Ananias and Sapphira wanted to be recognized for their generous gift. They wanted everyone to know how much they had given. I think they were hoping that the apostles would name the first church building after them! Talk about a backfire.
They will always be remembered, but not for their gift. They will be remembered for their attempt to deceive an all knowing God.
What will we be remembered for?
There was no rule about selling land and giving it to the church, but Barnabas did it and people seemed to like him, so why not? What started off looking like such a good idea ended so poorly when they chose to lie about how much of the proceeds they would end up giving. Even then, they could have given 5% of it to the church or 50% or all of it. Any of those options would have been fine. We have a hard enough time quenching the urge to boast about that which we have actually done, let alone boasting about things we never did.
ReplyDeleteAnanias and Sapphira actually had a gift to lie about. The bigger 21st century problem isn't lying about a gift given, but actually having a gift to even lie about.
ReplyDelete