Weekly Sermon

Please Join Barnabas in the Balcony : March 17, 2002

The Reverend Anne Benefield

Thessalonians 5:11-22, Acts 4:32-37

Now the whole group of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one claimed private ownership of any possessions, but everything they owned was held in common. With great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. There was not a needy person among them, for as many as owned lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold. They laid it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need. There was a Levite, a native of Cyprus, Joseph, to whom the apostles gave the name Barnabas (which means "son of encouragement"). He sold a field that belonged to him, then brought the money, and laid it at the apostles' feet. Prayer: Gracious God, open our souls that we might learn from this passage how to follow in the footsteps of Barnabas, the son of encouragement. Amen. This passage makes me uncomfortable. When they start talking about giving up private ownership of possessions, selling homes and handing over the money, I get nervous. This passage proved to be a conversation stopper when we studied it at the Bible study last Sunday evening, but there is something to be learned here. If we can get past all our natural anxiety, we will find a gem of a lesson. There are a couple of very important sentences nestled between the statements about sharing all the possessions and selling homes. These easily-missed sentences may even explain how it happened that the earlier followers could share everything. One sentence says that the apostles gave their testimony with great power. In other words, the early followers were inspired- inspired to do great things. One of the great things they did was to take good care of each other. They cared so deeply about each other that there was not a needy person among them There is another important thing to notice in this passage. It is in the last two verses where we read: There was a Levite, a native of Cyprus, Joseph, to whom the apostles gave the name Barnabas (which means "son of encouragement"). He sold a field that belonged to him, then brought the money, and laid it at the apostles' feet. The early followers had a man among them who encouraged them. As we work our way through the Acts of the Apostles, Barnabas will come up quite a bit. He is always supporting, encouraging, and cheering on others. He traveled on missionary trips with Paul, stood up for Mark, and was faithful to Paul when Paul was imprisoned in Rome. I hope that after today, you will look on Barnabas as a good friend and a marvelous role model. In The Passionate People, Keith Miller talks about "basement" and "balcony people." He says, "The followers of Sigmund Freud support the theory that we are all controlled to some extent by basement people. These are people from our past who go with us everywhere…reach into our unconscious and drag us down…Basement people divert (or try to divert) us from our hopes and dreams. They constantly point out what is wrong, rather than what is right with us. They stress the negative, rather than the positive. Basement people cause a room to light up when they leave." In contrast, Miller describes "balcony people" as "people who are full of love, who cheer us on to be loving, courageous…They sit in the balcony of our lives like a heavenly cheering section, saying, 'You can do it! Remember how you handled this before! You can make it!'" Barnabas is a classic example of a balcony person. Most of us are dramatically affected by the way people treat us. When we are not appreciated, we do not do our best. When we are treasured, we shine. To be our best, we need balcony people like Barnabas-people who encourage us. When we read about Barnabas in the Acts of the Apostles, we see several specific things that he does. First, he is vocal in his support of others. Second, he affirms people for who they are not who we think they are or who we want them to be. Third, he didn't rain on anyone's parade-he wasn't a negative force. He was a rainbow, not a cloudburst. In his book, One Anothering: Biblical Building Blocks for Small Groups, Richard C. Meyer tells a story about "a twelve-year-old boy who could not talk. After being served oatmeal for several days in a row, however, he amazingly blurted out, 'Yuck! I hate oatmeal.' "His mother was overwhelmed. She ran across the room, threw her arms around his neck and cried, 'For twelve long years your father and I were convinced you couldn't talk. Why have you never spoken to us?' "Bluntly, he explained, 'Up until now everything has been okay!'" [Richard C. Meyer, One Anothering: Biblical Building Blocks for Small Groups, (San Diego: LuraMedia, 1990), 79-80] So often we neglect to say the positive things. We focus on the shortcomings and ignore all that is fine and good. It takes discipline to note and affirm the good in each other. I've been reading a book called The Cathedral Within by Bill Shore. He tells about the Chicago Children's Choir, which involves 3000 children, 79% of whom are from low-income families. The executive director of the organization is a woman named Nancy Carstedt. With hard work and great discipline the choir teaches young people to sing well and gives them a chance to see the world. The choir encourages the children to be all that God created them to be. The Nancy Carstedt says one of the directors told her, "I've seen them bow and come up taller." Isn't that a wonderful phrase-bow and come up taller. The applause they hear gives voice to the appreciation their audiences feel. Being vocal in our affirmations is following in Barnabas's footsteps. The second thing that Barnabas did was to affirm people for who they were, not for who others thought they were. A week ago, John and I heard Ben Carson speak. He is the pediatric neurosurgeon who performed the hemispherectomy on Rebecca Yim. He has become very famous for his work, but in all things he points to God as the source of his gifts. Despite an incredible schedule-he had seen 40 patients on the day we heard him speak-he makes time to speak and in particular feels called to speak to youth. He told about his childhood. It was a tough life. He grew up in Detroit. His parents divorced. As a child, he and his brother started getting into trouble. That wasn't too surprising: they were black and poor. Pretty soon friends and teachers alike began saying that he and his brother couldn't learn. They just didn't have the ability to learn. There was only one person who thought differently: their mother. She herself had married at 13. She could only read a few words, but she knew her sons could do better. She believed in them. She didn't let the culture define who her boys were. She studied them and came to the conclusion that they were smart. She was right. They were very smart. Imagine what the world would have missed if Ben Carson's mother had seen her son as the world saw him? Imagine the life of just one of his patients, Rebecca Yim, who is now in regular school and taking ballet. We can only thank the Lord that Ben Carson's mother had a lot in common with Barnabas. There is one more thing to notice about Barnabas. Richard Meyer writes, "People…[who are like Barnabas] do not rain on other people's parades. Rather, they hold up people's unlimited possibilities. Bishop Fulton Sheen once related a conversation he had had with a woman in the elevator of a department store. He was shopping on the fifth floor and wanted to go to the sixth. So he stepped on the elevator with a few other passengers. Just as the elevator operator said, 'Going up!' a woman rushed out madly saying, 'I don't want to go up. I want to go down.' Noticing Sheen's clerical collar, she turned to him and said, 'I didn't think I could go wrong following you!' "He replied, 'Madam, I only take people up, not down.'" [Fulton J. Sheen, The Wit & Wisdom of Bishop Fulton J. Sheen, edited by Bill Adler (New York: Simon & Schuster, Doubleday Edition, Prentice Hall, Inc., 1968), 153] We're called to be like Barnabas, too, lifting up each other. This week there is an insert from One Great Hour of Sharing entitled "Passing the Blessing Hand to Hand." It is the story of a sharecropper named Spencer Lewis who worked 25 years to buy a farm that he wants to pass on to his son, but his older sons didn't want the farm because they saw their father's hard work and also saw how precarious his living was. Then some of the farmers in his area began forming a cooperative. Spencer was one of the first to join. To make the thing go they needed some capital support which One Great Hour of Sharing gave them, but before they could even get there, they needed a Barnabas. Spencer Lewis was that Barnabas. He helped his fellow farmers to understand that by linking hands with others, they would be able together to do what none could do alone-to create a future for their family farms. When we look at what the early church achieved, we recognize that it was the work of the Holy Spirit. Still, a man like Barnabas who was vocal in his affirmation, appreciated each person for who they were, and was a rainbow, not a cloudburst sure made way for the Spirit to move in.