Becoming Barnabas: The Example Of Encouragement (Part 3): Words Can Go The Distance

by on February 3, 2026 | 1 Comment

I remember standing in a parking lot as my dad panicked that gas prices approached one dollar per gallon. The panic that my dad and many other consumers experienced led to another fallout that remains with us today, the concern for mileage. How far can we go per gallon of gas? How can you make resources count most while expending least?

Ligon Duncan pointed out in his podcast, The Everyday Pastor, that older pastors know they get more mileage out of encouragement than out of exhortation or correction.1 It is the difference between driving strategically to get the most out of a tank of gas versus driving with a lead foot and stomping on the brakes so that you burn up fuel and wear out your brake pads too. My hope is that even as a younger pastor, I can learn this lesson and help others see it too.

This installment looks at Barnabas in connection to the early years of Paul’s ministry. Barnabas comes alongside Paul, then still called Saul, as he came for the first time to Jerusalem and met the other apostles.

The stakes were high in this situation. On his own, Paul may not have stood up to the scrutiny of suspicion that he met in Jerusalem. Barnabas came alongside him and took up his case. Previously, we saw how Barnabas took action to support his fellow church members. He did something practical for the encouragement of others in the family of faith. In this instance, Barnabas spoke to encourage others.

Think about how much mileage Barnabas got out of these simple words of encouragement. It set up most of the apostle Paul’s ministry. These simple words helped facilitate the gospel going throughout the whole known world of the Gentiles.

Encouraging words carry great, deep, amazing power. Barnabas disciples us in how we use our words. This series explores Barnabas’s exemplary life to consider why Joseph the Levite from Cyprus earned the nickname that means “son of encouragement.” What does it mean to pursue this noble role of providing encouragement in the church’s life? The main point in this post is that encouragement often requires speaking.

Example

Acts 9:1–31 records Saul’s conversion experience through his encounter, three years later, with the Jerusalem apostolate with Barnabas speaking for Saul. His conversion experience is important backstory and context for understanding Barnabas’s contribution. This backdrop shows something about how Paul would be received when he came back to Jerusalem.

As this story starts in Acts 9:1, Saul was “still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord.” He raged about Christians and wanted them to suffer legal if not fatal repercussions for trusting Christ. On his journey toward Damascus for the purpose of hunting down Christians, Saul is confronted by Christ himself, who summons him to faith. Galatians 1:15–18 fills in some gaps in this story, where Paul explains that when God

called me by his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son to me, in order that I might preach him among the Gentiles, I did not immediately consult with anyone; nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were apostles before me, but I went away into Arabia, and returned again to Damascus.

Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to visit Cephas and remained with him fifteen days.

Before preaching in Damascus, Paul went into Arabia, likely to where there was a famous ancient library, so he could study and learn his new faith, preparing to proclaim it. Then, when Paul encountered trouble on his return to Damascus, he headed to Jerusalem for the incident that is most important for our consideration. In Acts 9:26–31, Saul’s return to Jerusalem was some three years after he left Jerusalem on a hunt for Christians.2

This setting frames Barnabas’s encouragement because the Jerusalem apostles and believers would understandably be suspicious of the man who left Jerusalem on a quest to kill them. At this point, when Paul was most likely—perhaps most rightly—liable to criticism, Barnabas steps into the situation to speak well of him. In the context of this situation, we do not need to know many of Barnabas’s words to see how valuable they were and how powerful this act of speaking encouragement would have been for Saul and for those who heard Barnabas. Barnabas is an example of taking the initiative to speak encouragement.

Execution

I set the stage for Barnabas’s speaking up in Saul’s favor. We see how deep his encouragement ran as he spoke for a man who was, in some ways, understandably on the outs. We will look at the implications of Barnabas’s words of encouragement to see what it teaches us about how we should be encouragers. How do we execute what we learn from Barnabas?

First, we should not withhold encouragement even though a person may deserve criticism. Saul was very susceptible to criticism in this situation. Remember that Saul had just shown up in Jerusalem, and what Barnabas had previously known about him was that he wanted to kill all the Christians. Why did Saul not return immediately to Jerusalem to seek forgiveness and inclusion in the church’s ranks, rather than waiting three years?3

Barnabas could have come down hard on Saul. He could have said, “You know, Saul, you really blew it all over the place last time we saw you.” He could have thrown it in his face that he should have come back far sooner and made amends with the Christians who were still so afraid of him. Barnabas could have kept Saul on ice and frozen him out of the Jerusalem church. Barnabas could have found all kinds of reasons to withhold encouragement and instead to give criticism.

But he did not. Rather, Barnabas set aside all the reasons that he could have found to say something negative about Saul and took up for him publicly to commend his gifts before the whole body of church officers.

What does Barnabas’s practice show us? Look for ways to commend people and to say affirming things to them. Look for ways as much as possible to set aside criticism. Look for ways instead to focus on the positive insofar as is possible.

