Last month we were considering Barnabas’ exhortation to the young believers in Antioch. He “exhorted them all, that with purpose cd heart they would cleave unto the Lord” (Acts 11:2323Who, when he came, and had seen the grace of God, was glad, and exhorted them all, that with purpose of heart they would cleave unto the Lord. (Acts 11:23)) and undoubtedly his exhortation is just as timely for us today as it was for them in that day. We still have the same wily foe who would ever hinder our spiritual progress if he possibly can, hut he cannot harm us if we stay in the path of dependence on the Lord. May we be kept in it!
But Barnabas’ work did not stop there. He did not just give the exhortation and then leave them, He knew they needed instruction and spiritual food for the pathway, and perhaps he felt his own incompetency as a teacher so he went down to Tarsus seeking for Saul. Apparently Saul had not been saved for very long at this time but he had spent three years in Arabia, and those silent years in a Christian’s life, when he finds himself alone with God, are often rich in blessing to the soul. Moses’ forty years on the backside of the desert were most necessary and important in God’s ways with him, and undoubtedly fitted him in a special way for his path of service afterward. So, it was with Saul of Tarsus, and so it will be with us if we learn of Him in these times of quietness, it appears, in the portion we are considering, that Barnabas recognized Saul’s gift as a teacher too, and so they labored together in this great work.
They started holding meetings, and the work spread so much that they remained there for a whole year. Great numbers came together to hear, as Barnabas and Saul told out the wonderful message of redemption and established those who had believed in the truth. Undoubtedly there was great joy in that city, as there had been in Samaria some years before when Philip preached there.
Now, dear young reader, have you and I availed ourselves of the wonderful privileges we have of hearing the truth today? Perhaps there is a little meeting near at hand where the Word of God is read and taught according to truth. Are we found present at these meetings? We are far more privileged than those dear young believers at Antioch, for we now have the whole Word of God but it had not all been written then. Each one, too, can sit in the meeting with the Word of God before him and read for himself, and in most places we can do this in peace and quietness. Oh, how favored we are! And yet as we attend these little readings from place to place how many empty seats there are. Other interests have crowded in and there is little time for the Word. Oh may the Lord exercise each one of us in these things! Let us be diligent at the meetings and not miss the blessing.
There were exceedingly practical results produced by these meetings in Antioch long ago. The people in the city could see that the ones who attended them were different—they were new creatures in Christ Jesus. They acted like new men; the bad habits fell off and they talked about Christ, and their neighbors could see that He was their “all in all.” They did not have any sectarian name, but exalted ONE NAME ONLY and so the people of the city began to call them “Christians.” And would it not be lovely if even today, our walk, our talk, our everything, were such that all who know us could see Christ in us in such a way that they would put His Name upon us, calling us Christians.
ML 11/26/1950