Open our Bibles together today to Acts chapter
5. While you're doing that, let me introduce
to you a friend who is here today that I've not
met before, but he is a friend of some in our
congregation. Bruce Sider is a missionary on
deputation under overseas crusades, trusting
the Lord to return to Central America as a full
-time missionary. Bruce, would you stand up,
please? there beside Paul Hubbard. Bruce is the
one who led the missions trip last winter, wasn't
it? In December, Paul went on in Guatemala and
El Salvador. We heard lots about that trip and
it felt like a great time. Good to have you here
today. I think you ministered in our college
small church this morning too, is that right?
Good to have you. For our reading we will begin
back in chapter 4 with verse 36. Joseph, a Levite
of Cyprian birth who was also called Barnabas
by the apostles, which translated means son of
encouragement, and who owned a tract of land,
sold it and brought the money and laid it at
the apostles' feet. But a certain man named Ananias
with his wife Sapphira sold a piece of property
and kept back some of the price for himself with
his wife's full knowledge. And bringing a portion
of it, he laid it at the apostle's feet. But
Peter said, Ananias, why has Satan filled your
heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and to keep back
some of the price of the land? While it remained
unsold, did it not remain your own? And after
it was sold, was it not under your control? Why
is it that you have conceived this deed in your
heart? You have not lied to men, but to God.
As he heard these words, Ananias fell down and
breathed his last, and great fear came upon all
who heard of it. And the young men arose and
covered him up, and after carrying him out, they
buried him. Now there elapsed an interval of
about three hours and his wife came in not knowing
what had happened And Peter responded to her
tell me whether you sold the land for such and
such a price And she said yes, that was the price
Then Peter said to her why is it that you have
agreed together? To put the spirit of the Lord
to the test Behold the feet of those who have
buried your husband are at the door and they
shall carry you out as well and she fell immediately
at his feet and breathed her last. And the young
men came in and found her dead, and they carried
her out and buried her beside her husband. And
great fear came upon the whole church and upon
all who heard of these things. Our Heavenly Father,
we pray that you would open our ears and that
the Spirit of the Lord would show us the things
of Christ. in this text, and we pray this in
Jesus' name, amen. Our text this morning portrays
a startling, vivid contrast of characters. Certainly
there is a thread of similarity which ties them
together. All of the parties involved were professing
Christians and were also members of the Jerusalem
Church. All likewise were landowners who sold
land in order to give proceeds to the leaders
of the church for distribution to the poor among
them. But the real story, the real lesson intended
by the Holy Spirit in recording this is found
in the contradistinction, in the contrast of
the parties involved. On the one hand, we have
a husband and wife who are characterized by brazen,
calculated, premeditated hypocrisy. And on the
other hand, we have a man, Barnabas, characterized
by glistening, quiet, Christ -like integrity.
The former, that is, hypocrisy, is a self -destructive
weapon. For the latter, integrity, is a mighty
tool in the hand of God. Integrity in one's life
is absolutely essential if God's blessing is
desired. And who of us would say we do not desire
the blessing of God? If we want it then, it absolutely
requires integrity. in our lives. Until we ask
the question, what is integrity? How is it defined?
Webster's dictionary says this, the quality or
state of being sound in moral principles, uprightness,
honesty, and sincerity. A good definition, but
how does that look in real life? What does a
person look like who is characterized by integrity?
Well, it seems to me that in our text today there
are two elements of integrity that are revealed
to us. The first one is that integrity means
being responsive to needs. Being responsive to
needs. So the context of our text is this. Among
the many thousands of people being converted
to the Christian faith, there were truly needy
people. The immediate response of those who had
the means to do so was to provide for those needy.
We see in verse 34 the result of that. There
was not a needy person among them. For all who
were owners of land or houses would sell them
and bring the proceeds of the sale. and lay them
at the apostle's feet, and they would be distributed
to eat as any had need." Our text then provides
a specific example of one man, one man who did
exactly what those verses just said. His name,
Barnabas. Now why is he mentioned here? I think
there are a couple of reasons why Barnabas is
chosen. In the first place, Barnabas will later
in this book become a main figure in its narrative.
And Luke, being the good author and careful historian
that he was, carefully planted the seeds about
Barnabas early on in the book before he actually
comes to the front of the stage in the narrative.
