Acts 28: Paul Needed Brothers at His Side

Introduction

Why did the apostle Paul, a thinker and a theologian trained in the Scriptures, leave no books, no philosophical treatises and no scholarly articles, only letters? Letters to churches and letters to friends. That is the question raised by Jan Carsten Schnurr, a lecturer in historical theology at the FTH in Giessen, invited this Sunday by the FeG Mainz (Free Evangelical Church of Mainz).

His answer runs through the whole message: God takes deep relationships between Christians very seriously. The starting point is a short phrase in Acts 28. A prisoner at the end of a long sea voyage, Paul meets a few brothers on the road to Rome: “When Paul saw them, he thanked God and took courage.”

The preacher then follows Paul through his companions: his coworkers, Barnabas the encourager, Timothy his son in the faith. And he asks each of us: who has been a Barnabas for you, and for whom can you be one?

Message outline

1. Letters, because faith is built on relationships

The greatest Christian teacher of all time, Jesus aside, is writing texts that will shape the whole history of the Church. Thousands of commentaries and millions of sermons will be written about them. And these writings are letters.
Paul had nothing against deep theological reflection, as the letter to the Romans proves. But in chapter 16 of that same letter we read: “Greet Ampliatus, my beloved in the Lord. Greet Urbanus, our fellow worker in Christ, and Stachys, my beloved. Greet Apelles, the approved in Christ.” And so on, for a whole chapter.
The first letter to the Thessalonians is almost entirely about Paul’s relationship with this young church. The deeper doctrinal questions take up only a small part of it.
“God takes deep relationships between Christians very, very seriously.” This may be a distinctive mark of the Christian faith: relationships that move us forward and through which our relationship with God also grows.
That is why the Church matters so much in the New Testament. It is not first of all a place for Sunday morning activities, but a community, “a network of relationships” where something of the nature of Jesus becomes visible, and into which we are to welcome other people with love.

2. “He thanked God and took courage”

At the end of the book of Acts, Paul arrives near Rome after a long and exhausting journey, a prisoner with an uncertain future. At Appii Forum and the Three Taverns, two places on the Appian Way, he suddenly meets a few Christians.
Paul clearly needed this encouragement. In a few moments, these unknown believers became friends and brothers to him, after the trials of recent months, and a source of strength to face what awaited him in Rome.
Paul was not married, as he explains at length in the first letter to the Corinthians: it was not his calling. Yet he was never a lone fighter. In his letters alone, 36 coworkers, men and women, are named.
He dictated the letter to the Romans to Tertius. Several letters bear several authors’ names, such as Paul, Silvanus and Timothy: he consulted with others when he wrote. Tychicus carried the letters to the Colossians and the Ephesians, and could answer questions and clear up misunderstandings.
His friends fed him in prison, where he would probably have had nothing to eat. They accompanied him, helped him, and prayed with him, for him and for the young churches. Paul’s mission was “real teamwork.”

3. More than colleagues: friends

Paul’s coworkers were much more than helpers. They were his close friends, his brothers and sisters in the faith. Without them, he could not have carried his immense responsibility.
The book of Acts tells us that he sometimes waited for his closest coworkers, who had been delayed on the road, because he did not want to evangelize without them.
In the letter to the Colossians, he writes about Aristarchus, Mark and Justus a sentence that always touches the preacher: they have been a comfort to me (Colossians 4:11).
Of Phoebe, a deaconess of Cenchreae, he writes: “she herself also has been a helper of many, and of my own self” (Romans 16:2).
Luke accompanied him on the ship to Rome. We know this because he writes these passages in the “we” form. Paul lived, it seems, on the counsel, the prayer and the love of his brothers and sisters in the faith.

