Pastor's Ponderings: Tuesday Bible Study on Acts of the Apostles 11:22-26 (February 3, 2026)

February 3, 2026:  Tuesday Bible Study on Acts 11:22-26

Good morning my dear Bible Study group. Today please remember to pray for Joyce and Larry who have suffered a serious breach of personal information, and have had their finances, and even their home in danger. This morning Joyce is trying to come up with $1500.00 to stop an auction on their new home. This has been a very difficult time for them. If I seemed to be a little off this past week including Sunday, I have been suffering with severe headaches, which I now believe was a virus. I finally woke up on Monday morning yesterday, with no headache. I have been most thankful for that relief. Today, our James is home from school with a flu like illness. Please pray for him too.

In our passage for today we meet Barnabas. He had the good fortune to be sent to Antioch to check on the progress and success of the new Christ movement in that gentile community. What he found was amazing in one way, the rapid acceptance of the gentiles into the community of believers, but Barnabas also found a rudderless ship which need help with organization, and defense against the persecution of the Jews who lived in that community. We need to be aware, that though all of this feels like it moves in a very timely succession, with little time passage, it has been nine years since Paul's conversion and escape from the hostility of the Jews in Damascus.

So, Barnabas leaves Antioch and travels to find Paul. Paul, now known for his conversion and faith, has fled the anger of the Jews in Damascus, and settled in Tarsus, which scholars believe was his hometown. With the guidance of the Spirt, and Barnabas’ wise gifts for seeing how to fill the need of the new gentile community of faith, he heads to get Paul to meet the need of the Gentile Christians in Antioch. As a former Pharisee Paul knows how to keep things moving forward, and when it comes to the persecution by the Jews, Paul can debate with them toe to toe. When they arrive back in Antioch, both Paul and Barnabas remain there cared for by the congregation that has been formed there for about a year. It is in Antioch that the name Christian becomes commonly used. Antioch was known for the nicknames that it applied to people and groups. Christian was intended to be a slight and insult, but the new gentile Christians took it as a name of great honor and chose to use it as a blessing for their community of those who accepted Christ as their LORD and SAVIOR. I think that very often we feel like the calling of a person much needed to serve in a position of leadership in the Church is just a matter of luck. I am here to tell you that is not the case. When a congregation calls a new pastor to proclaim the Gospel in their midst, it happens by the presence and power of the Holy Spirit guiding the hearts and minds of those who will be sharing their lives of faith with that newly called person. The very same thing is true here. First, it is Barnabas who is sent, and as we discover, his wisdom (Spirit) is exactly right for understanding what kind of a leader will be needed in this new non-Jewish group. And of course, we know that Paul was exactly right for this kind of care for the Gospel of Jesus Christ. 35 years ago, I was called to care for, and proclaim, the Gospel of Jesus Christ in the midst of the members of American. Life across the Body of Christ, the Church, now is filled with concerns for the viability of congregations, and even the viability of the Gospel itself in the face of the modern world in which we live. It is for us, just as it was for Barnabas and Paul, American is small, but loving with Christ's Love, serving others with hope and loving kindness, and trusting in the Christ of God to shepherd our journey of faith.

Under the Spirit's care the new Church grew, and Christ's Church will always be the same.

With Love in Christ, Pastor Kim