Our final "bad girl" is Sapphira, wife of and co-conspirator with Ananias. Their story is found in Acts 5. Together they decide to sell their land and present a portion of the proceeds to the church as if that portion was the whole. This could, potentially, give them an "in" with the church, where all belongings were being shared. This could make them seem really righteous while allowing them a little nest egg "just in case".
How often are we like that - we want to make a full commitment to God, to Christ, even to the church - but we want a safety net just in case we are wrong and the church/God fails us. In this case it was monetary - but it could be emotionally or in any other way. What are we holding back? What is the price we are paying/going to have to pay because of it?
In this case the cost was dear. Peter was not fooled by the presentation and so gave Ananias, and later Sapphira, the chance to admit they had back some of their money - but neither did - so they ended up falling down dead right there.
For us it may not be so much a physical death - though when what we hold back is our habits/indulgences like overeating, drinking, smoking, drugs etc. perhaps we are hastening our own deaths - but there is a spiritual death that comes each time we come before God pretending to be/bring something we are not. We know deep down that we are not fully committed, and God knows it, and we actually know God knows it - but still we try to fool ourselves and God that we are bringing our whole selves.
How does one give it all? How can one take that leap of faith? I still struggle with that nearly every day but what one doesn't do is pretend to have given more than you have. Peter explains to Ananias that the field was his - he was not obligated to give the proceeds to the church. What he did wrong was making a show of being more pious, more religious, more generous than he really was. He tried to fool not only the church, but God - and that was unacceptable.
But the focus was to be on Sapphira - how does she fit into this? The story makes little distinction between what she did and the actions of her husband. She was a part of the decision to sell the field as well as the decision to hold back some of the proceeds. She had a chance to come clean when Peter asked her - but, not knowing her husband had been struck down, she remained loyal to him rather than being honest with Peter and the church. It is sad to think that the one seemingly functional marriage relationship we have studied ends up this way. Sapphira seems to have had a good relationship with her husband, they worked together and made decisions together. They were loyal to each other. But the decision they made together ended up costing them both their lives. She was not a horrible person - nor even as warped as many we have seen - but she, like so many before and after her, longed for security and put that before faith. Is this not something we all have to fight? We see people who are homeless, people who lose everything, not to the church but to the bank or to the government or to some other creditor - and we do not want that. We want to feel safe.
Somehow we need to get to the point where we can feel safe in God's hands - where we are not relying on our own abilities, possessions, strengths. Somehow we need to let go and come to God with open hands (as Henry Nowen put it), take that leap of faith (as Kierkegaard put it), rest in the promises (as the hymn puts it). However we put it, somehow we need to give our whole selves into God's hands. If we find we cannot let go to that point - we need to recognize it, be honest about it and pray for help, not pretend that we have.
So let us focus on giving ourselves to God. Let us focus on being honest with God about our struggles - its not like we're fooling anyone anyway - and let work on, not looking like good Christians, but being the Christians we are called to be.
No comments:
Post a Comment