4. Barnabas, the encourager

His name was Joseph. He was nicknamed “son of encouragement,” the encourager: Barnabas in Aramaic. He did not just bear that name, he was a great encourager for Paul.
First in Jerusalem. Paul had studied the Scriptures there under Gamaliel, but above all he had become a passionate enemy of Christians, even lending a hand in the stoning of Stephen. The believers in Jerusalem distrusted him and avoided him. So Barnabas “took him and brought him to the apostles” and told them how Paul had seen the Lord (Acts 9:27). This intervention broke the ice and built trust.
About ten years later, Paul had gone back to Tarsus. People speak of his “silent years”: God gave him this time to grow, to learn, to take on small tasks and to prove himself, “just as God also gives us time to grow step by step.”
Around the year 46, a revival broke out in Antioch of Syria. Sent by the church in Jerusalem, Barnabas arrived, saw the grace of God and was glad (Acts 11:23). The preacher asks: “Can I rejoice with others when God is at work elsewhere?” Even when it happens in a way I am not used to, even when someone else seems to succeed better than I do?
Barnabas encouraged these Christians, stayed to help, and remembered Paul: “That man has energy and potential. He teaches better than I do. We need him here.” He made the long journey to Tarsus, looked for him, found him and brought him back. Antioch became the starting point of the three missionary journeys.
Their friendship went through crises. Over John Mark, a coworker who had failed, Barnabas wanted to give a second chance and Paul did not. Barnabas was gentler and more patient, Paul more determined and results-oriented, the preacher supposes. The dispute led to a temporary separation, which Luke recounts frankly. Some clues suggest that they later overcame the crisis.
They were a remarkable team, but not a perfect one. That may even be a comfort for our families and our churches, which are not perfect in their relationships either.

5. Who has marked your faith?

The preacher asks a series of questions: which people have marked your faith? For which encounters are you grateful to God? Which Christians pulled you out of trouble? Who gave you courage, as Barnabas did for Paul, to trust Jesus and not give up?
“We are sometimes in danger of giving up, of losing heart. At any rate, I am.” Who comforted you when you were going through a hard time? Who has been a credible role model in the church, in your family or among your friends? And if you are not yet a Christian, who made you want to think about it?
Jan Carsten Schnurr shares his own story: for 28 years he has had a prayer partnership with a very good friend. Every one or two weeks they call each other, talk about everything on their minds, give each other advice and pray together. “It has often been a refuge for me to know that we can still pray and talk about this problem together. I do not have to be alone with it.”
He recommends trying this kind of partnership with one other person: “It costs nothing to go to someone and simply ask.” Others pray regularly as a couple.

6. Paul and Timothy: learning by example

These friendships set off a chain reaction: Paul in turn became an encourager and a mentor for many. He struggled for them, sometimes with tears.
The preacher has noticed a tendency in himself: we pray a lot for people to come to faith, and then we tick the box. Paul did the opposite: he prayed regularly for living Christians, that they would remain and grow in the faith, because he knew they would go through difficulties and temptations, and because they had become precious to him as brothers and sisters.
To the Thessalonians he writes: “as a nursing mother cherishes her own children,” we would have liked to give you not only the Good News of God, but also our own lives, “because you had become very dear to us” (1 Thessalonians 2:7-8). Paul wanted to build relationships, not just preach.
He met Timothy in Lystra during his second journey and accompanied him spiritually for years. The second letter to Timothy, perhaps his last, shows it: Paul, an old man alone in prison, expects a death sentence. Many abandoned him at his trial. “Only Luke is with me.”
He asks Timothy to come before winter and to bring the cloak he left at Troas with Carpus. He is no doubt cold in his cell. “remembering your tears, that I may be filled with joy” (2 Timothy 1:4).
In this spiritual testament, he encourages Timothy to take up the baton and to fight the good fight of the faith. He writes: “knowing from whom you have learned them” (2 Timothy 3:14). Timothy had been able to see that Paul was not perfect, but trustworthy: not a charlatan, not someone after his hearers’ money, not a church planter trying to become a star, and not the inventor of a gospel dreamed up in an ivory tower.
“In the Christian life, we often learn not in a theoretical way, but through personal relationships, through observation and through imitating credible role models.”
The preacher has lived this in his own crises, for example during his studies, when he wrestled with many questions of faith: “Perhaps I am not experiencing Jesus right now, perhaps I have not for a long time, to the point of believing that he no longer hears me. But a few other Christians do experience him, and their faith, their steadfastness and their love carry me.”
This fellowship is lived most of all when we commit ourselves together to God’s cause. Paul says of Euodia and Syntyche, two women of Philippi, that they struggled with him for the gospel (Philippians 4:2-3). Putting together our gifts, our time and our resources to honor Jesus, make him known and do good to others, this binds us together.

