Ananias & Sapphira

I’m reading through the book of Acts right now and really enjoying it. For the first four chapters, it seems like everything is going simply awesome. The Church is growing like wildfire, miracles are happening, believers are experiencing authentic fellowship and meeting each other’s needs. Everything is perfect.

Then in Acts 5 I read the story of Ananias & Sapphira. I cringe everytime. As much as I try to get past it, part of me feels like this belongs in Old Testament and not alongside the birth of the church of the risen Christ. I’ve just been reading about the powerful move of the Holy Spirt and Christians being genuinely Christlike. I long to be a part of that. But sometimes I forget that the gospel means more than just good times and celebration.

Ananias & Sapphira messed up big time. They brought pride and deceit into the church. They lied to the Holy Spirit. The result was death.

If we are ever going to follow the example of the church in Acts, our lives need to be marked with exceptional honesty, purity, and devotion. I have to learn more and more to be a slave to righteousness and be dead to sin. I don’t want to “withhold part of my field money” and pretend like I’ve really given everything. Perhaps the saddest part about this story is how alike the husband and wife are. They both tell the exact same thing to Peter. They both end up dead. Great fear seizes me every time I read this. No matter what, I have to remember that the Holy Spirit is first and foremost unconditionally and utterly holy.

It’s hits home right after Ananias and Sapphira are gone. The work of the Holy Spirit continues: “The apostles performed many miraculous signs and wonders among the people.” (Acts 5:12)