Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Acts 11:24
For he was a good man, and full of the Holy Ghost and of faith: and much people was added unto the Lord.
24. full of the Holy Ghost and of faith ] The same character is given to Stephen (Act 6:5), and a man of like character with that most eminent among the Greek-Jews would exert much influence in Antioch, where Greeks and Greek-Jews were the chief part of the population. It was in consequence of the persecution after Stephen s death that these preachers had come to Antioch, and some of them were probably of those Grecians who had been forward in the work for which Stephen was martyred.
and much people was added unto the Lord ] The sanction of the Church of Jerusalem to what had been done, as it was given by the joy and encouraging words of the “Son of Consolation,” would quicken the zeal of these already earnest labourers for Christ.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
For he was a good man – This is given as a reason why he was so eminently successful. It is not said that he was a man of distinguished talents or learning; that he was a splendid or an imposing preacher; but simply that he was a man of an amiable, kind, and benevolent disposition – a pious, humble man of God. We should not undervalue talent, eloquence, or learning in the ministry, but we may remark that humble piety will often do more in the conversion of souls than the most splendid talents. No endowments can be a substitute for this. The real power of a minister is concentrated in this, and without this his ministry will be barrenness and a curse. There is nothing on the earth so mighty as goodness. If a man wished to make the most of his powers, the true secret would be found in employing them for a good object, and suffering them to be wholly under the direction of benevolence. John Howards purpose to do good has made a more permanent impression on the interests of the world than the talents of Alexander or Caesar.
Full of the Holy Ghost – Was entirely under the influence of the Holy Spirit. This is the second qualification mentioned here of a good minister. He was not merely exemplary for mildness and kindness of temper, but he was eminently a man of God. He was filled with the influences of the sacred Spirit, producing zeal, love, peace, joy, etc. See Gal 5:22-23. Compare the notes on Act 2:4.
And of faith – Confidence in the truth and promises of God. This is the third qualification mentioned; and this was another cause of his success. He confided in God. He depended, not on his own strength, but on the strength of the arm of God. With these qualifications he engaged in his work, and he was successful. These qualifications should be sought by the ministry of the gospel. Others should not indeed be neglected, but a mans ministry will usually be successful only as he seeks to possess those endowments which distinguished Barnabas – a kind, tender, benevolent heart; devoted piety; the fulness of the Spirits influence; and strong, unwavering confidence in the promises and power of God.
And much people – Many people.
Was added unto the Lord – Became Christians.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Act 11:24
For he was a good man.
The feast of St. Barnabas the apostle: tolerance of religious error
The text says that he was a good man, full of the Holy Ghost and of faith. This praise of goodness is explained by his very name, Barnabas, the Son of Consolation, which was given him, as it appears, to mark his character of kindness, gentleness, considerateness, warmth of heart, compassion, and munificence. His acts answer to this account of him. The first we hear of him is his selling some land which was his, and giving the proceeds to the apostles, to distribute to his poorer brethren. The next notice of him sets before us a second deed of kindness, of as amiable, though of a more private character. When Saul was come to Jerusalem, he assayed to join himself to the disciples; but they were all afraid of him, and believed not that he was a disciple. But Barnabas took him and brought him to the apostles, and declared how he had seen the Lord in the way, and that He had spoken to him, and how he had preached boldly at Damascus in the name of Jesus. Next, he is mentioned in the text, and still with commendation of the same kind. How had he shown that he was a good man? by going on a mission of love to the first converts at Antioch. On the other hand, on two occasions his conduct is scarcely becoming an apostle, as instancing somewhat of that infirmity which uninspired persons of his peculiar character frequently exhibit. Both are cases of indulgence towards the faults of others, yet in a different way; the one, an over-easiness in a matter of doctrine, the other, in a matter of conduct. With all his tenderness for the Gentiles, yet on one occasion he could not resist indulging the prejudices of some Judaizing brethren, who came from Jerusalem to Antioch. Peter first was carried away; before they came, he did eat with the Gentiles, but when they were come, he withdrew, and separated himself, fearing them which were of the circumcision. And the other Jews dissembled likewise with him; insomuch, that Barnabas also was carried away with their dissimulation. The other instance was his indulgent treatment of Mark, his sisters son, which occasioned the quarrel between him and St. Paul. Barnabas determined to take with them, on their apostolic journey, John, whose surname was Mark. But Paul thought not good to take him with them, who departed from them from Pamphylia, and went not with them to the work. He is an ensample and warning to us, not only as showing us what we ought to be, but as evidencing how the highest gifts and graces are corrupted in our sinful nature, if we are not diligent to walk step by step, according to the light of Gods commandments. Are we sufficiently careful to do what is right and just, rather than what is pleasant? do we clearly understand our professed principles, and do we keep to them under temptation? The history of St. Barnabas will help us to answer this question honestly. Now I fear we lack altogether, what he lacked in certain occurrences in it, firmness, manliness, godly severity. I fear it must be confessed, that our kindness, instead of being directed and braced by principle, too often becomes languid and unmeaning; that it is exerted on improper objects, and out of season, and thereby is uncharitable in two ways, indulging those who should be chastised, and preferring their comfort to those who are really deserving. We are over-tender in dealing with sin and sinners. We are deficient in jealous custody of the revealed Truths which Christ has left us. We allow men to speak against the Church, its ordinances, or its teaching, without remonstrating with them. To be kind is their one principle of action; and, when they find offence taken at the Churchs creed, they begin to think how they may modify or curtail it, under the same sort of feeling as would lead them to be generous in a money transaction, or to accommodate another at the price of personal inconvenience. Not understanding that their religious privileges are a trust to be handed on to posterity, a sacred property entailed upon the Christian family, and their own in enjoyment rather than in possession, they act the spendthrift, and are lavish of the goods of others. Undoubtedly, even the best specimens of these men are deficient in a due appreciation of the Christian mysteries, and of their own responsibility in preserving and transmitting them; yet, some of them are such truly good men, so amiable and feeling, so benevolent to the poor, and of such repute among all classes, in short, fulfil so excellently the office of shining like lights in the world, and witnesses of Him who went about doing good, that those who most deplore their failing, will still be most desirous of excusing them personally, while they feel it a duty to withstand them. Such is the defect of mind suggested to us by the instances of imperfection recorded of St. Barnabas; it will be more clearly understood by contrasting him with St. John. Now see in what he differed from Barnabas; in uniting charity with a firm maintenance of the truth as it is in Jesus. So far was his fervour and exuberance of charity from interfering with his zeal for God, that rather, the more he loved men, the more he desired to bring before them the great unchangeable verities to which they must submit, if they would see life, and on which a weak indulgence suffers them to shut their eyes. He loved the brethren, but he loved them in the Truth (3Jn 1:1). Strictness and tenderness had no sharp contention in the breast of the beloved disciple; they found their perfect union, yet distinct exercise, in the grace of charity, which is the fulfilling of the whole law. I wish I saw any prospect of this element of zeal and holy sternness springing up among us, to temper and give character to the languid, unmeaning benevolence which we misname Christian love. I have no hope of my country till I see it. Many schools of religion and ethics are to be found among us, and they all profess to magnify, in one shape or other, what they consider the principle of love; but what they lack is a firm maintenance of that characteristic of the Divine nature, which, in accommodation to our infirmity, is named by St. John and his brethren the wrath of God. Regarding thus the goodness only, and not the severity of God, no wonder that they ungird their loins and become effeminate; no wonder that their ideal notion of a perfect Church is a Church which lets everyone go on his way, and disclaims any right to pronounce an opinion, much less inflict a censure on religious error. But those who think themselves and others in risk of an eternal curse dare not be thus indulgent. Here, then, lies our want at the present day, for this we must pray–that a reform may come in the spirit and power of Elias. Then only can we prosper (under the blessing and grace of Him who is the Spirit both of love and of truth), when the heart of Paul is vouchsafed to us, to withstand even Peter and Barnabas, if ever they are overcome by mere human feelings, to know henceforth no man after the flesh, to put away from us sisters son, or nearer relative, to relinquish the sight of them, the hope of them, and the desire of them, when He commands, who raises up friends even to the lonely, if they trust in Him, and will give us within His walls a name better than of sons and of daughters, an everlasting name that shall not be cut off. (J. H. Newman.)
