Scripture Daily

Context No. 1598 of 4322 · Acts

Context · Reflection

Acts 5:1-8: in context

1But a certain man named Ananias, with Sapphira his wife, sold a possession, 2and kept back part of the price, his wife also being aware of it, then brought a certain part and laid it at the apostles’ feet. 3But Peter said, “Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and to keep back part of the price of the land? 4While you kept it, didn’t it remain your own? After it was sold, wasn’t it in your power? How is it that you have conceived this thing in your heart? You haven’t lied to men, but to God.” 5Ananias, hearing these words, fell down and died. Great fear came on all who heard these things. 6The young men arose and wrapped him up, and they carried him out and buried him. 7About three hours later, his wife, not knowing what had happened, came in. 8Peter answered her, “Tell me whether you sold the land for so much.” She said, “Yes, for so much.”

In the early church, believers were selling property and laying the proceeds at the apostles' feet for the common good. Ananias and his wife Sapphira sell a piece of land, but secretly keep back part of the price while bringing the rest and presenting it as though it were the whole. Peter confronts Ananias: why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit? The land was yours, and the money was yours to keep; why have you contrived this? You have not lied to men but to God. And Ananias falls down dead, and great fear comes on all who hear.

It is important to see what Ananias's sin actually was, because Peter makes it clear. It was not that he kept back part of the money; the land was his, Peter says, and the money was his, to give or keep as he chose. There was no obligation to give all, and no sin in keeping some. The sin was the lie, the pretense: bringing part while presenting it as the whole, faking a total devotion and generosity that was not real, in order to be admired for a piety he did not actually have. He wanted the reputation of complete sacrifice without the reality, and he lied to God to get it. This is the sin the passage treats with such severity: religious hypocrisy, the pretending to a holiness or generosity we do not possess, the performance of a devotion that is not real, to look better before others than we truly are. The severity of the judgment underlines how seriously God takes this pretense, this lying to the Holy Spirit by faking a piety we do not have. There is a searching warning in it for all of us who are tempted, in ways usually far subtler than Ananias's, to perform a greater devotion than is real, to let others believe we are more generous, more prayerful, more sacrificial than we actually are. The sin is not in having less devotion than we wish; it is in pretending to more than we have, in the hypocrisy that fakes a holiness it does not possess. God is not deceived by the performance, and he takes the pretense seriously. Better an honest, imperfect devotion than a performed, hypocritical one; God prizes truth in the inward being, and the lie that fakes a piety we lack is a lie told to him.

Am I tempted to perform a greater devotion, generosity, or holiness than is real, letting others believe I am more than I am, and do I see that the sin is not having less devotion than I wish but pretending to more than I have, faking before God and others a piety I do not possess?

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