But secondly, Barnabas illustrates the sterling
character of a disciple who genuinely follows
the Lord Jesus Christ. Now we learn some things
about him in verses 36 and 37. He was born on
Cyprus. He was not native to Palestine. Cyprus
is an island in the north and eastern part of
the Mediterranean Sea. Furthermore, we see that
he was of Levi's ancestry. He was... of the family
of Levi, one of the sons of Jacob. As a Levite,
he was among those who were given responsibility
for the tabernacle, later the temple. They had
religious duty to care for the needs of that
place. Furthermore, originally the Levites were
not given land. God said, I am the inheritor
of the Levites. They don't need land. However,
by the time the captivity occurred, which was
600 years or so before this record in the Book
of Acts, it was common for the Levites to own
land nonetheless. And we see here that Barnabas
owned a tract of land. His given name was Joseph.
Very common. But his nickname was Barnabas. The
believers, and especially the apostles as seen,
enjoyed calling him by his nickname because that
name means son of encouragement. When you see
the word bar or the prefix bar in a name that
means son of, so he was the son of encouragement
or consolation. And it's interesting that whenever
you see this man in the book of Acts... He is
encouraging somebody. A little bit later on,
right after the conversion of Saul of Tarsus,
when no one would believe him and trust him.
It is Barnabas who first extended his hand to
Saul as a friend. It introduced him as a brother
and encouraged other believers to trust in him.
And then a little bit after that, it is Barnabas
who has seen, along with Saul, taking some goods
from the church in Antioch down to the church
in Jerusalem because they at that time would
again have needs. And then we see him trying
to give his nephew, John Mark, a second chance
in ministry. I think you recall what happened.
He accompanied Barnabas and Saul. later called
Paul on their first missionary journey, and he
flunked out. He didn't make it. He went back
home. He didn't go with them to the work. It's
the way that the book says it. And because of
that, when the second missionary journey was
being arranged, Paul refused to take John Mark
along. But Barnabas wanted to give him a second
chance, another opportunity to serve the Lord,
and he did. So Barnabas is a man who is an encourager.
He's a man who is responsive to the needs of
others. He is a man of integrity. A man of integrity
uses the ability that he has to respond to others
in their genuine need. Now, how can we apply
that to our lives? Well, I think that that's
very obvious. That if we today intend to be men
and women of integrity, It means we must get
our hands dirty. It means that we must make sacrifices
to do what is necessary to get involved, to ease
the hurt, to comfort the grief, to supply the
want, to give for the needs of others around
us. For any of us to perceive the crisis in another
life is to take action. if in fact we are people
of integrity. Now why is that? Because we know
something of the love of Jesus Christ. The Lord
Jesus Christ came into this world because of
His great love for us and His desire to meet
our needs that we might be saved. And now that
we have trusted Him as Savior, that love is implanted
in us and it compels us to do for others as Christ
has done for us. Turn to the words of the apostle
of love, John, in 1 John chapter 3. In this third
chapter, John is contrasting the children of
the world, the unsaved, with the children of
God, the saved. He says in verse 13, Do not marvel,
brethren, if the world hates you. By the world,
he's talking about that evil system which controls
and manipulates the unregenerate people in our
world, a world system which is very, very strong
and organized. Now he says, don't be surprised
if that world system and those people who are
captivated by it hate you. We know that we have
passed out of death into life because we love
the brethren He who does not love abides in death
But he's saying there that if there is not love
in a person who professes to be a Christian That
in fact his profession is empty Because one who
knows Jesus Christ has love in him he says in
verse 15 Everyone who hates his brother is a
murderer. He follows in the train of Cain and
Satan mentioned in previous verses. And you know
that no murderer has eternal life abiding in
him. We know love by this, that he laid down
his life for us, and we ought to lay down our
lives for the brethren. But whoever has the world's
goods and beholds his brother in need and closes
his heart against him, how does the love of God
abide in him? Little children, let us not love
with word or with tongue, but indeed in truth.