A good man
Has–
I. A good creed. Divine truth is the basis of all holy and devoted life. A good man has just views of Deity, of the method of salvation, of the present life, and of that which is to come.
II. A good heart. It is not possessed as natural to himself. The declaration with respect to the human heart is that it is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked. We require, therefore, to have it renewed. And, hence, the promise under both Testaments is, that God will take away the heart of stone and give the heart of flesh–that is, He will give us new dispositions; He will reclaim us from our corrupt affections. Hence, therefore, we are said to be born again, to have received the Holy Spirit, of which Barnabas was full.
III. A good life. The Christians life is essentially right. It is governed by the fear of God; it is moved by love to Himself; and it is dedicated to the glory of His name. (The Pulpit.)
What a good man is and how he becomes so
All words describing moral excellence tend to deteriorate, just as bright metal rusts by exposure, and coins become illegible by use. So it comes to pass that any decent man, with an easy temper, and a dash of frankness is christened with this title good. The Bible is more chary. Christ rebuked a man for calling Him good, because he did so out of mere conventional politeness. But here we have the picture in the Scripture gallery, catalogued He was a good man. Note–
I. The sort of man whom the judge will call good.
1. Barnabas was a Levite of Cyprus. A Jew who had so come in contact with foreigners that many a prejudice was beaten out of him. We first hear of him as taking a share in the burst of brotherly love, so as to entail an after life of manual labour. Next, when the older Christians were suspicious of Saul, Barnabas, with that generosity which often sees deepest, was the first to cast the aegis of the protection of his recognition round him. In like manner here, when Christianity developed in a suspicious direction, Barnabas was sent, and being a good man he saw, and rejoiced in goodness in others. The new conditions led him to enlist Sauls services, to engage with him in missionary service, and then, without a murmur, to allow his junior colleague to take the first place. Then came the quarrel in which he lost his friend, and we hear of him no more.
2. Note the lessons.
(1) That the tap root of all goodness is reference to God and obedience to Him. Not that nothing is good that is done without reference to God, but the noblest deed done without this reference lacks nobleness.
(2) That the truest goodness is the suppression of self–a characteristic of the whole life of Barnabas.
(3) That the farther traits of character are preeminent in Christian goodness. All this mans virtues were of the meek and gracious sort, which make but a poor show by the side of some of the tawdry splendours which the vulgar world calls virtues. A thrush or a blackbird is but a soberly clad creature by the side of paroquets, but the one has a song, and the other only a screech. So there is comfort for us commonplace people. We may be little violets, if we cannot be flaunting tiger lilies.
4. That true goodness does not exclude the possibility of falling. The Bible is frank in telling us of the imperfections of the best. Often imperfections are exaggerations of characteristic goodness. Never let gentleness fall away like badly made jelly into a trembling heap, and never let strength gather itself into a repulsive attitude. But remember that only One could say, Which of you convinceth Me of sin.
II. The Divine Helper who makes men good.
1. This Helper is not merely an influence but a Person, who not only helps from without, but so enters that their whole nature is saturated with Him.
2. Strange language, but does not the experience of every man who has tried to make himself good show its necessity? Think of what is needed to make us good–the strengthening of the will which we cannot brace sufficiently by any tonic or support we know of; consider the resistance with which we have to cope from our passions, tastes, habits, occupations, friends, etc. You have got the wolf by the ears for a moment, but your hands will ache presently in holding him and what then? Ah, you need a Divine Helper, who will dwell in your hearts and strengthen your wills to what is good, and suppress your inclinations of evil.
3. The great promise of the gospel is precisely this. The first word is Thy sins be forgiven thee, the second, Arise and walk. The gift of pardon is meant to be introductory to what Christ calls emphatically the gift of God, the fountain of living streams of holy life and noble deeds. He who is good must surely delight in seeing us good, and must be able to turn us into His own likeness.
4. Full of the Holy Ghost, as a vessel might be to its brim of golden wine. Does that describe you? Full! A dribbling drop or two in the bottom of the jar: whose fault is it? Why with that mighty rushing wind to full our sails should we be lying in sickly calms? Why with those tongues of fire should we be cowering over grey ashes? Why with that great tide should we be like dry watercourses?
III. How that Divine Helper comes to men. Full of faith.
1. No goodness without the Spirit, no Spirit without faith in Christ. If you open a chink the water will come in. If you trust in Christ He will give you the new life of His Spirit.
2. The measure in which we possess the power that makes us good depends on ourselves. Open thy mouth wide and I will fill it. You may have as much of God as you want, and as little as you will. The measure of your faith will determine at once the measure of your goodness, and of your possession of the Spirit that makes good. Just as when the prophet miraculously increased the oil in the cruse, the stream flowed as long as they brought vessels, and stayed when there were no more; so long as we open our hearts for the reception the gift will not be withheld, but God will not let it run like water spilled on the ground. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
The moral sympathies of a good man
It is interesting to distinguish the historic names of the Church, and to recognise the forms of greatness that we associate with them. As were Peter and Paul and John in the apostolic age–men distinctively practical, intellectual, and spiritual, so it has been in every age since. The Church has had its practical workers, men full of spiritual earnestness and power–its dauntless and fervid preachers, its Chrysostoms, Fenelons, Whitefields, Baxters, Wesleys; its apologists, its men of broad intellectual views, its teachers, its controversialists, its Augustines, Luthers, Pascals, Butlers, Chalmers. And it has had its contemplative, spiritual men–men full of goodness, and practical solicitude, charity in them triumphantly reigning over knowledge, and tongues, and prophesying. Such were Bernard, Fenelon, Melanchthon, Fletcher of Madeley, Watts, and Doddridge. In this latter class we should assign a place to Barnabas. Note–
I. The evangelists idea of a good man. He evidently means more than that he was merely a good-natured man, and more than that he was simply a virtuous man. He was good in the sense in which the work was good; himself a converted, a spiritual man; good in the sense of being full of the Holy Ghost and faith. In the highest and scriptural sense of the term, no man can be good who is unspiritual. A mans goodness must regard God as well as man; spiritual obligations as well as social ones. The most moral imperatively needs conversion; for what is conversion but the awakening in a man of the thought of God; the quickening in him of the love of God; the producing within him of sympathy with God; the restoration of him to the image of God; the begetting within him of a feeling of practical gratitude to God, which makes him do everything to please and to glorify God? A man may be very virtuous, and yet be utterly godless. As such he is only half a good man. The faith which is attributed to Barnabas was his spiritual recognition and reference; he walked by faith, not by sight; lived ever As in the Great Taskmasters eye; did all things with a spiritual reference, and to a spiritual end. A man can preach only as he believes, and he will preach vividly or dully, tamely or earnestly, in proportion as he believes.
II. It was in virtue of this eminent spiritual goodness that he rejoiced in the work which he saw going on. It was contrary to his national and dispensational theories; it shocked many of his prejudices; his instructions were to discourage, if not prohibit it; but the spiritual sympathies of the saint were too strong for the notions of the theologian, for the proprieties of the ecclesiast, for the dignity of the commissioner. He sees the manifest work of grace; and who is he that he is to gainsay it. He is learning that our proprieties are not always Gods methods; that God often chooses uncanonised ways and unconsecrated agents to do the mightiest things. The work appeals to the good mans heart; it touches his spiritual sympathies. He sees sinners converted, however irregularly; he sees the grace of God, and he is glad. And should we, were we men of holier hearts, of stronger spiritual sympathies, have so much difficulty with our ecclesiastical theories and proprieties? If our piety were more fervent, we should more vividly appreciate the preciousness of mens souls, and the unspeakable blessing of their salvation; and in our joy over the fact we should scarcely care to ask who had done it. Wherever we saw a spiritual work done, there we should recognise Gods worker, and rejoice over spiritual conversion by whomsoever effected. If we be good as Barnabas was good, we shall rejoice with his joy whenever we see what he saw.
