Apostles at fault.
When a grave and critical juncture had been safely passed without damage done to any, there arose a quarrel about an unimportant and insignificant matter, which had regrettable, not to say deplorable, results. The heart of the earnest and affectionate Paul yearned to know how their converts fared in "every city where they had preached the Word of the Lord" (Acts 15:36). Barnabas immediately acquiesced in Paul's proposal to visit them; everything promised another useful mission journey, in which the calmer and more genial qualities of the one man would supplement the intenser and more vehement characteristics of the other. But there arose a question as to companionship, which wrecked their agreement to work in one another's company, and which separated the two friends for life. Barnabas wished to take Mark, and would not abandon his desire; Paul would not consent to take him: "and the contention was so sharp … that they departed asunder" (verse 39). We learn from this incident—
I. THAT AS ACT OF MORAL WEAKNESS MAY HAVE FAR LONGER AND MORE SERIOUS CONSEQUENCES THAN WE CAN POSSIBLY FORESEE. Could Mark have foreseen that his desertion of the cause in Pamphylia would have led to the lifelong separation of his uncle from Paul, he would probably have remained with them, and "fulfilled the work," even as they did. But he did not reckon on after consequences. It is well for us to consider that our acts of minor wrong-doing, of moral weakness, of spiritual shortcoming, may do an amount of mischief from the commission of which we should shrink with dismay if we could only look it in the face.
II. THAT BETWEEN THE TWO APOSTLES A DECIDED AND REGRETTABLE FAULT WAS COMMITTED. Their intention to work together in the cause of Christ need not and should not have been broken off by their disagreement. They ought either to have compromised the matter by mutual concession, or one of the two should have yielded to the other. Paul owed too much to Barnabas to be justified in pushing his own will to the point of separation. Barnabas owed too much to Paul to make it right for him to insist so pertinaciously on his particular desire. One should have yielded if the other would not. It was an unedifying, unseemly, unchristian thing for two apostles to throw up a plan on which they had sought Divine direction, and which must have received the sanction of the Church, because they could not agree on a matter of detail. They must both have lived to regret it. Men in prominent positions, and those who are engaged in great matters, are bound to be above such unseemliness of behavior. Either
III. THAT IN EACH CASE THE FAULT COMMITTED WAS THE SHADOW OF HIS OWN PARTICULAR EXCELLENCY. Probably both of the apostles were blameworthy. But so far as Paul was to be condemned, his failure was the shadow of his intensity. Such was the entirety of his devotedness, such the intensity of his zeal, such the strenuousness of his soul, that he could not brook anything which looked like half-heartedness. And so far as Barnabas was to blame, his fault was the shadow of his kind-heartedness, his willingness to give another chance to a young man, his reluctance to exclude from noble service a man who had made one mistake. Each was animated by a commendable spirit, though each may have gone too far in his own course. Often when we unsparingly condemn, it would be well to remind ourselves and others that the faults of good men are usually but the shadow of their virtues.
IV. THAT GOD JUDGES THE GOOD BY THEIR ABIDING SPIRIT, AND NOT BY THEIR OCCASIONAL DISPOSITIONS: so also should we. These two men were not the less servants of God, ambassadors of Jesus Christ, because they were betrayed into temporary ill humor. God appraised them by their essential, abiding spirit of love and devotion; he forgave their passing ebullition. In the same way we must take care to estimate men, not by an occasional outburst which is not really characteristic and is no true criterion, but by the "spirit of their mind "—that which really shapes and colors their life and character.
V. THAT THIS FAULT OF THE APOSTLES HAD, AS BECAME THE MEN, A CHRISTIAN ENDING. Paul afterwards wrote kindly of Barnabas, and actually sent for Mark, declaring that he was "profitable for [the] ministry" (2 Timothy 4:11). The sun should not go down upon our wrath. If any man has a quarrel against any, he is to "forbear and to forgive" (Colossians 3:13).—C.
HOMILIES BY E. JOHNSON