perhaps the most interesting aspect of this story is the fact that Saul has become a saved follower of Christ, and now God is calling him to go preach the Gospel. What an amazing testimony! What an amazing conversion. However, something most of us would do happens. Be honest, the majority of us would all probably act the same way. As Saul begins to preach, the crowd begins question him. After all, this man was on his way to persecute them, yet now he is on the way to speak life to them. In fact the crowd not only began to question him, they began to plot a way to kill him. What a Christ like thing for the Jewish people to do, right?

The Disciples take Saul away from the crowds, however they are all afraid of him. Let’s be honest a majority of us would be terrified of Saul as well. In fact some of them believed that He wasn't even a disciple. However, I am under the impression that one man named Barnabas changed Saul’s ministry forever. Barnabas takes Saul under his wing and speaks of his bold proclamation of Christ in Damascus.

Barnabas saw the change in Saul’s life despite what his past looked like. The best way to sum up the Christian life to me is this, it’s not about where you've been, it’s about where you're going. Friend, let me be the first to tell you that Saul went. In fact Saul became a man we know in the Bible as Paul. Paul lead one of the greatest evangelical mission journey’s this world has ever seen. I personally believe Barnabas played a major role in helping encourage Paul at the beginning of his ministry.

There are two things to gather out of this. The first is the fact that Barnabas saw the change in Saul and wanted to help him. He didn't let Saul’s past define their relationship but he encouraged him to continue doing God’s work. The Second thing is that people will always try to bring up the past, however when we come to Christ according to 2 Corinthians 5:17 “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.” We become a new man when we give our lives to Christ and we are no longer defined by our past sins. By the way, Paul wrote this verse while he was preaching in

Corinth, just saying.

Be like Barnabas, let your life reflect the love that Christ has for us. Bring people along this Christian journey with you, you never know who you may impact along they way.