III. The spiritual goodness which led Barnabas to rejoice in the good that had already been done, led him also to cooperate with it; and thus much people were added to the Lord. He found a work of conversion going on; and instead of contenting himself with mere commendation, he gave himself heartily to cooperate with these irregular men and their irregular work. He had energies to contribute, an influence to exert. Who was he that he should stand aloof when God Himself was working? If it be ours to work, in the mere peradventure that God will work with us, assuredly we may not without culpability withhold our effort when He is palpably working. Who but He can awaken solicitudes about salvation, and out of the sinner evolve a saint? And when these results are seen, we need be in no doubt whose work they are. And eagerly and fervently should we strive for the honour of working with Him. All good men do this. They wilt turn away from your strifes of doctrines and modes; but demonstrate your devoutness by your spiritual achievement, and then, just in proportion to their goodness, they will come and help you.
IV. The goodness of Barnabas was the cause of his success. And so it will ever be. Men are not converted by demonstrations of the gospel, but by inspirations of it. Men are never reasoned into spiritual life; they are quickened into it. We must ourselves be what we seek to make others. We can raise them no higher than our own level. I am not faithful to Christ merely because I eloquently and urgently preach His gospel; He demands of me that I be what I preach–His living epistle, known and read of all men. Learning may be desirable, eloquence needful; but piety is essential: it is the basis and power of all spiritual work. (H. Allon, D. D.)
Characteristics of the good man
A good man is–
I. A converted man. In me, that is, in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing. There is none that doeth good, no, not one. These statements are not inconsistent with the fact, that there is a natural conscience in man, and that there are amiable feelings urging to noble and generous actions; nor can it be denied that, apart from the power of Divine grace, there is often a striking superiority of one man above another. But the qualities of unconverted men come far short of goodness; nay, they serve to show more strongly the wickedness of the human heart, which resists the dictates of natural conscience, and the admonitions of the Word of God. We must, therefore, be transformed, by the renewing of our minds, that we may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God. The eyes of our understanding must be enlightened, our affections must be fixed supremely on God. We must be dead to sin, that we may live unto righteousness. Till then, sin must have dominion over us.
II. A man who believes in Christ and makes open and steadfast profession of his faith. Infidelity is obviously incompatible with true goodness; for it is the wilful deliberate rejection of the truth. But unbelief, in the sense of the refusal of a sinner to accept of Christ as his Saviour, is equally incompatible. How can it be otherwise? All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God. A Saviour has been provided, and, in the riches of the Divine beneficence, has been freely offered to men. Can there be any goodness in the heart which remains unmoved by love like this? Is there anything but the spirit of unholy rebellion in the breast of that man who refuses to comply with the first duty of a perishing sinner? No, a life of holy obedience must have its beginning in submission to the righteousness of Christ as the only ground of acceptance. And this faith we must openly and steadfastly profess. Believing with the heart unto righteousness, with the mouth we must make confession unto salvation. This is one of the evidences of the sincerity of our faith, the proof to ourselves, and the world around us, that our faith is a true and a saving faith, and not merely the cold speculative belief of the doctrine of Christ.
III. A man of piety and devotedness. Who can deny that it is one of the first duties of man to love God, and to seek to please Him? He is the all-perfect Jehovah, the fountain of our being, and the source of all our happiness; one whom we are under the strongest obligations to love, and fear, and serve. If it be our duty to love and honour our fellow men, much more it is our duty to love and honour God. This will appear still more evident if we consider that where there is no piety, the opposite dispositions must have the ascendency in our souls. If we do not love God, we must be at enmity with Him (Mat 6:21; Jam 4:4).
IV. A man of active and enlightened beneficence. The Second Commandment of the law is as essential to real goodness as the First. Love to men never fails to flow from love to God. Love is the fulfilling of the law; it completes the character of a true Christian. No gifts or endowments, however excellent, can compensate for the want of Christian love. But all beneficence is not goodness. There is the beneficence of sudden impulses; the beneficence which needs to be awakened by touching representations; the beneficence of the Pharisee, who doeth his alms before men to be seen of them; extorted beneficence compelled by the example of others–the beneficence of fashion or custom, not of religious or even moral principle. True goodness or beneficence is different from all these. It has its root in a renewed heart. It is constant and uniform–a habit not an act–an ever-flowing stream, not the effervescence of momentary feeling. A good man loves his fellow men, and because he loves them he is earnestly desirous of promoting their real welfare. His liberal mind deviseth liberal things.
V. A man who endeavours to regulate his whole temper and conduct by the maxims and precepts of the gospel of Christ. He recognises the law of God as the only rule of his life and conversation. The law is not made void, it is established, by faith. Other men are governed by the principles of the world, principles often decidedly at variance with the law of God, and the morality of the gospel. A good man steadfastly refuses to submit to their authority.
VI. A man who earnestly desires the advancement of the Divine glory and the establishment of His kingdom. None of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself, etc. This desire is not confined to the duties of prayer and praise. The good man is actuated by a holy solicitude that every part of his conduct may be so entirely in agreement with the law of Christ, as to curb and restrain the wickedness of the ungodly, and to strengthen and encourage the hearts of true believers in the diligent pursuit and practice of true holiness. (P. McFarlan, D. D.)
Goodness, as illustrated in the character of Barnabas
Mark–
I. The good man as depicted by the world.
1. There is the decent and orderly man. He is so regular in his attendance on the ordinances of the Church, so decorous in all his proceedings, that if you venture to ask whether, while he bears the form of godliness, he also manifests the power thereof, you are decried as uncharitable, and never to be satisfied. What is goodness, if such a man as this is not good?
2. Then comes the liberal, open-hearted, and benevolent man. If you examine whether his liberality may not be thoughtless profusion, whether his benevolence may not be a mere natural feeling, whether other parts of his conduct uphold or contradict the supposition of his goodness, you are encountered with declarations that a better man never existed; and are silenced with the perverted text, that charity covereth a multitude of sins.
3. Then comes the industrious and frugal man–so laudably diligent in his business, so careful to provide for his family! If you intimate a doubt whether his labours exemplify any disposition beyond covetousness or mere worldly prudence, you are treated as a man determined to find fault, as one whom neither generosity nor frugality can please.
4. The next person is the cautious man. His object is never to give offence. He says civil things of every person; yet not so civil of any person as to excite the jealousy of another. He attaches himself to no party; but endeavours to induce all severally to regard ]aim as well inclined to their cause, and yet, while his conduct is a tissue of time-serving insincerity, he is generally allowed to be a very good sort of man.
4. Another is the easy, good-humoured man. He is so pleasant, so harmless, so neighbourly! Every person whom he meets he appears delighted to see. It is thus that, possibly without possessing a single estimable moral quality, he obtains far and wide the denomination of as excellent a man as ever was born.
5. The last character is the man of honour, who studiously practices whatever is creditable, and avoids whatever is discreditable, in the class of society in which he moves. Ask him why he shuns any particular practice. Does he reply, Because it is sinful? The expression is foreign to his lips. He answers, Because it is mean, low, degrading, unbecoming a gentleman. Why does he pursue a specified line of conduct? Because it is acceptable to God? He thinks not of such a standard. He pursues it because it has the stamp of fashionable estimation. Destitute, it may be, of a grain of true religion, this man is regarded by multitudes as a model of perfection!
