27 But Barnabas took him, brought him to the apostles, and described for them how on the road he had seen the Lord, who had spoken to him, and how in Damascus he had spoken boldly in the name of Jesus. 28 So he went in and out among them in Jerusalem, speaking boldly in the name of the Lord. 29 He spoke and argued with the Hellenists, but they were attempting to kill him. 30 When the brothers and sisters learned of it, they brought him down to Caesarea and sent him off to Tarsus. 31 Meanwhile the church throughout Judea, Galilee, and Samaria had peace and was built up. Living in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, it increased in numbers.
Acts 9:27-31
In his book Retrieving the Human, José Comblin observes that evangelization is not a program but a way of life, the natural expression of people whose lives have been changed by Christ. In his words, “the new person acts,” and that action becomes the good news others can see.
Comblin’s words are powerful for a community seeking to regain its witness, powerful for a people trying to understand who they are in the midst of a strong and often distracting culture. As Alice’s famous rabbit says, “I’m late, I’m late,” we too can feel that sense of urgency. It is late, too late to worry about some of the minor things that separate us. Christians through the ages have sensed this urgency in their message: there is a new world on the horizon, and we are invited to take part in it.
Have you ever noticed how the church often does its best work when it has the least power? When it cannot rely on influence or control, it is forced to rely on God. What we speak about, a new world shaped by changed lives, becomes real not through laws or programs, but through ordinary people living differently, even from a place of weakness, trusting that God is their strength.
This is seen clearly in Paul. Once a persecutor of the church, he becomes someone entirely new. He takes on an identity in Christ that calls him to leave behind what he once trusted, to love those he once opposed, and to serve the very Lord he had resisted. And in that change, something larger begins to happen. The church grows, not by force, but by the witness of transformed lives.
We live in a culture where violence and harsh words often seem to set the tone, and where Christianity is sometimes visible in name but less so in practice. It becomes easy to wear the identity without embracing the calling. But the gospel does not allow for that separation. Faith is not simply something we claim, it is something we live.
God is both the ground beneath our feet, giving us the courage to say, “this is not how we are meant to live,” and the horizon before us, showing us what life can become when it is shaped by love. In Christ Jesus, you have been transformed. In the light of God’s love, you are being made new.
So go into the world in your freedom to love. Let that love be seen in what you do. Let it shape your life in ways both small and large. And in doing so, become bearers of the good news of Jesus Christ.