Christians

 DEVOTION

THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES

CHRISTIANS

Acts 11:25-30

25 Then Barnabas went to Tarsus to look for Saul, 26 and when he found him, he brought him to Antioch. So for a whole year Barnabas and Saul met with the church and taught great numbers of people. The disciples were called Christians first at Antioch. 27 During this time some prophets came down from Jerusalem to Antioch. 28 One of them, named Agabus, stood up and through the Spirit predicted that a severe famine would spread over the entire Roman world. (This happened during the reign of Claudius.) 29 The disciples, each according to his ability, decided to provide help for the brothers living in Judea. 30 This they did, sending their gift to the elders by Barnabas and Saul.

NIV

It is right to spread the good news about Jesus, and about the kingdom of heaven, but it is also right to teach believers. We are not told what Barnabas and Saul taught beyond the good news of the kingdom of God. They could have shared all the teachings of Jesus, such as everything he said during that sermon on the hillside, or perhaps what he taught from the boat on the seashore. Maybe they were teaching the believers in Antioch about the Holy Spirit with all his gifts and how he manifests his fruit in the lives of those who have been baptized into him. Whatever they were teaching, they spent a whole year teaching a great number of people. Here is where we believers were first called Christians. We are not sure who decided that name, but it does make sense, since people were usually called something according to whose teaching and doctrine that leader laid down, such as Platonists, who got their name because they followed the teaching of Plato. Because those believers were following the teachings of Christ, then Christian would be a good title. Maybe the people of Antioch named the Christians, or perhaps it was the idea of Saul and Barnabas, yet it stuck, and today we call ourselves Christians because we follow Jesus, the Christ. It is unfortunate that, over the years, we have decided to call ourselves by some denomination's affiliation.  We might say we are a Baptist, Methodist, Pentecostal, Catholic, or Lutheran. Then we have to divide those up: a Free Will Baptist, a Southern Baptist, an Apostolic Pentecostal, an Assembly of God Pentecostal, and on and on, with hundreds of denominational identifications we identify as something other than a Christian. Who then do we follow, Wesley, Calvin, Smith, Peter, Apollo, or some silver-tongued preacher of deception? Should we not just follow Christ, and therefore say we are Christians? We also see that after learning through a prophet that a famine would spread throughout the Roman world, the brothers in Antioch sent gifts to the brothers in Judea. This is where we might get the missionary idea, either from Saul and Barnabas being in Antioch, or the believers there sending or supporting those in Judea. Yet the idea is more about all believers helping other believers in need. We might have forgotten how to share with each other. We tend to keep what is ours, ours and maybe give a little percent to the church, but would we just give to someone who has less, or is in need? What does it mean to be a Christian?