7. The chain continues down to us

Paul writes to Timothy: “The things which you have heard from me among many witnesses, commit the same to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also” (2 Timothy 2:2). Timothy became a mentor in his turn, and the chain has continued down to us.
Who has been a Barnabas, a Paul or a Timothy, a Phoebe or a Euodia for you? And have you ever been able to be a help in someone’s story of faith? Where is that person now? Do they need a prayer, a conversation, an email or a postcard?
The preacher believes that God has given each of us contacts and abilities to be a help in the faith for a few people. Outside of marriage and family, it sometimes works better from man to man and from woman to woman, with a special eye for young Christians, their struggles and their life decisions.
During his studies, members of his home church thought of him, asked how he was doing and were glad to see him again. He also saw young people lose their connection with the faith at the turning point of the end of school, when they moved to another city: “It was probably their decision, but perhaps we could sometimes have accompanied them better and prayed for them.”
At the start of his studies, he heard John Stott, the English author and theologian who died in 2011 and one of the most influential Christian figures of the 20th century, at an international student conference where he spoke about Timothy. Stott called on the students to take up the baton from his generation: “I am obviously not an apostle, and I do not have an apostle’s authority. But like Paul, I am an old man, and I can say that the time of my departure is near. Which of you is ready to become a Timothy for the younger generation?”
Stott added that the man who led him to Christ at the age of 17 wrote to him every week for five years and prayed for him every day. “What I owe to that man, I will only know in heaven.”
The lesson: people matter more than structures, buildings, projects or campaigns. No one is responsible for everyone, that would crush us. But it is worth investing time and love in a few people whom God lays on our hearts.
The message ends with the prayer of a song by Andreas Malessa: “I am filled, rich with such great capital, because you, my God, give me friends full of love. As white light is broken into colors, so I also see your face in many people.”

Key takeaways

God takes relationships between Christians very seriously: the Church is a network of relationships, not first of all a place for activities.
Even Paul needed brothers at his side. When he saw them, he thanked God and took courage.
Barnabas opened doors for Paul and rejoiced at God’s grace at work in others. His friendships were not perfect, but they bore fruit.
We learn the faith by watching and imitating credible role models, and the chain is passed on from Paul to Timothy, then to others, down to us.
People matter more than structures: investing time and love in a few is worth it.

Personal application

Who has been a Barnabas for you, someone who gave you courage when you were about to give up? Have you ever thanked them, and thanked God for them?
Can you sincerely rejoice when God is at work elsewhere, or through someone other than you?
Is there a person to whom you could propose a prayer partnership of two, by phone or face to face?
Which young Christian, or which friend who has drifted away, needs a prayer, a conversation, an email or a postcard from you this week?
In which task for God could you commit yourself alongside others, as Euodia and Syntyche struggled with Paul for the gospel?

Verses cited

Frequently asked questions

What does Acts 28:15 mean for the Christian life?

A prisoner, worn out by the journey and facing an uncertain future, Paul meets a few Christians on the road to Rome. He thanks God and takes courage. For Jan Carsten Schnurr, even the greatest apostle needed brothers and sisters at his side to find the strength to face what awaited him.

What did Barnabas bring to Paul?

In Jerusalem, Barnabas took Paul and introduced him to the apostles, when everyone distrusted the former persecutor. About ten years later, he went to find him in Tarsus to bring him to Antioch, the church from which the three missionary journeys set out. Without Barnabas, the preacher says, all this would have been hard to imagine.

How can you become a Barnabas or a Paul for someone?

Jan Carsten Schnurr invites us to ask where the other person stands and what they need: a prayer, a conversation, an email or a postcard. He also recommends trying a prayer partnership of two. Each of us has received from God contacts and abilities to be a help in the faith for a few people, especially for young Christians.