II. The good man as portrayed in Scripture. Barnabas–
1. Was full of the Holy Ghost. The words describe him as sanctified by Divine grace, as being no longer of the world, even as Christ was not of the world, and as filled with the fruits of the Spirit, with all righteousness and godliness, with holy views, principles, tempers, desires, purposes, which are by Jesus Christ unto the glory and praise of God.
2. Barnabas was full of faith. His faith was sincere, cordial, warm, energetic, productive. It was not a cold and naked assent to the historical truth of the actions of Christ, such as he might yield to a true account of Pontius Pilate or of Judas. It was not a barren speculation dwelling in his head as a portion of abstract knowledge, like a curious principle in mechanics, or a subtle theorem in astronomy. It was faith in a Saviour. On that Saviour, to whom he owed all, he depended for all. To that Saviour he looked with assurance for strength and guidance. He knew in whom he trusted. His works were the fruits of faith, and his faith was manifested by his works.
3. When he came, and had seen the grace of God, was glad. He would have rejoiced had he beheld no more than the tranquillity and outward comfort of his fellow Christians. But the delight which swallowed up all other motives of joy was to behold the growing establishment of the Church of Christ; to behold sinners turning with abhorrence from their iniquities, and glorifying the Lord their Redeemer by newness of life.
4. Exhorted them all, that with purpose of heart they would cleave unto the Lord. The joy of Barnabas did not waste itself in idle contemplation. His love of Christ constrained him to labour for Christ. His love of man impelled him to the assistance of man. How many sufferers previously (chap. 4:36, 37) experienced from his compassion the comforts of food and raiment! He went about as a minister to mankind of those blessings, which exclusively confer complete and durable consolation. (T. Gisborne, M. A.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 24. For he was a good man] Here is a proper character of a minister of the Gospel.
1. He is a good man: his bad heart is changed; his evil dispositions rooted out; and the mind that was in Christ implanted in him.
2. He is full of the Holy Ghost. He is holy, because the Spirit of holiness dwells in him: he has not a few transient visitations or drawings from that Spirit; it is a resident in his soul, and it fills his heart. It is light in his understanding; it is discrimination in his judgment; it is fixed purpose and determination in righteousness in his will; it is purity, it is love, joy, peace, gentleness, goodness, meekness, temperance, and fidelity in his affections and passions. In a word, it has sovereign sway in his heart; it governs all passions, and is the motive and principle of every righteous action.
3. He was full of faith. He implicitly credited his Lord; he knew that he could not lie-that his word could not fail; he expected, not only the fulfilment of all promises, but also every degree of help, light, life, and comfort, which God might at any time see necessary for his Church, he prayed for the Divine blessing, and he believed that he should not pray in vain. His faith never failed, because it laid hold on that God who could not change. Behold, ye preachers of the Gospel! an original minister of Christ. Emulate his piety, his faith, and his usefulness.
Much people was added unto the Lord.] No wonder, when they had such a minister, preaching by the power of the Holy Ghost, such a Gospel as that of Jesus Christ.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Barnabas is here described to be beyond what the Jews called a righteous man, who would say to his neighbour, That which is yours is yours, and that which is mine is mine; meaning such as would do no wrong. But Barnabas, as the good man in their esteem, (such a one as the apostle speaks of, Rom 5:7, for whom one would dare to die), had actually made, and not called only, that which was his his poor neighbours, selling what he had to bestow upon them, as Act 4:37.
Much people was added unto the Lord; his good works, accompanying his good preaching, might be a great means of the conversion of so many.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
24. For he was a good manThesense of “good” here is plainly “large-hearted,””liberal-minded,” rising above narrow Jewish sectarianism,and that because, as the historian adds, he was “full of theHoly Ghost and of faith.”
and much people were addedunto the LordThis proceeding of Barnabas, so full of wisdom,love, and zeal, was blessed to the great increase of the Christiancommunity in that important city.
Act 11:25;Act 11:26. BARNABAS,FINDING THE WORKIN ANTIOCH TOOMUCH FOR HIM,GOES TO TARSUSFOR SAULTHEYLABOR THERETOGETHER FOR A WHOLEYEAR WITH MUCHSUCCESS, AND ANTIOCHBECOMES THE HONOREDBIRTHPLACE OF THE TERMCHRISTIAN.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
For he was a good man,…. He had the grace of God wrought in his soul, and did good works; he was very kind, and generous, and charitable; he sold what land he had, and gave the money to the apostles, for the use of the community, Ac 4:37
and full of the Holy Ghost, and of faith; he was full of the several graces of the Spirit, and particularly of faith; and he was full of the extraordinary gifts of the Spirit, and of the faith of miracles; he was full of the doctrine of faith, and of spiritual gifts for the preaching of it: the same character is given of Stephen, Ac 6:5
and much people was added unto the Lord; by the means of Barnabas, through his ministry, and the exercise of those gifts he was full of; so the Arabic version, “and he drew a large multitude to the Lord”.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
For (). Because. This is the explanation of the conduct of Barnabas. The facts were opposed to the natural prejudices of a Jew like Barnabas, but he rose above such racial narrowness. He was a really good man (). See Ro 5:7 for distinction between and , righteous, where ranks higher than . Besides, Barnabas was full of the Holy Spirit (like Peter) and of faith and so willing to follow the leading of God’s Spirit and take some risks. This is a noble tribute paid by Luke. One wonders if Barnabas was still living when he wrote this. Certainly he was not prejudiced against Barnabas though he will follow the fortunes of Paul after the separation (Acts 15:36; Acts 15:41).
Was added unto the Lord ( ). First aorist passive indicative of , common verb to add to. These people were added to the Lord Jesus before they were added to the church. If that were always true, what a difference it would make in our churches.
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
Good [] . More than strictly upright. Compare Rom 5:7, where it is distinguished from dikaiov, just or righteous. “His benevolence effectually prevented him censuring anything that might be new or strange in these preachers to the Gentiles, and caused him to rejoice in their success” (Gloag).
Fuente: Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament
1) “For he was a good man,” (hoti en aner agathos) “Because he was (spiritually) a good man,” a man good from the heart, though he later once quarreled with Paul over taking or not taking John Mark his nephew, on a missionary tour with him and Paul, and even parted company over the matter, Act 13:13; Act 15:36-41.
2) “And full of the Holy Ghost and of faith:” (kai pleres pneumatos hagiou kai pisteos) “And full of or controlled (motivated by) the Holy Spirit and of faith,” a desired state and objective of pursuit for every child of God, Eph 5:17-18; Gal 5:22-26. To be “filled with” means to be controlled, superintended, or directed by the Holy Spirit, in harmony with the word of God, 1Jn 4:1-3; Rom 8:14; 1Th 1:5-10.
3) “And much people was added unto the Lord,” (kai prosetethe ochlos hikanos to Kurio) “And a considerable crowd (of people) was added to, became attached to the Lord,” as a result of his work as on the day of Pentecost, in connection with the preaching of the word of salvation and repeatedly after Pentecost as the Spirit accompanied the word with power, Act 2:41-47; Act 5:14. One is added to the Lord by faith in Jesus Christ, Eph 2:8-9; Gal 3:26; Rom 1:16; Rom 4:3; Rom 4:5; Rom 4:16; Rom 10:8-13.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
24. For he was a good man. Barnabas is commended with the commendation of the Holy Ghost; yet we must know that there was respect had not so much of him as of us. For all those are condemned of ungodliness and malice who envy other men’s labors, and are grieved when they see the same have good success.
Also we must note the epithet used in the description of a good man, full of the Holy Ghost, full of faith. For after that he had said that he was an upright and good man, he showed from what fountain this goodness did flow; that, abandoning the affections of the flesh, he did, with all his heart, embrace godliness, having the Spirit to be his guide. But why doth he separate faith from the Spirit, whose gift it is? I answer, that it is not named severally, as if it were a diverse thing, but it is rather set forth as a principal token, whereby it might appear that Barnabas was full of the Holy Ghost.
