AUG 6 2026 | The Book of Acts S1E3 | Barnabas

Sea Change Church — The Church Has Left the Building S1E3 · "Barnabas" Pastor Adam Stadtmiller · August 9, 2026 Acts 11:19–26 Morning, Church, on this very cool, relaxing day in La Jolla. Not so cool, right? A little hot here, a little muggy. It is our August weather, hottest month of the year if you're visiting from somewhere in here, but it's been nice. Hope you're doing well. If you have your Bibles, open to Acts 11. We're in the Church Has Left the Building series, part of a 12-week, three-part series that is about the vision and mission of our church — equipping you in the purpose of the church, then maturing and equipping you in your own personal giftings, who God has called you to be, and then using the final four weeks of this series to show believers who seem like just ordinary people who changed the world, so that you would get inspired to go out and be sent to change the world.

Please come take the gifts assessment — not so much a test, more of an assessment. And so today we come to Barnabas, part three of this message. Barnabas is this incredible believer. We're going to be reading verses 19 through 26. We use the English Standard Version here — pretty solid translation. Follow along with me from verse 19: "Now those who were scattered because of the persecution that arose over Stephen traveled as far as Phoenicia and Cyprus and Antioch, speaking the word to no one except the Jews." That's an important caveat. Verse 20: "But there were some of them, men of Cyprus and Cyrene, who on coming to Antioch spoke to the Hellenists," that's the Greeks, the Gentiles, also, "preaching the Lord Jesus." What were they preaching?

The Lord Jesus. Not their perspective on politics, not their perspective on anything else. We preach Jesus Christ crucified, resurrected, and coming again. Verse 21: "And the hand of the Lord was with them, and a great number who believed turned to the Lord." Verse 22: "The report of this came to the ears of the church in Jerusalem, and they sent Barnabas," that's our friend we're going to look at today, "to Antioch. When he came and saw the grace of God, he was glad, and he exhorted them all to remain faithful to the Lord with steadfast purpose" — not drifting purpose, steadfast purpose — "for he was a good man, full of the Holy Spirit and of faith, and a great many people were added to the Lord." And then verse 25: "So Barnabas went to Tarsus to look for Saul, and when he had found him, he brought him to Antioch.

For a whole year they met with the church and taught a great many people. And in Antioch, the disciples were first called Christians." A powerful story about a very ordinary person — I guess you could say he was extraordinary, but graded on a different scale than the world often grades on. He wasn't a star athlete, as far as we know. But he had some unique qualities, and what's interesting is that he started serving within the church. This is key, because God's trajectory to leadership — and a lot of people want leadership, or at least influence — runs through servanthood first. Mark 10:45: "Jesus came to serve and give his life as a ransom to many." We looked a couple weeks ago at Stephen, and Philip as well.

Where did they start in the first church in Jerusalem? They didn't start with a podcast or with influence. They started as busboys, waiting tables, serving the poor, and from that, God took them on a trajectory to leadership. We come across Barnabas now, and he goes on his own volition and leaves the church — this series is called "The Church Has Left the Building" — and goes into a sphere of influence. It says some of them went to Cyprus, which is actually where Barnabas was from. He was a Cyprian. Let me give you the big idea, and I want you to insert yourself into it: Acts repeatedly shows that the mission of Jesus was never intended to depend on a handful of extraordinary leaders.

The apostles provide the foundation, but the expansion of the church happens because ordinary disciples — business owners, believers, sports coaches — say yes to God where they are. The Holy Spirit then empowers everyday people to make an extraordinary difference. If I could have a thousand people show up to a big weekend where I get to preach and everyone leaves stoked, I could have that, and honestly, I love a big conference, I love the energy — good things happen there. But if you asked me now, at 56, would I rather have that, or be assured of leaving a legacy of that same thousand people going out into their own places of influence — to send those people out in their giftings to be a Barnabas, a Stephen, a Philip — I'll take the latter.

