Who is Your Barnabas?
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Review ALL IN season. Purpose for the series: how where we are as The Shed is where they were then…
Review Last Sermon: Finding the Way - Saul’s Conversion (Chosen Vessel)
Contextualize the importance of Damascus to this story as a lead-in to the text: “He was on his way to persecute and arrest followers of the Way, but he enters the same place he was just breathing murder against with a different message…”
19b Now for several days he was with the disciples who were at Damascus,
20 and immediately he began to proclaim Jesus in the synagogues, saying, “He is the Son of God.”
Pray
There are three things I want to point out in these next few verses, and the first is this:
Saul went to church…
Saul went to church…
For “several days” he was with the disciples (at Damascus)… He went to church…
For Luke, “several days” is a generic reference to an undisclosed period of time. We find out later in Galatians this was a period of about 3 years.
15 But when God, who had set me apart even from my mother’s womb and called me through His grace, was pleased
16 to reveal His Son in me so that I might preach Him among the Gentiles, I did not immediately consult with flesh and blood,
17 nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were apostles before me; but I went away to Arabia, and returned once more to Damascus.
18 Then three years later I went up to Jerusalem to become acquainted with Cephas, and stayed with him fifteen days.
He spent some time alone with God in Arabia, but returns to Damascus and spends time with the disciples there…
Note, He didn’t stay in Arabia.
In this era of deconstruction and deconversion and turning away from the church, it is important that we don’t try to stay in Arabia…
Too many who want to be lone wolf Christians…
I saw a video just the other day where a person was trying to explain why “prophetic types” don’t often go to church regularly…
React.
He returned to Damascus… spent time with the disciples there…
He went to the disciples to become a disciple…
He went to church… And…
20 and immediately he began to proclaim Jesus in the synagogues, saying, “He is the Son of God.”
Here’s another note… He didn’t stay in Arabia by himself forever, but he also didn’t stay in the comfort of the fellowship of believers forever either…
He went to the community…
He went to the community…
Sometimes we can swing the pendulum far the other direction where we show up at church every time the doors are open, but have no room left in our schedule for getting outside the walls of the church to make a difference…
He wasted no time… Once he found the Truth, his mission was to spread that Truth…
Once he worked himself out with Jesus, it was time to go!
What are you waiting for?
Saul had been saved just long enough to barely get himself in line with God’s word for him, yet he felt so strongly about his conviction that he immediately started preaching Jesus in the synagogs.
21 All those hearing him continued to be amazed, and were saying, “Is this not he who in Jerusalem destroyed those who called on this name, and who had come here for the purpose of bringing them bound before the chief priests?”
Is this not the one who we used to know for different reasons?
Is this not the one who used to run fast and wild?
Is this not the one who used to…
When people look at you, let them be amazed! Is this not the one who…??
They should be able to look at who we are now and who we were then and see enough to amaze them!
He went to Church
He went to the Community
He went with Barnabas
He went with Barnabas…
He went with Barnabas…
22 But Saul kept increasing in strength and confounding the Jews who lived at Damascus by proving that this Jesus is the Christ.
23 When many days had elapsed, the Jews plotted together to do away with him,
24 but their plot became known to Saul. They were also watching the gates day and night so that they might put him to death;
25 but his disciples took him by night and let him down through an opening in the wall, lowering him in a large basket.
26 When he came to Jerusalem, he was trying to associate with the disciples; but they were all afraid of him, not believing that he was a disciple.
27 But Barnabas took hold of him and brought him to the apostles and described to them how he had seen the Lord on the road, and that He had talked to him, and how at Damascus he had spoken out boldly in the name of Jesus.
He went with Barnabas…
He went with Barnabas…
Just because you were rejected there, doesn’t mean God wont use you there, it just means you need a Barnabas…
Even after his time spent alone with Jesus, Saul needed the church fellowship provided by the disciples in Damascus…
Even after his time in church with them,
Even after his persecution by the jews,
Even after 3 years of proving himself,
He was still rejected by the fear of those in Jerusalem.
We all need a Barnabas…
We all need that person who sees in us what others might miss…
We all need that partner who can be the encourager in our life (Barnabas means son of encouragement)…
I like the phrase Luke uses: But Barnabas “took hold of him…”
We all need someone that can “take hold of us” and pull us out of the rejection and advocate on our behalf and encourage us as we go…
Call Worship Team
Saul went to church, but that wasn’t the destination…
Saul went to the community, but that wasn’t completion…
Saul’s launching pad was when Barnabas “took hold of him”
That’s why we need more than just a communal type of discipleship and learning, we also need partners who will “take hold of us”
We all need someone who will advocate for us, encourage us, lift us up, inspire us, push us, hold us accountable…
This is the importance of your discipleship partner…
(Explain Discipleship Partners for those who don’t know)
Everyone needs a Barnabas!
So Saul’s pattern after encountering Jesus was this:
Saul went to church.
Saul went to the community
Saul went with Barnabas…
Altar Call: Who is your Barnabas?
