Read Acts 4:32-37

What wonderful words about the church. Most words about the church are not like that. People like to do the church down and frankly the church does itself down all too often.

But let’s dream awhile shall we? Imagine there was a church as this one is described: a church where its members displayed unity; a church where its members displayed community; a church where its members displayed testimony; and a church where its members displayed generosity.

It would be a beautiful place to be. You would get on well with everyone. You would feel great love and practical care from everyone. You would not stop talking about how Jesus had transformed everyone. You would want to share in resourcing it for everyone.

Yes, this passage in Acts mirrors somewhat the passage we looked at last week (Acts 2:42-47). There we read about the very early church, just days and weeks after it had started after the coming of the Holy Spirit, the Day of Pentecost, the birthday of the church so to speak.

Life had moved on. The church had suffered attack from outside: certain people in Jerusalem didn’t like this new Jesus movement and saw it as a challenge to their authority and ways of doing things. So in Acts 3 and 4, we read of the first healing by the early followers of Jesus, and the first persecution.

But none of that dimmed their faith nor their resolve to be a wonderful group of people, living in unity, community, testimony and generosity. Let’s look at these various characteristics:-

Unity – the early Christians were one in heart and mind (v.32) it’s not easy living like that. Any of us living in families know that being one in heart and mind can be a rare event. Your brother annoys you, your dad ignores you, your mother shouts at you. The unity displayed here was special, because even the closest of human relationships – blood family ties – cannot necessarily replicate such unity. Even the Three Musqueteers, pledged to each other in everlasting loyalty and friendship, struggled to be united.

Community – the early Christians shared what they had with one another. Now that sometimes happens in families or between friends, but mostly we hold onto our possessions tightly. “It’s mine” might ring out across the playground, but it’s a sentiment echoed in our actions day after day after day. We are bound up with what we own and we declare our identity by what we own. (Play Video clip: Rat Race). That sums up so many people’s lives and we in the church are not immune from it.

Testimony – however, the life of those early believers was so good that they couldn’t stop sharing the story of Jesus. The resurrection, Jesus’ rising from death, is so world transforming and life transforming and community transforming that they couldn’t stop talking about it and they couldn’t stop living it. Well, wouldn’t you want to tell people about this wonderful Jesus who made this wonderful group of people?

Generosity – they just gave to others. They supported the work of the church’s leadership, they resourced the ministry of the church, they ensured no-one went without (v.34). The love of God, which had been shown to them in Jesus’ life and ministry, was now energising them to serve others by ensuring that no-one went without.

What a beautiful picture of a group of people so full of God in their lives. Imagine that today: that we could be like that too. What a powerful effect it would have on us and on the extension of God’s Kingdom!

And the writer of Acts, Luke, the friend of Paul, gives us an illustration of this unity, community, testimony and generosity in action (v.36-37).

Let us think of something rather unpleasant instead. (Video clip: Bridget Jones)

What we saw there was deceit. Daniel Cleaver cheats on his girlfriend. There is lying, deceit, dishonesty, treachery, cheating, duplicity and falsehood. Bridget Jones is developing a really nice relationship with Daniel and it’s destroyed.

Read Acts 5:1-11 – lying comes in again and theft also.

Lying – this isn’t hard to spot in our story. Both Ananias and Sapphira concoct a deal whereby they decide that Barnabas’s gift made him look really good and holy so they could get the same respect if they do something similar. Well, they own some land and they sell it, giving the proceeds to the Apostles.

Now their plan is fatally flawed because they decide to lie. They want to look generous but they don’t want to be generous, so they keep back part of the sale proceeds but don’t tell anyone (v.2)

This lying comes out when Ananias presents the ‘gift’ to the early church. You can imagine him thinking, look at me folks, can you see how generous I am, how holy I am, how good my faith is. You and I know what we call such people: hypocrites. Ananias and Sapphira were hypocrites.

And what is worse, not only did they lie to the church, but as the senior church leader, Peter points out, they lied to God (v.3, 4c). And they didn’t have to. Peter reminds Ananias that he could have done what he wanted with the money (v.4a). They had a free choice. Even Sapphira had the chance to redeem herself and not to lie: Peter gave her the chance to set the record straight (v.8), but she chose not to. They had the opportunity to do the right thing and they chose not to.

Not only did they lie they also stole this money from God. The word for ‘kept back’ could be translated as ‘misappropriate’ which is a posh word for ‘steal’ or ‘embezzle’ or ‘pocket’. Ananias and Sapphira were promising this money to God and they were stealing it from him.

And they both died there and then. Seems a bit harsh but I think God must have known that at this early stage there was no way that evil could be allowed to take root. I guess the other church members were afraid, were very afraid: we read of their ‘great fear’. Yet perhaps they were thinking of their own lives – I bet they weren’t perfect either – perhaps they were thinking ‘There, but for the grace of God, go I.’

Can we just step back a moment from the story and ponder some hard truths about God: hard, because we wish it were not quite so; truths because we can see them enacted in the past and today if we have eyes to see.

Three things can be seen in this community of the early church:

a) radical action – possessions did not take a hold of their lives. We struggle with that. We are urged daily by the society we live in to put possessions at the heart of ourselves, defining us and portraying to others our identity. We feel constrained not to wear cheap Tesco trainers before our friends when actually they do just as good a job as expensive ones. We fall for the marketing and advertising all too often.

b) sacrificial action – voluntary and occasional selling of property to help others was a generous, even sacrificial act by the early church members. We struggle with that. When the Finance Committee was drawing up this year’s budget, we wanted to be generous but were held back by the lack of funds. We worked out that to meet our expenditure needs this year, each income earning church household would need to give £1040 or £87.00 a month. If we say that £87 a month is people giving 5% of their income to the church, then households here earn only £20,800 a year. Very few households have such an income. We are not sacrificial. We are, dare I say, stealing from God, by not being generous.

c) proportionate action – the early church knew the importance of the richer members giving generously, but also of all giving as they were able. We struggle with that. Let me quote you something (ACTS – BST, p.107, Calvin’s words). Those words were written some 500 years ago and we haven’t changed, have we?

This passage, the early church at work, should challenge us to the core of our faith. We are so full of western values that we have pushed Jesus values to the margin of our lives, a nod to worship, an okay to prayer and an all right to Bible study, never mind a generous spirit to fund the work of God and to extend his Kingdom.

We need to examine our lives and hearts and just get serious about this Jesus we profess to love and follow.