11 June 2020 - St Barnabas - Acts 11:21b-26; 13:1-13

       Everyone has a story.  And Barnabas has a very interesting story from the days of the Early Church.  Barnabas was not one of the original group of apostles, but he is about as close to them as you can get.  Barnabas was a Jew from Cyprus who was a close associate of St Paul.  In fact, Barnabas is the one who introduced Paul to Peter and the other apostles.  He served as a kind of mediator between Paul, a former persecutor of the followers of Jesus, and the still suspicious Jewish Christians. When a Christian community was formed in the important city of Antioch, Barnabas was sent there as the official representative of the church of Jerusalem to bring them into the umbrella of the Early Church.  Barnabas and Paul spent a year in Antioch instructing the Christian community there. bringing back contributions to the Church in Jerusalem.  Paul and Barnabas later returned to Antioch to preach the Gospels to the Gentiles there.  We hear about Barnabas’ story in our reading from the Acts of the Apostles today. Barnabas is the patron saint of the country of Cyprus and the city of Antioch, and of peacemakers.  Even though all of this sounds like a nice story, we know that Barnabas and Paul faced many challenges and controversies, including Christian communities were there was a lot of division and discord, as well as a relationship with the mother Church in Jerusalem that could often be tense and heated. May Barnabas be an inspiration to us in the challenges that we face today in our modern world.  May we unite our prayers with the prayers of St Barnabas today.