Bible 101 - Acts 5-7

Presented June 26, 2006 by Phyllis Gilbert

Review: At Pentecost, we watched the Holy Spirit baptize and fill believers, who were then transformed from fearful colleagues to bold preachers. As he was preparing to ascend to the Father, Jesus had said "You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." Those witnesses are using every opportunity to do just that, and we saw that from 120, the number of believers grew to 3,000 and then 5,000. Peter and John not only speak in Jesus' name about redemption, but they speak words of healing. And for their boldness, they are arrested by the Sanhedrin, the Jewish council of chief priests, elders and teachers of the law - the same group who had just weeks before found Jesus guilty of blasphemy and put him to death. I believe the Sanhedrin drew a sigh of relief when Joseph of Arimathea (a member of the Sanhedrin but a man who believed Jesus was the Messiah), buried Jesus. But their sense of victory over this rabble rouser who'd challenged their way of life and religious piety didn't stay dead, and now his disciples were posing a new threat. What to do?

Early church: The new converts are staying together, studying the Word, listening to the apostles, the ones who'd been with Jesus for three years, and learning from them. They're praying and having Eucharist. Their fellowship is intense (Acts 2:42-47). In ch. 4 we meet Barnabas, the man whose gift of encouragement is a member of the fellowship. He sells property in Cyprus and gives the proceeds to the apostles to help those in need. He was not alone; others also sold land and houses to support the group and to finance outreach. And while most of the believers were of "one heart and mind," we'll discover tonight that this wasn't universal.

Acts 5: Ananias and Sapphira were a married couple who sold property as others had done. But instead of giving the entire sum to the church, they discussed the matter and decided to withhold some of it. It was their right to do so; they owned the land, they sold it, and the money was theirs to use as they wished. But here's where they get in trouble: Ananias comes to the prayer meeting and delivers the money to the apostles saying he'd brought all that he'd gotten from the sale, but Peter looks at him, and with the Spirit's discernment, says to Ananias: "why are you lying? Has Satan filled your heart and you're now lying to the Holy Spirit?" Those were the last words Ananias heard: he dropped dead before Peter and all the believers. "Great fear seized all who heard what had happened," we're told. What a dramatic sequence of events: they sell land, they get money, they put some in the bank, bring the rest to the apostles saying "this is all of it," and the deception is immediately known. The money was theirs; Peter makes it clear that it was their decision to dispose of it as they wished. The sin was lying about it. Young men carry Ananias's body out and three hours later, Sapphira comes in not knowing her husband is dead. Peter asks her, holding the money in his hand, "Is this the price you were paid for the land?" and she answers yes. Peter tells her she's lied to the Holy Spirit and she falls dead just as her husband had. She's carried out by the same young men and the two are buried. They serve as examples to the other believers: tell the truth! We can lie to ourselves and other human beings, but we cannot lie to God. God is concerned with our priorities. How often did Jesus preach on putting possessions in their place? The rich young ruler, who came to Jesus asking "what must I do to inherit the kingdom of God?" told Jesus he'd kept all the commandments since his youth. But Jesus told him to sell what he had and give to the poor and follow Jesus. The young man went away with head down; he couldn't give God first place in his life. The deaths of Ananias and Sapphira taught the young church the value of being transparent before God and each other.

Acts 5:11: Note that the word church is first used here in the New Testament to describe the body of believers. The word comes from the Greek eklesia meaning "called out." The church is called out from the world to be the body of Christ, and gaining strength from this body, and from prayer, fellowship, Eucharist and study of the Word, its members can then be used by the Holy Spirit to go out and evangelize the world.

Acts 5:12: The apostles, given gifts by the Holy Spirit as signs of their ministry and the Holy Spirit's baptism, are healing many who come to them. Even those who are in Peter's shadow when he passes by are healed. The group is now meeting in a part of the Temple called Solomon's Colonnade. Notice how public this group has become; earlier they met in homes and upper rooms. Now they're out, staking a claim to part of the Temple complex. We're told "no one dared join them" but we're also told "more and more men and women believed in the Lord and were added to their number." This appears to be a contradiction. But recalling the incident with Ananias and Sapphira, we can interpret this as meaning that no one who wasn't fully committed to Christ joined them, only believers who were wholehearted in their faith.

Acts 5:17: Jesus had told the disciples that they'd face the same hatred from some quarters as he had faced, and so they do. The high priest and other Sadducees, the ruling religious power, were jealous over the apostles' success. They'd warned Peter and John in ch. 4 that they were not to preach "in that name." But Peter and John had told them they were obliged to do so: "We cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard," and they've continued to preach, teach and heal in Jesus' name. Now they and the other apostles are hauled in for a lecture, and this time, they're jailed. The next morning, the full Sanhedrin gathered for a trial, and they sent the guards to get the apostles. But during the night, an angel of the Lord had freed them from jail, and at that moment, the apostles were preaching in the Temple courts. The guards came back to the Sanhedrin saying "they're not in jail, but the guard is there and the gates are locked." The Temple police chief and his staff are puzzled, but then one of them looks up and sees the prisoners teaching in the Temple courts. And so they rearrested them, and took them to the Sanhedrin in an orderly way, "not using force" because they were afraid of the people. Remember that Jesus was arrested at night because the leaders feared the people. Before the Sanhedrin, the apostles hear the same caution: "quit teaching in this name," because "you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching and are determined to make us guilty of this man's blood." Peter had boldly spoken on the Day of Pentecost about the religious leaders' plot to arrest and kill Jesus. They desperately want to quash this; they see the crowds slipping away from them and moving toward belief in Christ. Peter speaks out again: "We must obey God rather than men," he tells them, and once more tells them that Jesus, whom they killed, rose from the dead and is seated at God's right hand. Not only that, Jesus died to provide redemption from sin and "forgiveness of sins to Israel." Then Peter adds: "we are witnesses of these things." Paul tells us in I Cor. 15 that the Gospel is the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and that's exactly what Peter and the apostles witnessed and what they are preaching. Naturally, the Sanhedrin is a hostile audience. At hearing Peter, "they were furious and wanted to put them to death."