There was a great multitude added. Though the number of the godly was already great, yet Luke saith that it was increased by Barnabas’ coming. Thus doth the building of the Church go forward when one doth help another with mutual consent, and one doth gently allow (741) that which another hath begun.
(741) “ Candide… probat,” candidly approves.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(24) For he was a good man.Words of praise of this kind are comparatively rare in this history, and we may, perhaps, think of them here as expressing St. Lukes personal estimate of the character of the preacher, which he was all the more anxious to place on record because he had to narrate before long the sad contention which separated him from his friend and fellow-worker (Act. 15:39). The word good is probably to be taken as presenting the more winning and persuasive form of holiness, as contrasted with the severer forms of simple justice. (Comp. Rom. 5:7.)
Full of the Holy Ghost.This was implied in his very name as the Son of Prophecy (see Note on Act. 4:31); but it is interesting to note that the words are identical with those in which the historian had previously described Stephen (Act. 6:5). Barnabas appeared to him to reproduce the mind and character of the martyr.
Much people.Literally, a great multitude, implying a large increase upon the work related in Act. 11:21.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
24. For Commentators are at a loss for the reference of this for; that is, For what in the preceding context does this verse assign a reason? Kuinoel thinks it gives the reason for selecting Barnabas; but that fact is too far back. Others refer it to exhorted, (Act 11:23,) as if his zeal in his ministry was because he was a good man. Dr. Alexander refers it to his being spiritually so glad. All this seems to overlook the real facts. Gentile Luke is accounting for Barnabas’ deep and ready sympathy with this Gentile movement, by Barnabas’ own Christian liberality and goodness.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
‘For he was a good man, and full of the Holy Spirit and of faith, and much people was added to the Lord.’
No greater accolade could have been paid to Barnabas than this, that he was a good man, and that he was full of the Holy Spirit as was evidenced by his outstanding faith (compare Gal 5:22). And it was this that ensured his success. It also makes clear that the Holy Spirit approved of the work going on in Antioch for it was being nurtured by a man of the Spirit. And the result was that a great many people were ‘added to the LORD’. They not only became members of the church but became ‘one with Christ’ through the Holy Spirit (compare 1 Corinthians 12).
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
24 For he was a good man, and full of the Holy Ghost and of faith: and much people was added unto the Lord.
Ver. 24. For he was a good man ] Few exist today.
” Rari quippe boni-
Iam nec Brutus erit, Bruti nec avunculus usquam.
(Juvenal.)
Anthony de Guevara tells a merry story of the host at Nola, who when he was commanded by the Roman censor to go and call the good men of the city to appear before him, went to the churchyard, and there called at the graves of the dead, Oh ye good men of Nola, come away, for the Roman censor calleth for your appearance: for he knew not where to call for a good man alive. The Scripture complains that there is none that doeth good, that is, none in comparison, none to the mad multitude, that, like Jeremiah’s figs, are naught, stark naught. Phocion was surnamed Bonus; the Good, but the excellency of a godly man is (Barnabas-like) to be full of the Holy Ghost and of faith, to follow God fully as Caleb, Num 14:24 ; to have a heart full of goodness, as those Romans; a life full of good works, as Tabitha; shining full fair, as a right orient and illustrious star with a singularity of heavenly light, as good Noah did in his generation; and as holy Joseph whose life, saith Bucholcer, was a constellation, yea, a very heaven bespangled with brightest stars of glorious graces.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Acts
WHAT A GOOD MAN IS, AND HOW HE BECOMES SO
Act 11:24
‘A good man.’ How easily that title is often gained! There is, perhaps, no clearer proof that men are bad than the sort of people whom they consent to call good.
It is a common observation that all words describing moral excellence tend to deteriorate and to contract their meaning, just as bright metal rusts by exposure, or coins become light and illegible by use. So it comes to pass that any decently respectable man, especially if he has an easy temper and a dash of frankness and good humour, is christened with this title ‘good.’ The Bible, which is the verdict of the Judge, is a great deal more chary in its use of the word. You remember how Jesus Christ once rebuked a man for addressing Him so, not that He repudiated the title, but that the giver had bestowed it lightly and out of mere conventional politeness. The word is too noble to be applied without very good reason.
But here we have a picture of Barnabas hung in the gallery of Scripture portraits, and this is the description of it in the catalogue, ‘He was a good man.’
You observe that my text is in the nature of an analysis. It begins at the outside, and works inwards. ‘He was a good man.’ Indeed;-how came he to be so? He was ‘full of the Holy Ghost.’ Full of the Holy Ghost, was he? How came he to be that? He was ‘full of faith.’ So the writer digs down, as it were, till he gets to the bed-rock, on which all the higher strata repose; and here is his account of the way in which it is possible for human nature to win this resplendent title, and to be adjudged of God as ‘good,’ ‘full of the Holy Ghost and of faith.’
So these three steps in the exposition of the character and its secret will afford a framework for what I have to say now.
I. Note, then, first, the sort of man whom the Judge will call ‘good.’
Then the next thing that we hear of him is that, when the young man who had been a persecuting Pharisee, and the rising hope of the anti-Christian party, all at once came forward with some story of a vision which he had seen on the road to Damascus, and when the older Christians were suspicious of a trick to worm himself into their secrets by a pretended conversion, Barnabas, with the generosity of an unsuspicious nature, which often sees deeper into men than do suspicious eyes, was the first to cast the aegis of his recognition round him. In like manner, when Christianity took an entirely spontaneous and, to the Church at Jerusalem, rather unwelcome new development and expansion, when some unofficial believers, without any authority from headquarters, took upon themselves to stride clean across the wall of separation, and to speak of Jesus Christ to blank heathens, and found, to the not altogether gratified surprise of the Christians at Jerusalem, ‘that on the Gentiles also was poured out the gift of the Holy Ghost,’ it was Barnabas who was sent down to look into this surprising new phenomenon, and we read that ‘when he came and saw the grace of God, he was glad.’ The reason why he rejoiced over the manifestation of the grace of God in such a strange form was because ‘he was a good man,’ and his goodness recognised goodness in others and was glad at the work of the Lord. The new condition of affairs sent him to look for Paul, and to put him to work. Then we find him set apart to missionary service, and the leader of the first missionary band, in which he was accompanied by his friend Saul. He acquiesced frankly, and without a murmur, in the superiority of the junior, and yielded up pre-eminence to him quite willingly. The story of that missionary journey begins ‘Barnabas and Saul,’ but very soon it comes to be ‘Paul and Barnabas,’ and it keeps that order throughout. He was an older man than Paul, for when at Lystra the people thought that the gods had come down in the likeness of men; Barnabas was Jupiter, and Paul the quick-footed Mercury, messenger of the gods. He was in the work before Paul was thought of, and it must have taken a great deal of goodness to acquiesce in ‘He must increase and I must decrease.’ Then came the quarrel between them, the foolish fondness for his runaway nephew John Mark, whom he insisted on retaining in a place for which he was conspicuously unfitted. And so he lost his friend, the confidence of the Church, and his work. He sulked away into Cyprus; he had his nephew, for whom he had given up all these other things. A little fault may wreck a life, and the whiter the character the blacker the smallest stain upon it.
We do not hear anything more of him. Apparently, from one casual allusion, he continued to serve the Lord in evangelistic work, but the sweet communion of the earlier days, and the confident friendship with the Apostle, seem to have come to an end with that sharp contention. So Barnabas drops out of the rank of Christian workers. And yet ‘he was a good man, full of the Holy Ghost and of faith.’