We shall know by this that we are of the truth,
and shall assure our heart before him. the assurance
of salvation should not come to you and me because
sometime way back whenever we bowed our knees
and prayed a prayer. Assurance of salvation really
is not found either in a baptismal certificate
or some indication of church membership. The
assurance of salvation is found in this. the
fruit of Jesus Christ in our lives. Here he talks
about love. He says, if we say that we love our
brothers, but we do not have integrity to be
responsive to their needs, there is reason to
question whether we are genuinely converted.
And so he exhorts us, don't love just with your
tongue or in word, but with actions. truthfully.
And he says, from that we will know that we're
in the truth and our hearts will be assured before
God. To know a need and have within oneself the
ability to do something about it. And then to
ignore the situation is to expose an absence
of integrity in one's life. Integrity means that
I do what is needed in order to meet the needs.
in someone else's life. Do you want God's best?
Of course you do, as one of God's children. That
if we want God's best, integrity is required.
And integrity means being responsive to the needs
of other people. There is a second element that
is involved in real integrity, and that is being
honest with God and with others. I want you to
notice that that is involved in our text, and
it's really the bulk of the text that we read
this morning. We have in the part of Barnabas
an example of a man of integrity who was responsive
to the point of selling his property and giving
his money away so that he could meet the needs
and the lives of others. Integrity also means
being honest and actually what we have in our
text is a contrast in the illustration for it's
found in the lives of Ananias and Sapphira. You
see Ananias and Sapphira also saw the need. They
saw that there were people who were poor among
them. They saw in addition to that the acclaim
that apparently came to Barnabas and the others
who sold things and gave their money to the poor,
and they wanted some of that applause. In addition
to all of that, it seems that they wanted to
keep some of the money for their own purposes.
And so to accomplish all of this, they agreed
upon a scheme. Now the narrative here seems to
fall out in four parts. Part one is the deceit,
verses one and two. Ananias and Sapphira sold
the property and Ananias took some of the money
for himself. The word kept back in verse 2 means
he embezzled it. He kept it back for himself,
his wife being fully aware of what was taking
place. And then he brought a portion of the proceeds
and he laid it at the apostles' feet. That means
he put it at their disposal. But in doing that,
he was a deceiver because he pretended to give
all of it when in fact he only gave a portion
of it. Please understand that the sin of Ananias
and Sapphira was not in keeping some of the money.
Even Peter says, while it was in your power you
could do with it what you wanted. But the sin
of an anastasis of fire was in keeping some of
it and pretending to give all of it. That made
them hypocrites. And so we have the record of
the first two hypocrites of the Church. These
two tried to appear more spiritual than they
actually were. What is a hypocrite? The word
hypocrite in the Greek means a stage actor. The
verb means to reply or to give an answer. It
was used in that day of a person who would be
involved in a dramatic presentation. He would
have several masks for his use. And according
to the part that he played, he would pick the
appropriate mask up and put it over his face
and change his voice. When that part was done,
he would put that mask down, pick up another
mask, put it over his face, change his voice,
and play the next part. That was the common way
of acting in that day. Thus, this word hypocrite
referred to stage actors. It is used, however,
in the Bible with a spiritual connotation that
is negative. It is used to refer to one who is
putting on an act, who is not living consistently
with what he really is on the inside. The Lord
Jesus, in fact, used this term. Turn back with
me to Matthew chapter 6. Notice that he used
it exactly in the same way that it's being used
in the context of Acts 5. In Matthew chapter
6 and verse 5, the Lord Jesus says, and when
you pray, you are not to be as the hypocrites.
He's talking here about the religious leaders
of that day. primarily the Pharisees. He says
they loved to stand and pray in the synagogues
and on the street corners in order to be seen
by men. Now notice that. Their desire is to put
on this show, this play, this drama. And so they
acted out something that was not genuine with
their hearts. Go down a few verses to verse 16.
You see the emphasis is on the outward, upon
that which is seen. And so it is with the hypocrites
of Acts chapter 5. this money so that they could
also have the reputation of a Barnabas. They
gave a portion of what they had received and
pretended that it was all. That was their deceit.
We notice then Peter's discernment, verses 3
and 4. God gave Peter this insight. It was quite
a confrontation. Peter did not say, thank you.
He simply said, Ananias. Therefore he was known,
you see. He was among them. He was not a stranger.