After what Barnabas did for Saul, is it not striking what Paul wrote in 1 Timothy 5:1–2? “Do not rebuke an older man but encourage him as you would a father, younger men as brothers, older women as mothers, younger women as sisters, in all purity.” He outlines a comprehensive list of all the groups in the church—organized by age as well as by sex (men and women)—and explains how to encourage rather than rebuke someone in each category. Paul learned from Barnabas that encouragement gets more mileage than criticism.

When I was an assistant pastor, one young man in our youth group was not focused, not grounded in Scripture very deeply, and not great at committing to things. I would still make it a point to commend him every time I could for his contribution to discussions, to leading prayers, and things like that. One of the other older adult leaders pulled me aside once and said, “Don’t you think you are too positive about him? He has a lot of weak spots.”

I replied, “His dad criticizes him at home for even coming to church, so I want to be his greatest cheerleader just for showing up.” A year later, on a week-long mission trip, that guy led one of the best devotionals I have heard. Criticism would have pulled even more wind from his sails. Encouragement strengthened him for more and better. Try to set aside criticism as much as possible and strengthen people toward better things with encouragement.

Second, Barnabas teaches us that you must look for and even create opportunities to encourage. Put another way, you will likely not stumble into encouraging people by accident. We must decide to be encouragers and to pursue whatever it takes to become the encourager. Think about Acts 9:26–27:

And when [Saul] had come to Jerusalem, he attempted to join the disciples. And they were all afraid of him, for they did not believe that he was a disciple. But Barnabas took him and brought him to the apostles and declared to them how on the road he had seen the Lord, who spoke to him, and how at Damascus he had preached boldly in the name of Jesus.

Barnabas could have sat back and let Saul sink or swim on his own merits. He could have waited for Saul to come to him. Barnabas could have avoided tense and awkward conversations. He could have just stayed uninvolved.

But Barnabas went to Saul, “took him and brought him to the apostles and declared to them how . . . he had seen the Lord” and had gifts and experience to serve the church. He did not insert himself into a situation where someone needed to be criticized. He did insert himself where someone needed encouragement and support. He even encouraged Saul in front of his potentially biggest critics.

Ask yourself, is the person who made the biggest positive difference in your life the one who was good and diligent at scolding you? Or was it the person who encouraged you the most, even when you may have felt—or maybe it was true—that there was not much there to encourage?4 In that respect, who would you rather be for someone else?

You will easily default into criticism and complaint. You need to look for and create opportunity to encourage. Look for opportunities. Pursue them. You will find the effort grows more fruit than your best complaining. The execution of encouragement is challenging but gets great mileage.

Entreating

The applications of Barnabas’s example that we have considered are good practices that we should cultivate in our lives. They also point us to the gospel and how Christ cares for his people. Here is where we come back to Hebrews 7, where verses 24–25 explain that Christ “holds his priesthood permanently, because he continues forever. Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them.”

I am thinking specifically of how Christ always lives to make intercession for his people. We distinguish Christ’s work into the categories of, to draw on a fancy theological word, impetration and intercession. Impetration has to do with his meritorious work on earth of securing the blessings of forgiveness and everlasting life. He accumulates blessings as he earns them for his people. His intercession is how he asks the Father to apply those blessings to his people as we live on earth.

We know that you must earn money to spend money. You cannot spend what you do not have. It is a good point about stewardship of our resources, but it helps us understand this distinction about Christ’s work. Christ is spending his resources from heaven now. First, he earned those blessings in what we call impetration while he lived a perfectly righteous life on earth and when he bore God’s curse for our sin, especially as he died on the cross. He earned forgiveness and life for all who believe in him. Then, he rose from the grave. His ministry did not end at the resurrection because he ascended to heaven to intercede for us. To connect the dots, Christ Jesus is speaking in defense of, in favor of, all who trust in him right now before the throne of heaven.

Who has more reason to criticize than the perfect Jesus Christ as he looks on sinners? Could he not say, “You are such a failure! You keep defying me! You cannot get it right”? If anyone has good reason to offer criticism, it is Jesus for his people. If anyone has reason not to set aside his complaints about you, it is the Lord Jesus.

But what does Jesus do instead? He intercedes for you. Jesus Christ did not just live, die, and rise from death for you. He is speaking words of encouragement over you and about you right now. He is doing for you, on the supernatural scale, what Barnabas did for Saul.

Consider richly what it means that Jesus focuses on the good things he can say about you. He focuses on defending you and feeding you, entreating the Father to remember always that he earned heavenly blessing for you. Beautifully, Jesus is the reason why he can speak encouraging things about you. His entreating for you is not because you deserve it but because Christ has set his love on you in full grace. We speak words of encouragement to and about one another because Christ lives to speak the same for us.

Notes

  1. Ligon Duncan, Matt Smetherst, and Bryan Chapell, The Everyday Pastor, podcast,  November 18, 2024, “Preaching Christ in Every Sermon,” https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/podcasts/everyday-pastor/preaching-christ-every-sermon/).
  2. Eckhard J. Schnabel, Acts, Zondervan Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament (Zondervan, 2012), 455.
  3. Schnabel, Acts, 456.
  4. Duncan, Smethurst, and Chapell, “Preaching Christ in Every Sermon.”

©Harrison Perkins. All Rights Reserved.

You can find this whole series here.

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