To equip, to exhort, and to encourage, over and over. Now, there's a key word today — it's not in your notes, but I want you to write it down. The word is risk. You're going to see Barnabas take a lot of risk here. Cyprus was a risky situation. The relationships he stood by — Paul, John Mark — were risky. Over and over, he's coming alongside people, helping them get up off the ground, walking with them, that they might be equipped and encouraged to go to the next place. My life verse is out of Joshua 1: "You will lead these people into their inheritance." There is nothing I enjoy more than helping people become who God has called them to be.

You all have something too, something built into you that God's given you. I personally enjoy reading about Barnabas because I see him, over and over, being the person on the sidelines, coming alongside other believers and saying, "Let's go. Never give up. Continue on." This big idea involves risk. You will be called to believe in people when no one else believes in them, to come alongside a struggling situation and be part of it. Encouragers, exhorters — ordinary people like Barnabas — have the ability to help others step into who God has called them to be. Now, I wrote a question this morning that's not in your notes, but I think it's one we all need to ask: What if your greatest contribution to the kingdom isn't what you accomplish for the kingdom, but rather who you encourage to accomplish what God has called them to do?

In our Western world, are people being called to be self-centered? I'm not just talking about arrogance — there's a lot of people who are self-centered without being arrogant. They're just constantly focused on themselves: where's my promotion, what's the next thing I want to do, where's that next level. It's all about me, my truth. That can easily become a deception in the church — leaning into what God has for you can quietly become something that's supposedly about expanding the kingdom of God, but really just has a lot of you in it. A really honest question to ask yourself is, am I self-centered? You can be kind and humble and still think about yourself a lot.

So — what if your greatest contribution isn't what you accomplish, but who you encourage to accomplish what God has called them to do? You live in a world right now that needs exhorters. The key word in the scripture is exhortation — that's Barnabas's key spiritual gift, one of the gifts mentioned in Romans 12. And you live in a world right now where a lot of what's presented, especially online, and even just when you get a little deep with people and hit a trigger topic, comes from critics, skeptics, naysayers — a constant dystopian verbiage, because out of the heart, the mouth speaks. If I had recorded everything you said this week and published it online for everyone to see, how proud of it would you be?

Would you be known for hope, for believing, for joy, for preaching the gospel, for helping others along? Or is it just a litany of upsetness and frustration? Jesus lived in a very difficult time but continued to speak about a future kingdom that was coming. Where is your focus? So let's meet Barnabas. He's had his name changed — his given name was Joseph — but Barnabas was a man known primarily for his character, and then by his gifts. Remember, the seven men chosen in Acts 6 were chosen to wait tables, and I hope that's your mindset too. I've said from this pulpit many times: if you're not willing to scrub the toilets, you're not willing to be on stage.

I heard through the grapevine that someone was upset I'd said that — and yes, I did say it, and I'll say it again. You want a group of people, whether it's Philip, Stephen, or Paul himself, who are willing to walk the trajectory of the kingdom as they progress toward influence, and it always starts as a servant. Jesus himself started as a servant. We're going to meet Barnabas, a man who cared more about caring for others than he cared about himself. The first thing we see, in Acts 4:36, is this: "Thus Joseph, who was called by the apostles Barnabas, which means Son of Encouragement, a Levite and a native of Cyprus." Some of the Cyprians at the start of this passage were taking a risk, going to places no one else was going — to the Gentiles — even though their fellow Jewish believers weren't sure that message was for them.

Even though Barnabas was a Jew, he had a heart for the Gentile, the same as Paul did later. The risk factor here is: who is God sending you to? I asked our first service this morning to raise their hands if they knew their spiritual gifts — about 40% did. Then I asked how many knew where God had called them to go and transform the world in his name — about 20%. That told me we're not doing a good enough job equipping and sending; we've become too attractional and not missional enough, and we want to change that. In Romans 12:6-8, which isn't in your notes but is worth writing down, it talks about this gift of exhortation.