Why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the
Holy Spirit and to keep back some of the price
of the land? Again, the word embezzled is used
in verse 3, keep back. You embezzled some of
this for yourself. While it remained unsold,
did it not remain your own? After it was sold,
was it not under your control? Why is it that
you have conceived this deed in your heart? You've
not lied to men, but to God. There's quite a
confrontation, and other people were around.
It was a stripping of this man. It was an exposing
of his real deed and his heart. This was done
in other times in the Bible. For example, when
Nathan went before King David, pointed his finger
in David's face and said to him, you are the
man. And there before all of his court, David
in his sin was exposed. There is a lesson to
be learned here, and it's this, that sin is always
exposed. in one way or another. As the book of
Numbers tells us, be sure your sin will find
you out. We can cover it for a time. We can pretend
and be hypocrites for a period. But there comes
a day for all of us when our sin will be exposed.
Is it not interesting, to say the least, to notice
in verse 3 that Peter says you have been empowered
by Satan. Satan has filled your heart. The word
filled there is the same word as back in chapter
4 verse 31 for the filling of the Holy Spirit.
He suggests to us there that just as the Holy
Spirit had empowered the believers earlier, so
now Satan had empowered Ananias, this man who
was at least a professing Christian. That does
not mean that the sin was totally from Satan.
The scheme seems to have been hatched in the
heart of Ananias and his wife. But once the sin
was there and began to be developed, Satan empowered
it so that it could be brought to pass. Beware
of that, my fellow believer. For when sin takes
root in our lives and we do not deal with it,
it is possible for Satan to empower us and to
bring about that sin and its awful fruit in us.
In verse 4, he says, you have lied to God. What
does that tell us? It tells us that the Holy
Spirit is God. There are people who try to teach
us that the Holy Spirit is but an influence,
and they like to use a small s in their translations
of the Bible when the Holy Spirit is mentioned.
My friend, when you lie to the Holy Spirit, you've
lied to God because the Holy Spirit is God. When
you run up against somebody who denies the deity
of the Holy Spirit, here's one text you can use
to argue against their false teaching. He further
says about their sin in verse 9, why is it you
have agreed together to put the Spirit of the
Lord to the test? That is strong language. He
is saying, you have presumed to sin. against
the holiness of God. And so this husband and
wife are absolutely exposed before everybody
for their hypocrisy. Verses 5 through 10 talk
about their death. After Peter had spoken to
Ananias, he says in verse 5 that he heard the
words and then immediately he fell dead. Right
there in the front of everybody, he died, smitten
of God. He breathed out his last. You would expect
Dr. Luke to use a medical term, and he does.
This is a Greek medical term. It means to expire,
in verse 5. So the young men arose and covered
him up. Again, it's a medical term. It means
to wrap or to bandage. They took him out. They
buried him. And three hours went by. Now, why
his wife had not heard about the death, we do
not know. Where she had been for those three
hours, scripture does not say. But the fact is
that she came in ignorant of what had happened.
And so Peter immediately asked her to confirm
or to deny what her husband had said. And she
confirmed the lie. And Peter said to her, why
is it that you have agreed together? And verse
10, she fell immediately at his feet and expired,
breathed her last. Now there are a couple of
things to say about this. Number one, this is
not church discipline. God never gave the church
in the first place the right to kill anybody
He has given the sword to the government Romans
13 But not to the church probably a very good
thing This is not church discipline what this
is is the direct action of God it is divine judgment
it is his intervention immediately into the facts
His exposing of them and dealing drastically
with them You say well, why did this happen here?
Well all of us can thank God that this is not
the norm for this age Because if God dealt with
every hypocrite in the church like he dealt with
the first two this room will be empty this morning
Because all of us to some degree at some time
or another have played the part haven't we? So
we can thank God that He is merciful and gracious,
but then the question comes, why did He deal
with these two so severely? I think the best
answer to that is that it took place in a transitional
period. What we see here is an illustration of
the way that God will deal with sin immediately
in the coming kingdom when the Lord Jesus Christ
rules on the earth. Isaiah 65 -20 intimates that,
but rather than turning there, I'd like you to
go back to Revelation chapter 19. Here we have
the second coming of the Lord Jesus described.
