Then Barnabas went to Tarsus to look for Saul, and when he had found him he brought him to Antioch. For a whole year they met with the Church and taught a large number of people, and it was in Antioch that the disciples were first called Christians. (Acts 11:25-26)

How important is Barnabas in the story of the church. He reached out to Saul who had persecuted the church but had since had his conversion. When the others wouldn’t have anything to do with Saul . . . Barnabas reaches and invites him into the work. And Saul becomes Paul. I always liked the Cotton Patch Gospels which was an attempt to translate the New Testament into Southern idiom using Southern place names. I’ll never forget this particular passage:

And it was here in Mobile that the disciples were first labeled "Christians.

And, of course, Mobile is my hometown!