I find that God tends to give spiritual gifts that back up the natural gifts he already created in someone — someone with an analytical mind might get a spiritual gift of administration on top of it, and that's when it goes to the next level. I want to challenge all of you to take the gifts assessment. We're going to run a gifts assessment class every three months here, and once you're in, we'll give you a list of where you can serve — whether that's here at the church or out in your own sphere, a soccer team or a jiu-jitsu gym — the point isn't to get better at jiu-jitsu, it's to preach the name of Jesus Christ crucified to that group in the way God made you to.

Here's the passage from Romans: "Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them: if prophecy, in proportion to our faith; if service, in our serving; the one who teaches, in his teaching; to the one who exhorts," that's the word, this is Barnabas's gift, "in his exhortation; the one who contributes, in generosity; the one who leads, with zeal; the one who does acts of mercy, with cheerfulness." As I've been getting the results of the spiritual gifts assessment, I'm surprised how many people have generosity and giving in their top three. We're all called to be generous in some way, but some people have a special gift for it, and Barnabas was one of them — giving is a form of encouragement, as we'll see in a second.

So Barnabas, filled with the Holy Spirit, now has a spiritual download that makes things exponential. If I teach in my own humanness, without the gift of teaching, people are still impacted because God made me a teacher and I've studied to do it. But when the Holy Spirit gets a download on top of that gift, more happens in your hearts and lives than I can explain. People have come up to me and said, "You said this thing years ago, and it's why our marriage stayed together," and I don't even remember saying it — that's the Holy Spirit at work, and He can do that with your gifting too.

When you're operating in your gifting, you're operating in the supernatural. Barnabas is operating in the supernatural here. Here's the thing — his character became so defining, it replaced his name. It says he was full of grace, full of the Holy Spirit, goodness, kindness. His foundation was character, and that's earned. On top of that, God gave him a gift, and he became so fluent in the language of that gift that they changed his name to Barnabas, son of encouragement. I would ask you: if a hundred people who know you got together to vote on your nickname based on what they actually know of you, what do you think you'd be called?

What's interesting is it's the apostles who call him that — Peter, Matthias, all these others. He was so fluent operating in his gift that it brought him great joy. When you work in your gifting and know who God has called you to be, it will bring you great joy, and you can stop asking, "What is my purpose?" That question is the number one obsession of Western society, and honestly, we worship at the idol of purpose. If you preach Jesus Christ crucified, live within your gifts, and become a servant to others, your purpose will come lay at your feet. You don't have to chase it. Living in the angst of "am I in God's purpose" is so antithetical to the gospel — our purpose is Jesus Christ.

Barnabas understood this. It became his word. The Greek word is paraklesis, related to the verb parakaleo — to encourage, to exhort, to urge onward, to strengthen, to comfort, to come alongside and help. In a healthy way — not codependency, not getting your self-worth from fixing people — who are you coming alongside, caring a little more about what God's doing in their life than what's happening in yours? It's a self-fulfilling joy once you start doing it. It's hard at first — you have to stop thinking about yourself — but when you do it, you see people reach a milestone they could never have reached without you.

I was asking myself this week: in "The Lord of the Rings," who's the hero of the story, Frodo or Sam? I think it's Sam — he's always alongside Frodo, helping carry the burden of the ring, though he never carries it himself. Civilization isn't saved unless Sam is there. Everyone wants to be Frodo. Barnabas was content being Sam. Your words have the power of life and death, the scripture says. Are you using them to speak life or death? I had three different people this week, not from our church, all in different places, give me similar negative words about something I'm walking through personally. Every time I heard it I just kept thinking, "No, that's not the result." They told me I was living in denial — but there's a difference between denial and being a person of faith.

I don't know what gifts are needed most in this season, but exhortation, encouragement, and faith have to be in the top five. We live in a reality where people are losing hope, where there's a loneliness epidemic. Imagine what it's like to have a person like Barnabas come alongside and speak words of encouragement that become the wind beneath someone's wings. Let me give you a few more examples from scripture before we land the plane. First: he sold his property to care for others. Acts 4:36-37 says, "Thus Joseph, who was also called by the apostles Barnabas... a Levite, and a native of Cyprus, sold a field that belonged to him and brought the money and laid it at the apostles' feet." That's radical.