Using graphic but pictorial language in verse
15 of Revelation 19, it says, and from His mouth
comes a sharp sword. That refers to His words.
so that with it he may smite the nations, and
he will rule them with a rod of iron." Notice
that phrase, with a rod of iron. The iron speaks
of judgment. The Lord Jesus will rule on the
earth for that thousand year period with a rod
or a scepter of iron. What it means is that in
the millennial reign of Jesus Christ, Sin will
be dealt with immediately so that it cannot build
up as it does in this age. In the kingdom, Satan
will be bound and cast into the bottomless pit.
And that apparently does mean all of his powers,
all of his demons with him will be hindered,
bound, unable to interfere. in history for that
thousand years. Those powers are not bound now,
however much some misguided theologians like
to say that they are bound. They are free to
roam the earth to be involved in leading the
world system and creating warfare against God
and His purposes. But they will be bound in the
millennium. Nonetheless, there will be sin in
the hearts of those unsaved people who will be
born into the millennial period. But that sin
will be kept under oppression. It will not be
able to be expressed like men express sin today.
There will be, apparently though, some who will
openly express the rebellion. Even though Jesus
Christ will be reigning visibly from His throne
in Jerusalem, there will be those who will openly
rebel against Him that fast. They will be struck
dead so that rebellion cannot spread among men.
The rod of iron. What happens in Acts 5 is a
preview of what it will be like in that period.
For we are still very much a part of Israel and
the Jews and the offering of the kingdom at this
point in the book of Acts. Now notice the fourth
stage in the narrative comes in verse 11 when
it says, In great fear came upon the whole church
and upon all who heard these things, a similar
thing said in verse 5. You don't have to have
a whole lot of imagination to understand what
it's saying. For if one person were to drop dead
in this auditorium this morning, after having
his sin exposed as the sin of these two was exposed,
it would create a tremendous amount of fear in
us. Now there may be some here who would be tempted
to say, well, let that happen. We need that kind
of fear. Beware lest it be your sin that's exposed.
When we understand something of the holiness
of God, it will create fear in us whether we
see this kind of immediate judgment or not, but
this certainly served as an illustration. The
dishonesty, the deception, the hypocrisy of Ananias
and Sapphira reveal the lack of integrity in
their characters. Integrity means being honest
with God and with others, and these two, by their
actions, We're an illustration of the contrast,
the lack of integrity. As I've said before, God
doesn't always deal with hypocrites in the church
as directly as he did with the first two. But
the fact nonetheless remains that God does deal
with them. Charles Ryrie said, all sin is judged,
though God may not choose to do it always in
the same manner. Heaven's silence is not always
heaven's consent. God hates sin in his people
just as much today as when he demonstrated his
hatred in this instance. There are some times
when God will rather allow the hypocrisy to bear
its awful fruit in one's life. That's what he
did with David. You remember the hypocrisy of
that man of God when he committed terrible adultery
with Bathsheba and then schemed to have her husband
killed and lied about all of it? Go back to Psalm
32 and notice the words of David himself concerning
it. For upwards to a year, David played the hypocrite,
just like all of us have done. Notice the fruit
that came in his life because he would not deal
with his sin. He begins in Psalm 32 by saying,
How blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven,
whose sin is covered. How blessed is the man
to whom the Lord does not impute iniquity. in
whose spirit there is no what? No deceit, no
guile. He knew something about that because he
had been a deceiver. Then he writes, When I kept
silent about my sin, my body wasted away through
my groaning all day long. For day and night thy
hand was heavy upon me. My vitality was drained
away as with the fever heat of summer." What
he's describing there in poetic language, the
fruit of unconfessed sin, the fruit of hypocrisy.
He says, it affected my body. He says, physically
I was affected by the hypocrisy of that year
when I lied to God and to other people. and would
not admit my sin. He says, my vitality, my personality
was drained away as though I were in the fever,
heat of summer and exhausted. That is the fruit
of sin and the life. Sometimes God allows that
to take place rather than dealing directly. and
immediately with our hypocrisy. But, my friend,
make no mistake about it. God will deal with
it. And He did with David. God sent a faithful
prophet to David. His sin was exposed. He goes
on to talk there in Psalm 32 about acknowledging
his sin and the joyous relief and freedom that
came to him, the restoration that was his because
he dealt with his sin. I guess the question I'd
like to ask this morning of myself as well as
you is this. What is your IQ? I'm talking about
your integrity quotient. Are you a genuine person?
