'He was a good man, and full of the Holy Ghost and of faith.'--ACTS
xi, 24.
'A good man.' How easily that title is often gained! There is, perhaps,
no clearer proof that men are bad than the sort of people whom they
consent to call good.
It is a common observation that all words describing moral excellence
tend to deteriorate and to contract their meaning, just as bright metal
rusts by exposure, or coins become light and illegible by use. So it
comes to pass that any decently respectable man, especially if he has
an easy temper and a dash of frankness and good humour, is christened
with this title 'good.' The Bible, which is the verdict of the Judge,
is a great deal more chary in its use of the word. You remember how
Jesus Christ once rebuked a man for addressing Him so, not that He
repudiated the title, but that the giver had bestowed it lightly and
out of mere conventional politeness. The word is too noble to be
applied without very good reason.
But here we have a picture of Barnabas hung in the gallery of Scripture
portraits, and this is the description of it in the catalogue, 'He was
a good man.'
You observe that my text is in the nature of an analysis. It begins at
the outside, and works inwards. 'He was a good man.' Indeed;--how came
he to be so? He was 'full of the Holy Ghost.' Full of the Holy Ghost,
was he? How came he to be that? He was 'full of faith.' So the writer
digs down, as it were, till he gets to the bed-rock, on which all the
higher strata repose; and here is his account of the way in which it is
possible for human nature to win this resplendent title, and to be
adjudged of God as 'good,' 'full of the Holy Ghost and of faith.'
So these three steps in the exposition of the character and its secret
will afford a framework for what I have to say now.