He had land, he had property, and he sold it and laid the proceeds at the apostles' feet, trusting their leadership to use it well. We have people who do that here too, and I want to ask you to seek the Lord about whether there's somewhere He wants you to invest in this community — not just by serving or praying, which we love, but financially, to support what's happening at this church. That's a form of encouragement too — it's humbling and encouraging when someone says, "I have this gift I want to bring to the church." Second, he took a risk on Paul. No one wanted to be near Paul — they thought he was faking his conversion to infiltrate and destroy the church.

But Barnabas went and found him. Imagine: someone who watched over the coats of the men stoning Stephen to death, who had destroyed your friends and your church — do you go seek that person out? Barnabas did, because something in the Spirit told him, "That man is legit now." He brought Paul back to the disciples. Encouragers see potential before everyone else sees results. Who have you taken a risk on? Third, he strengthened the church at Antioch — that's the very passage we read today. He went there on his own and began developing the people in that church. Encouragers are developers. Who are you developing? I believe every believer needs at least one person — probably not a family member — that they're coming alongside and caring for, thinking about some days more than they think about themselves, because we're in the business of multiplication.

Go and make disciples — not crowd-seekers, not people chasing the best music from place to place, but disciples. Fourth, he became Paul's first missionary companion. When it came time to go on that first, life-threatening missionary journey, Barnabas said, "That's me — I want to walk beside him." Encouragers don't just walk ahead of people, they walk beside them. Who are you walking beside? Fifth — after that missionary journey, they had brought John Mark with them, and John Mark failed. He got scared and left the mission halfway through. When it came time for the next journey, Paul said he was done with John Mark. Barnabas said, "Yes, he is coming." You can imagine Barnabas pushing back on Paul, who he himself had once vouched for — "I risked my neck for you, and now he makes one mistake?" You can understand Paul's frustration too.

But encouragers understand boundaries, and they also never give up. That doesn't mean you don't need healthy boundaries or seasons of separation in certain relationships — but when do you stop praying for reconciliation? Encouragers, exhorters, they never give up. I was with a pastor once who told me, "I'm never going to be the person who cuts someone off completely — I'm trying to believe there will always be a place left for redemption." I love that about exhorters. He stood up for John Mark after his failure — that's Acts 15:36-41. There's a famous speech by Winston Churchill — I believe he gave it at Harrow. People misquote it as "never give up," but what he actually said was: "Never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never.

In nothing great or small, large or petty, never give in except to the convictions of honor and good sense." The West doesn't win World War II without one person willing to encourage the British people not to give up. I want to challenge you to become an exhorter, an encourager — to stop with the cynicism, the sarcasm, the criticism. I'm not saying you can't exercise good judgment, but is your first instinct always what's wrong with something, instead of what could be right with it? Say that in your marriages. Say that to your children. Be the person who always believes — not naive, not Pollyanna, but because of the gospel, because of Jesus Christ crucified and His work of redemption, we never stop persevering.

Perseverance leads to good character, good character leads to hope, and hope does not disappoint. I want you to say this with everything in your being: "I want to be a person who never quits." This week I had three health workers tell me my mom was going to pass away. I'm not in denial about a difficult health situation, but to the third person who told me that, I said, "The Vikings say that when a person passes, they go to the shore, enter the longboat, and sail to the west." I told them, "Should my mom go to the shore, enter the boat, and sail to the west, I will be swimming behind her and calling her back until God takes her.

I will never give up. And I won't give up on you, on my marriage, or on my friends." Can we be a church that doesn't give up, that tries one more time? I know you've all had difficult things happen, and some of you have been deeply abused — I'm not saying you don't need to get away from those situations. You know your place. I'm just saying: seek the Lord, and let's go to the next level.