Are you the same on Monday in the classroom or
in the hall or at the office as you are on Sunday?
Sunday school or church? Or are you deliberately
exchanging masks, playing the role, picking up
the mask of Christian on Sunday, and then when
Sunday is over, putting that down and picking
up the mask of whatever else you are the rest
of the week? Understand that that is literally
hypocrisy. Integrity means being honest. If we
want God's blessing, we must be a people of integrity.
It doesn't mean self -righteous. What it means
is being responsive to the needs of others and
being honest with God and with other people.
Integrity is illustrated in this story. I ask
you to listen closely as I read. Bad luck. The
light turned red and I was trapped, standing
at the corner. I prayed for it to change quickly.
He was standing too close to me. And besides,
it was cold and I was getting wet from the snow.
Can I have something for my file, mister? He
asked. This one was a crazy, no doubt about it.
The grimy box under his arm gave him away immediately.
Crazies always carry something, usually a shopping
bag with handles. They can be unstable, but this
guy looked pretty safe. Sorry, no money. I had
repeated the old lie so often it came out automatically.
I half expected to hear myself say, this is a
recording, please shove off and don't try it
again. Have you got anything from my file?" he
repeated. Finally his message sank through. I
fished in my pocket, pulled out a brochure, and
handed it to him. No, he shouted. Then almost
pathetically he finished. I don't have a file
for that. I took it back and turned away. Come
on, light change. I stepped over the curb to
look for a break in the traffic. I'm Howard,"
he said. What's your name? Mark. One syllable
was all the information I intended to give. I
had no desire to have some crazy calling me all
the time. I knew people had to change their telephone
number to stop the calls. I liked my number.
I chanced a quick look to see what he was doing.
He had a pencil in one hand and was stooping
to pick up a piece of paper from the snow. Just
then the light changed and I took off. Halfway
down the block I slowed down and looked back.
The crazy had just closed his box and begun to
look around for a new victim. A few days later
I was walking the same route when I noticed an
ambulance parked outside a dingy alley. I joined
the crowd of onlookers to see what had happened.
Two attendants in white jackets wheeled their
stretcher out of the alley. It was the crazy.
His face was showing, so I knew he wasn't dead,
but as the attendant shut the door, I could tell
by their conversation that he wouldn't stay uncovered
for long. A policeman questioned some of the
people in the crowd, but received no answers.
Nobody seemed to care that much, not even the
cop. It was just a little added excitement to
an otherwise dull December day. The cop raised
his voice and asked, did anybody know this guy?
Nobody answered. Finally, I volunteered. His
name is Howard. The people around me backed away
as if knowing the crazy's name made me crazy
too. The cop came over and began to pump me for
more information. His name is Howard. That's
all I know, sir. Well, at least there will be
a name for the headstone. Thanks for your help.
Oh, by the way, would you take this for me? picked
up the crazy's box. I'd like to skip the paperwork
on this one." He shoved the box into my hands
and walked away before I could say anything.
Why would I want this guy's garbage, I thought.
I looked around for a trash can, but I couldn't
just toss the box. Maybe it was the stories I
had heard of millionaires who live like bums.
Or perhaps it was just my slightly misguided
sense of loyalty to the human race. Whatever
it was, I opened the box. I was disappointed.
There was nothing but old clothes and a file
folder. I pulled out the file and dumped the
rest of the stuff, and then I noticed the crude
printing on the folder. It said, I opened it
and looked inside. It held only one small scrap
of paper, and on it was written, integrity, being
responsive to the needs of those around us, and
being honest with God and with others. I suppose
all of us have been in the place where Mark was
in that story, and it may be that even today
There's a lack of integrity in your life. Would
you write where you're seated? Confess to God
what needs to be said, and like David, know the
blessedness of being forgiven. Lord, I pray that
we will be men and women of integrity. I pray
that we will be responsive to those around us
this week who have needs. And I pray that you
will give us an honesty, an honesty with you
as well as with others. I pray that we will be
the kind of people you can bless. because of
it. In Jesus' name, Amen.