Now I have spent more time than I meant over this brief outline of the sort of character here pointed at. Let me just gather into one or two sentences what seem to me to be the lessons of it. The first is this, that the tap-root of all goodness is reference to God and obedience to Him. People tell us that morality is independent of religion. I admit that many men are better than their creeds, and many men are worse than their creeds; but I would also venture to assert that morality is the garment of religion; the body of which religion is the soul; the expression of religion in daily life. And although I am not going to say that nothing which a man does without reference to God has any comparative goodness in it, or that all the acts which are thus void of reference to Him stand upon one level of evil, I do venture to say that the noblest deed, which is not done in conscious obedience to the will of God, lacks its supreme nobleness. The loftiest perfection of conduct is obedience to God. And whatever excellence of self-sacrifice, ‘whatsoever things lovely and of good report,’ there may be, apart from the presence of this perfect motive, those deeds are imperfect. They do not correspond either to the whole obligations or to the whole possibilities of man, and, therefore, they are beneath the level of the highest good. Good is measured by reference to God.
Then, further, let me remark that one broad feature which characterises the truest goodness is the suppression of self. That is only another way of saying the same thing as I have been saying. It is illustrated for us all through this story of Barnabas. Whosoever can say, ‘I think not of myself, but of others; of the cause; of the help I can give to men; and I lay not goods only, nor prejudices only, nor the pride of position and the supremacy of place only at the feet of God, but I lay down my whole self; and I desire that self may be crucified, that God may live in me,’-he, and only he, has reached the height of goodness. Goodness requires the suppression of self.
Further, note that the gentler traits of character are pre-eminent in Christian goodness. There is nothing about this man heroic or exceptional. His virtues are all of the meek and gracious sort-those which we relegate sometimes to an inferior place in our estimates. These things make but a poor show by the side of some of the tawdry splendours of what the vulgar world calls virtues. It requires an educated eye to see the harmony of the sober colouring of some great painter. A child, a clown, a vulgar person-and there are such in all ranks-will prefer flaring reds and blues and yellows heaped together in staring contrast. A thrush or a blackbird is but a soberly clad creature by the side of macaws and paroquets; but the one has a song and the others have only a screech. The gentle virtues are the truly Christian virtues-patience and meekness and long-suffering and sympathy and readiness to efface oneself for the sake of God and of men.
So there is a bit of comfort for us commonplace, humdrum people, to whom God has only given one or two talents, and who can never expect to make a figure before men. We may be little violets below a stone, if we cannot be flaunting hollyhocks and tiger lilies. We may have the beauty of goodness in us after Christ’s example, and that is better than to be great.
Barnabas was no genius. He was not even a genius in goodness; he did not strike out anything original and out of the way. He seems to have been a commonplace kind of man enough; but ‘he was a good man.’ And the weakest and the humblest of us may hope to have the same thing said of us, if we will.
And then, note further, that true goodness, thank God! does not exclude the possibility of falling and sinning. There is a black spot in this man’s history; and there are black spots in the histories of all saints. Thank God! the Bible is, as some people would say, almost brutally frank in telling us about the imperfections of the best. Very often imperfections are the exaggerations of characteristic goodnesses, and warn us to take care that we do not push, as Barnabas did, our facility to the point of criminal complicity with weaknesses; and that we do not indulge, instead of strenuously rebuking when need is. Never let our gentleness fall away, like a badly made jelly, into a trembling heap, and never let our strength gather itself together into a repulsive attitude, but guard against the exaggeration of virtue into vice.
Remember that whilst there may be good men who sin, there is One entire and flawless, in whom all types of excellence do meet, and who alone of humanity can front the verdict of the world, and has fronted it now for nineteen centuries, with the question upon His lips, which none have dared to answer, ‘Which of you convinceth Me of sin?’
II. Secondly, notice the divine Helper who makes men good.
A divine Helper, not merely a divine influence, but a divine Person, who not only helps men from without, but so enters into a man as that the man’s whole nature is saturated with Him-that is strange language. Mystical and unreal I dare say some of you may think it, but let us consider whether some such divine Helper is not plainly pointed as necessary, by the experience of every man that ever honestly tried to make himself good.
I have no doubt that I am speaking to many persons who, more or less constantly and courageously and earnestly, have laboured at the task of self-improvement and self-culture. I venture to think that, if their standard of what they wish to attain is high, their confession of what they have attained will be very low. Ah, brother! if we think of what it is that we need to make us good-viz. the strengthening of these weak wills of ours, which we cannot strengthen but to a very limited degree by any tonics that we can apply, or any supports with which we may bind them round; if we consider the resistance which ourselves, our passions, our tastes, our habits, our occupations offer, and the resistance which the world around us, friends, companions, and all the aggregate, dread and formidable, of material things present to our becoming, in any lofty and comprehensive sense of the term, good men and women, I think we shall be ready to listen, as to a true Gospel, to the message that says, ‘You do not need to do it by yourself.’ You have got the wolf by the ears, perhaps, for a moment, but there is tremendous strength in the brute, and your hands and wrists will ache in holding him presently, and what will happen then? You do not need to try it yourself. There is a divine Helper standing at your sides and waiting to strengthen you, and that Helper does not work from outside; He will pass within, and dwell in your hearts and mould and strengthen your wills to what is good, and suppress your inclinations to evil, and, by His inward presence, teach ‘your hands to war and your fingers to fight.’
Surely, surely, the experience of the world from the beginning, confirmed by the consciousness and conscience of every one of us, tells us that of ourselves we are impotent, and that the good that is within the reach of our unaided efforts is poor and fragmentary and superficial indeed.
The great promise of the Gospel is precisely this promise. We terribly limit and misunderstand what we call the Gospel if we give such exclusive predominance to one part of it, as some of us are accustomed to do. Thank God I the first word that Jesus Christ says to any soul is, ‘Thy sins be forgiven thee.’ But that first word has a second that follows it, ‘Arise! and walk!’ and it is for the sake of the second that the first is spoken. The gift of pardon, the consciousness of acceptance, the fact of reconciliation with God, the closing of the doors of the place of retribution, the quieting of the stings of accusing conscience, all these are but meant to be introductory to that which Jesus Christ Himself, in the Gospel of John, emphatically calls more than once ‘ the gift of God,’ which He symbolised by ‘living water,’ which whosoever drank should never thirst, and which whosoever possessed would give it forth in living streams of holy life and noble deeds. The promise of the Gospel is the promise of new life, derived from Christ and maintained in us by the indwelling Spirit, which will come like fresh reinforcements to an all but beaten army in some hard-fought field, which will stand like a stay behind a man, to us almost blown over by the gusts of temptation, which will strengthen what is weak, raise what is low, illumine what is dark, and will make us who are evil good with a goodness given by God through His Son.
Surely there is nothing more congruous with that divine character than that He who Himself is good, and good from Himself, should rejoice in making us, His poor children, into His own likeness. Surely He would not be good unless He delighted to make us good. Surely it is something very like presumption in men to assert that the direct communication of the Spirit of God with the spirits whom God has made is an impossibility. Surely it is flying in the face of Scripture teaching to deny that such communication is a promise. Surely it is a flagrant contradiction of the depths of Christian experience to falter in the belief that it is a very solid reality.
‘Full of the Holy Ghost,’ as a vessel might be to its brim of golden wine; Christian men and women! does that describe you? Full? A dribbling drop or two in the bottom of the jar. Whose fault is it? Why, with that rushing mighty wind to fill our sails if we like, should we be lying in the sickly calms of the tropics, with the pitch oozing out of the seams, and the idle canvas flapping against the mast? Why, with those tongues of fire hovering over our heads, should we be cowering over grey ashes in which there lives a little spark? Why, with that great rushing tide of the river of the water of life, should we be like the dry watercourses of the desert, with bleached and white stones baking where the stream should be running? ‘O! Thou that art named the House of Israel, is the Spirit of the Lord straitened? Are these His doings?’
