Our students just returned from a mission trip to Portland. There we partner with a church planting movement called Go Church. Our pastors who led the trip described how the churches had grown since we were last there. They have developed leaders and planted new churches. Two thousand years in, the church is still growing.
Plants and churches need to be fed and watered in order to grow. Barnabas and Paul decided to go back and check on the churches and Christians from their earlier mission trip. But they had a disagreement. Barnabas, who clearly loved to encourage, wanted to take Mark with them even though he had abandoned them on the first trip. Paul did not want to take him. They disagreed so vehemently that they went separate ways to two different places.
Wait a minute: two great men of God had a disagreement? Barnabas and Saul had spent a lot of time together. But on this matter they could not agree. Barnabas and Mark went to Cyprus. Paul took Silas and headed to Cilicia strengthening the churches.
I have seen good people divide. It is painful to watch. One of my first deacons in my first church used to say, “We can disagree without being disagreeable.” Luke doesn’t tell us who was right. Instead, he just reports. God worked all things together for good, in spite of their conflict. We will see all the good that Paul and Silas did. In Paul’s last letter to Timothy, he asks for Mark to come to him because he needs him. God can heal hurts if we let him. Broken relationships can be restored. God is willing if we are.