Acts 5:34: But one of the members of the Sanhedrin, a wise man named Gamaliel, stands up, and advises them to stop and think. Other movements have come and gone; other leaders have come and gone. He says give the believers a little leeway; if this is of man, it will fade away, but if it is of God, they cannot stop it because they'd be fighting God. "His speech persuaded them," we're told and the Sanhedrin once again orders them "not to speak in the name of Jesus," beat them and let them go. And what do the apostles do? "They left rejoicing because they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the Name." And they taught and preached just as before. They are not to be stopped by the Sanhedrin.

Acts 6: As with any church, there are problems over little things, and people start to complain. In this instance, the Grecian Jews reported to the apostles that their widows were not getting the same amount of food that the Jerusalem widows were getting. This rivalry between those Jews who were born in Israel and those born elsewhere, but no less Jews, broke into loud voices over the food program. The disciples understand the need for an orderly distribution of food, but they consider their call to be to preach and teach, not to run a soup kitchen. And so they decide to choose seven men, "known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom" to take responsibility for this program. They prayed and selected seven men, including Stephen, commissioned them to this work by laying their hands on them and praying for them. This solution freed the disciples to preach and teach, and the Gospel continued to spread. And in this brief summary of the progress of the work we're told "a large number of priests became obedient to the faith." God's word and the Holy Spirit's conviction are influencing even the religious establishment.

Acts 6:8: The camera is going to be on Stephen for the rest of this chapter and the next; he is the first Christian martyr. Not only was he one of the seven chosen to administer the food program, Stephen was so on-fire for God that he couldn't do enough for the Gospel and the church. But a group of Jews of the Synagogue of the Freedmen (former slaves now set free by their owners, or who had bought their freedom) begin to argue with Stephen. They are defending the old ways of obedience to the law as the means of righteousness, and Stephen is saying "righteousness comes through faith in Christ." We're told the opposition runs out of words, unable to answer Stephen's argument, but so entrenched are they in their traditions that they hire men to say "we heard Stephen speak words of blasphemy against Moses and against God," and they stir up the people, the chief priests and other leaders who arrest Stephen. Does this sound familiar? The same tactic of hiring false witnesses was used to discredit Jesus. Fear is a powerful emotion; just as we saw the religious leaders' fear of Jesus' influence, they're now afraid of the Spirit-enabled witnesses to Jesus' work of redemption. They want to silence this bunch of upstarts once and for all. But Stephen, whose "face looks like an angel" (v. 18) is unafraid of these men.

Acts 7: Stephen is arrested and charged with blasphemy against the law of Moses and the temple, and so the Sanhedrin asks him "are these accusations true?" Stephen then replies with a long sermon, a lesson in Judaism 101. Beginning with Abraham, he traces the history of the Jews through Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, the exodus, the giving of the law and tabernacle, the wandering in the desert, and establishment of the monarchy. He mentions David and Solomon, the Temple. . . he's teaching the teachers! He then concludes by saying "You stiff-necked people with uncircumcised hearts and ears! You are just like your fathers." All through the history of the nation, God had sent his men (Joseph, Moses, Joshua, David, Samuel, Elijah, Isaiah and so many more) to remind the people of the covenant they'd made with God. They were to obey; God would bless. But they'd not only disobeyed, they'd killed God's prophets. And now they've killed "the Righteous one," Stephen shouts. Imagine their fury! They've been told once again how they'd had a chance to believe, to be God's people in heart and mind and life, and they'd rejected God's Messiah, killing him on a cross. The Sanhedrin gets up as one man, hustles Stephen out the door and stones him. This is illegal; they have no case against him, and they are forbidden by Roman law to sentence a man to death, let alone carry out the sentence. So they commit murder, lynching an innocent man. Stephen, whose face had glowed like an angel, is so alive, looking up to heaven, and he cries out "I see Jesus standing at the right hand of God," but his accusers, most tellingly "cover their ears and yell louder," pick up stones and fling them at him. He's told them their own story, one filled with sin and they're convicted by the Holy Spirit of their guilt. And so they quiet Stephen forever, but not before he says "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. . . Lord, do not hold this sin against them," and he dies.

Acts 8:1: And Saul was there, giving approval to his death." In the crowd gathered around Stephen with stones, Saul had been the man at whose feet the coats of the murderers were laid (7:58). He'd nodded encouragement and probably shouted "he must die," but this is the man who becomes the greatest missionary in the history of the church: St. Paul. God has a mission for him.

Next week: We'll see the next chapter in the church, and find Saul/Paul on the road to Damascus when God meets him.

Homework for those who want to go deeper:

Let's close in prayer.