III. And so, lastly, we are shown how that divine Helper comes to men.
True! there are convincing operations which He effects upon the world; but these are not in question here. These come prior to, and independent of, faith. But the work of the Spirit of God, present within us to heal and hallow us, has as condition our trust in Jesus Christ, the Great Healer. If you open a chink, the water will come in. If you trust in Jesus Christ, He will give you the new life of His Spirit, which will make you free from the law of sin and death. That divine Spirit ‘which they that believe in Him should receive’ delights to enter into every heart where His presence is desired. Faith is desire; and desires rooted in faith cannot be in vain. Faith is expectation; and expectations based upon the divine promise can never be disappointed. Faith is dependence, and dependence that reckons upon God, and upon God’s gift of His Spirit, will surely be recompensed.
The measure in which we possess the power that makes us good depends altogether upon ourselves. ‘Open thy mouth wide and I will fill it.’ You may have as much of God as you want, and as little as you will. The measure of your faith will determine at once the measure of your goodness, and of your possession of the Spirit that makes good. Just as when the prophet miraculously increased the oil in the cruse, the golden stream flowed as long as they brought vessels, and stayed when there were no more, so as long as we open our hearts for the reception, the gift will not be withheld, but God will not let it run like water spilled upon the ground that cannot be gathered up. If we will desire, if we will expect, if we will reckon on, if we will look to, Jesus Christ, and, beside all this, if we will honestly use the power that we possess, our capacity will grow, and the gift will grow, and our holiness and purity will grow with it.
Some of you have been trying more or less continuously, all your lives, to mend your own characters and improve yourselves. Brethren, there is a better way than that. A modern poet says-
‘Self-reverence, self-knowledge, self-control,
These three alone lift life to sovereign power.’
Fuente: Expositions Of Holy Scripture by Alexander MacLaren
faith. App-150.
people. Greek. ochlos. Literally crowd.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Act 11:24. , a good man and full of the Holy Ghost and of faith) Gal 5:22, The fruit of the Spirit is love-goodness, faith.
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
he was: Act 24:16, 2Sa 18:27, Psa 37:23, Psa 112:5, Pro 12:2, Pro 13:22, Pro 14:14, Mat 12:35, Mat 19:17, Luk 23:50, Joh 7:12, Rom 5:7
full: Act 6:3, Act 6:5, Act 6:8, Rom 15:15
and much: Act 11:21, Act 5:14, Act 9:31
Reciprocal: 2Ch 19:11 – the good Act 2:4 – filled Act 2:47 – the Lord Eph 5:18 – but Jam 3:17 – full
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
CHARACTERISTICS OF ST. BARNABAS
He was a good man, and full of the holy Ghost and of faith.
Act 11:24
No better man could be sent to Antioch to ascertain the truth or otherwise of what the Apostles had heard. The writer of the Acts describes his characteristics.
I. He was a good man.Good, not in the common acceptation of the term, but in the Divine. If a man lives morally; if he pays that which he owes; if he bestows his goods to feed the poor; if he conforms to the rules of society and the forms of religion, whatever his motives for so doing, by universal consent he is denominated a good man. Now the goodness of St. Barnabas involved all this. He was of the tribe of Levi; a son of consolation as his name signifies, and as he was surnamed by his fellow-Apostles; and so kind and charitable that he sold all his lands at Cyprus, and laid the money at the Apostles feet at Jerusalem, that they might distribute to the necessities of the poor. But the goodness of St. Barnabas was Divinethe creation of the Holy Spirit; for He makes all really good men (Joh 1:12-13).
II. He was full of the Holy Ghost.Not that he was with the Twelve, when, on the Day of Pentecost, they were all filled with the Holy Ghost; but it has been surmised that he was one of the converts made on that glorious day. Be this as it may, the same Divine privilege was granted to him. And it had the same sanctifying effect in him, though not accompanied by the gift of tongues.
III. He was also full of faith.He was strong in faith, giving glory to God. And because he believed in God he had faith in his mission. He knew and felt that Christianity was Gods living remedy for the worlds deadly ills, and therefore must ultimately prove efficacious in healing them. With this firm conviction, the offspring of his faith, he laboured most abundantly to spread it.
(SECOND OUTLINE)
THE MEANING OF GOODNESS
The immediate marks of goodness which are mentioned in connection with these words are, first of all, brightness and gladness. St. Barnabas is spoken of as being good, and as encouraging the people to persevere. The second mark had this for its result, that many were turned unto the Lord in consequence of St. Barnabass life and work. Both these points we may do well to pay attention to; for we often fail to have a hopeful spirit, and often fail to convince people when we are talking with them, because we are not as St. Barnabas was. Some pride, some jealousy, some envy, some vanity, that still smouldering ember of an early sin not quite quenched, these take the brightness out of us, and prevent its being said of us as often as it ought to be that we are good. Although we may be clever and in earnest, yet still it cannot be said of us in any true degree, as it was said of St. Barnabas, that many people have been turned unto the Lord through our conversation; and the reason is because, although it may be said of us that we are what St. Paul calls righteous, yet we have not attained to that mysterious mark of influence which is called here being good.
I. What is meant here by being good?
(a) There must first of all be self-knowledgea thing from which most of us flinch and fight shy of. What was one of the difficulties which must have beset Abraham when he was called? The difficulty is a very common one, and it frightens not a few from considering the fact of their call. Abraham was called while his father was still alive, and it would seem that God spoke to the son in a way in which He did not speak to the father. Now here arises at once a kind of horror in our minds that we should know more than our parents. But every generation as it proceeds along its way has some peculiar work to do, which the passing generation was not formed to do. And so it is with individuals; we have each a particular work to do, some steps to take which our parents could not mark out for us by their own footsteps going before. Many and many a son and daughter are driven from the realising of his or her personality and individuality because of this thought, I shall then have to say and do some things which my parents never said or thought. But more or less every life is a separate voyage of discovery, and more or less we must make it alone. Certainly, in speaking to Christian people we can fall back on this comforting thought, that our parents have prayed for us again and again, they have asked God to show us His Will and to enable us to do it. Well then, if one feels called by God to take some step in advance of those who have gone before, one can feel that it is made in answer to the prayers of our parents, who in this way have raised us above their own reach.
(b) Then comes the thought of self-mastery. Everybody who knows himself finds a lower and a higher self perpetually at war with each other. The pity of it is that this war is carried on so halfheartedly; the pity of it is that people do not realise quicker than they do the necessity of self-mastery; and it puts a man in a nobler position when he resolves step by step to gain it.
(c) And then must come self-culture. Not at once will you reach perfection. You find out that you have certain capacities; yes, but these will want improving, and the best and most powerful gifts that we have depend for their full efficiency, not so much upon our working at them, as upon our working upon the lower gifts that we possess. It is here that so many people fail; they will not patiently work, so to say, at the background of the picture. There are gifts that we have, perhaps gifts of real genius, but if they are to reach their full efficiency, we must work hard at certain lower powers that we have, even though they will bring us no credit, in order that the higher gifts may not be dimmed.
And when there has been this self-knowledge, when there has been this self-mastery, this self-culture, what should follow?
(d) Self-devotion, self sacrifice. These powers are not merely to be self-built towers up which we are to mount in order that we may look down upon and despise our neighbours. No; the object of attaining all these things is not for our own self-exaltation, but for a nobler end, using what gifts we have for Gods glory and the good of others.
If this is some answer to the question, it is not all, it does not touch the position of St. Barnabas.
II. A good man, and full of the Holy Ghost.This does not mean simply that he had something of the influence of the Holy Ghost as it had been in the world ever since the brooding over the surface of the waters, but St. Barnabas had a great measure of that peculiar and special indwelling of the Blessed Spirit which our Saviour promised to those whom He left, and yet would not leave as orphans. There are some people who wish to be good, who are willing to entertain the idea of individuality, of personality, of self mastery, self-culture, and even of self-devotion, but who keep outside, more or less, of the special gifts of the Holy Spirit. I believe in the Holy Ghost. I believe in the Holy Catholic Church. Ask yourselves whether in your anxiety to be good there is within you a humble and full acceptance of all those powers of the Holy Spirit in the way in which our Blessed Lord appointed them to be used.
And yet that was not all.
