Send The Elevator Down

“It is our opportunity and responsibility to send the elevator back down,” said actor Kevin Spacey the other day. At the top of his profession, Spacey is now turning to producing and directing movies and seems intent on helping unknown actors to have the same opportunities he received.

Who among us has not benefited from an older, wiser, stronger person who saw something promising in us and lent a hand. When I was in my late 20’s and struggling to lead a little church in the Mississippi Delta, a neighboring pastor recommended me to the largest church in the state for an opening on their staff. Before we moved, he came over to our home and brought with him seven of the nicest suits you’ve ever seen. He had bought some new ones, he said, and wondered if I could use these.

In the new church, someone remarked that I was the best-dressed minister on staff.

Three years later, I left to pastor one of the finest churches in that state. While there, that same friend gave my name to a committee looking for a trustee to serve on our denomination’s mission board. I put in four life-changing years with that organization which oversees the work of thousands of missionaries all over the globe, even traveling to Southeast Asia and drawing an evangelistic comic book for the churches there.

I am forever grateful for such a friend.

In the Bible, a disciple nicknamed Barnabas sent the elevator back down for a new believer named Saul. In his earlier life, Saul had been a terrorist wreaking havoc in the Christian community, so church leaders were understandably suspicious of his new confession. Barnabas spoke out on his behalf and encouraged the churches to believe in him. Saul was so bold in his preaching he enraged the very community he was trying to evangelize and left Jerusalem just ahead of a lynch mob. He languished for several years in his hometown of Tarsus in Asia Minor, making tents by day and doubtless listening to relatives’ recriminations at night.

Then one day, Barnabas arrived with good news.

God was doing a new work among Jews and Gentiles in the Syrian city of Antioch. Barnabas had been there and had noted that this was the very kind of ministry Saul was called to do. Perhaps the most pivotal sentence in Christian history is Acts 11:25, which reads, “Then Barnabas went to Tarsus to look for Saul.” He was sending the elevator down.

Sometime later, Barnabas and Saul were sent out as missionaries by the same church in Syria. In their first engagement on the island of Cyprus, Saul rose to the forefront, had his name changed to Paul, and became the leader of their ministry. Give Barnabas credit; he let his student blossom to his full powers. Next time, Barnabas took his nephew John Mark—a young man in desperate need of encouragement—while Paul worked with a newcomer named Silas.

As I say, Barnabas was his nickname. His parents had named him Joseph, but the early Christians nicknamed this Joe “Bar- Nabas.” It means “son of encouragement”, but I know some scholars who just call him “Mister Encourager.”

For my money, they could have named him “Otis.” You know, the elevator man.

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