III. St. Barnabas was also full of faith.This was, of course, in one sense, the outcome and result of the Holy Spirits indwelling. Faith is a gift of God not only in the object but in the act. It is also the cause and the support of the goodness of life. Here we need a caution. As there are those outside the Church who are trying to be good, and yet have not that obedience to accept the assistance of the Holy Spirit in the way in which Christ has appointed; so there may be some who are members of the Church, and who yet may be tempted to be content more or less with a religion which consists of good-heartedness, a religion which is chiefly based on the feelings and the sentiments, called out either by witnessing the miseries of the poor or by the splendour of ritual and high musical services. In both cases the real object of our faith as Christians might be left very much in the background, and practically treated as indifferent, almost as useless. It becomes us as members of a Church for which God has done great things to reflect whether we are truly accepting the gifts of the Holy Spirit in the Church, and, if in the Church, whether we are looking in the right and true direction to see what is the fountain from which these gifts flow.
Bishop Edward King.
Illustration
Whatever good natural qualities a man may have, before they can be turned to good account for God they must be elevated, improved, transfigured, as we may say, by the operation of the Holy Ghost, and by genuine faith in God. Natural good qualities are like all the rest of our nature. They are damaged by sin and by the Fall. There is no steadfastness in them. They are tainted by self. We see this constantly in men who are naturally good-natured as we say, but who are weak in Christian principle. Their good-nature takes a tinge of selfishness as they grow older, unless it grows to be something better than mere good-nature by the operation of the Holy Spirit. It must either grow better or grow worse. If it does not grow up to be something better than mere good-nature, it degenerates into that sort of easy good-nature, which never really gives up anything for others, but only seems to do so, and wins a cheap popularity by never contradicting anybody.
(THIRD OUTLINE)
GOOD, BUT WEAK
St. Barnabas was good, but he was not on that account perfect. He was good, but as a famous preacher said of another character in the Old Testament, He was good, but weak. This, perhaps, will not surprise many people. To them, there is always a sort of connection between goodness and weakness, whereas there is no connection at all. Yet men may be good and weak.
I. St. Barnabas would certainly seem to have an element of weakness in his character, which came out in two ways:
(a) First of all, in the matter of eating with the Gentiles. You will remember how at Antioch he and St. Peter, with others, forgot their own prejudices and customs and had boldly sat down to eat with the Gentile Christians; but when there came certain Jewish Christians, we are told that first of all St. Peter (who in many respects was notoriously weak) silently and gradually withdrew himself, and ate no more with them; and even St. Barnabas, says St. Paul with some indignation, was carried away with their dissimulation.
(b) And, secondly, his weakness came out in another and still more famous episode in his lifethat which was connected with Mark. On one lonely journey, St. Paul and St. Barnabas determined to take with them Mark, the young cousin of Barnabas, who may have had a soft training, being the only son of a rich widow, living, perhaps, in a villa of Gethsemane outside Jerusalem. This young man, who had been brought up in considerable luxury, when the crisis of his life came, when he found himself face to face with the robbers and other unpleasant accompaniments of travel in Asia Minor in those days, losing heart, returned to Jerusalem. Then, later on, having, perhaps, gone through some silent struggle of his own, he offered himself again for the service, and St. Barnabas wished to take him, but St. Paul refused, and the quarrel waxed hot between them. Here St. Barnabas was weak. The young man had forfeited their confidence, but St. Barnabas said, like many others, peace at any price. So we even have here the beginning of a system known as nepotism, or the favouring of relationsthe preference of kinsmen for this place or for that. So there came that great apostolic quarrel. And they parted, those two Apostles, and after this parting from St. Paul, St. Barnabas disappears altogether from the pages of sacred history, or remains the good-natured man.
II. Yet these are the important words which remain; He was a good man.And his goodness was shown in more ways than one. There are three instances I would give you:
(a) It was shown in the recognition of the work of the Holy Ghost among the Gentiles. It was a sign of goodness in St. Barnabas that he was able to put by his own prejudices; when he saw the grace of God he was glad. It was all he cared about, for he was a good man. There is one sign of his goodness, in letting his prejudices die before the grace of God.
(b) His goodness is seen in thisthat he was a peacemaker. Blessed are the peacemakers. Twice St. Barnabas saved St. Paul for the Christian Church. It was this gentle, good man, full of the Holy Ghost, a peace-lover, who, in the first instance, when all were suspicious of this terrible persecutor, took him by the hand and brought him into the apostolic band. Let that be written down for St. Barnabas, that he served the Church by saving a greater man to serve it.
(c) There is the love of the brethren shown by a capacity for self-sacrifice. It is one of the earliest marks of the infant Church. It was one of the first acts which seems to attract the attention of the writer of the Acts of the Apostles. When he was speaking about the early days of the Church, he picked out one man: And Joses, who by the apostles was surnamed Barnabas, having land, sold it, and brought the money, and laid it at the apostles feet. No cheap religion for this Barnabas. The love of the brethren had to be shown by self-sacrifice. And by self-sacrifice the history of the Church began, as with self-sacrifice it must go until the end. Here is always a sign of the love of the brethren, and of sincerity. Are men ready for any measure of self-sacrifice?
Rev. H. R. Gamble.
Illustration
The merely good-natured man does very little, and, on the whole, gets very little thanks for what he does. It is the men who have principles to which they must stick, and for which, if necessary, they are prepared to die, who make a mark on their contemporaries and on history. Principles must prevail. Mere good-nature is no good in the end. The first thing is to do justice. You may remember some very notable words of a Psalm which says, Thou, Lord, art merciful, because Thou rewardest every man according to his work. The general notion of mercy is to reward men not according to their works. The better view is, Thou, Lord, art merciful, because Thou art just.
Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary
4
Act 11:24. Full of the Holy Ghost. (See the notes at chapter 4:31.) The work and influence of Barnabas resulted in many more conversions.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Act 11:24. For he was a good man. We ask here for the precise meaning of the word good, and also why the particle for is prefixed to the statement. The word good does not mean merely that Barnabas was a man of earnest religious character. This is expressed by the words which follow. Rather it denotes that he was a man of a genial, generous, charitable, and candid disposition. This helps us to the meaning of the connecting particle for. The reason is given why he unfeignedly rejoiced in what he saw at Antioch. There may have been misgivings and suspicions at Jerusalem. But in his heart there were none. He may have been much astonishedas much astonished as those who went with Peter from Joppa to Csarea (Act 10:45); but he frankly acknowledged the work of the Divine Spirit, and was glad because Pagans had received the fall grace of God.
Much people was added unto the Lord. See what precedes (Act 11:21) and what follows (Act 11:26) as to the progressive but rapid growth of the Church in Antioch.
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
See notes one verse 22
Fuente: McGarvey and Pendleton Commentaries (New Testament)
24. Because he was a good man, and full of the Holy Ghost and faith. Here we see confirmed the significant fact that the apostles and primitive saints all recognized the Holy Ghost as the sovereign Arbiter in every matter of doubt and controversy, and that they dared not put their hand on the ark of God. Here we see that Barnabas unhesitatingly acquiesces in a downright innovation. While the grace of God, in Judaism, had always been free to the Gentiles, yet they must receive it by way of proselytism into the Mosaic church. Now Barnabas sees an institution which had stood fifteen hundred years unimpeached, literally ignored and relegated to oblivion. That looked like smashing up all the honored and sacred institutions of his fathers, yet we hear Barnabas shouting an uproarious Amen! and pronouncing his blessings on the whole procedure, importunately exhorting them to abide in the way they had started out. Why was this? Simply because Barnabas was a good man, full of the Holy Ghost and faith; consequently he had the inward light of the Spirit to discriminate the hand of God and recognize His work wherever he saw it. Knowing well that all the apostles submitted to the Holy Ghost in everything great and small, he felt perfectly free to give his endorsement to the Gentile innovation in the name of the Apostolic church.