Cornerstone Mission Church, Sunday Sermon March 9, 2008
Recently a book by Margaret B. Jones titled “Love and Consequences” was destined to be a bestseller. It is Jones’ personal memoir in vivid detail of what she experienced growing up in South Central Los Angeles as a half-white, half-Native American girl in the foster home of Big Mom. She tells a story about how her foster brother was gunned down by Crips gang members just outside of their home. She recounts how she carried illegal guns and sold drugs for the Bloods gang. Her memoir gives a fascinating and intimate outlook on the life in South-Central Los Angeles through the eyes of a young girl growing up as a gang member. It is about the spirit of human triumphant.
Michiko Kakutani from the New York Times quoted her, “I made it out of L.A. with my life and without a prison record. Wait, let me reword that, as it is not entirely true as it stands. I made it out of L.A. with what life I had left. I wake up in the morning, and where I live, in a little house on a dead-end street in a small Oregon town, I hear birds singing in a big-leaf maple outside my bedroom window, and I thank God because I know it shouldn’t have been so.”[1] The memoir was destined to be the bestseller, and the writer the bestseller writer.
But, just few days ago on March 4th, Jones’ memoir was discovered to be nothing more than a complete fabrication, a lie. Margaret Seltzer is her real name. She is not a half of white, a half-Native American, but white. Far from how she portrayed herself in the book, she did not grow up in South Central Los Angeles gangster hood nor was she raised in a foster home; instead, she grew up in an affluent Sherman Oaks of Los Angeles in the San Fernando Valley by her biological family; she was sent to a private Episcopal day school in the North Hollywood neighborhood.
She deceived her editor Sarah McGrath at Riverhead of Penguin Publishing Company for three years. MaGrath said, “It’s very upsetting to us because we spent so much time with this person and we felt such sympathy for her and she would talk about how she didn’t have any money or any heat and we completely bought into that and thought we were doing something good by bringing her story to light.”[2]
She deceived the readers as well. If you go to Boston NPR web site, you can listen to the host of On Point program, Tom Ashbrook, interviewing Margaret Jones before her memoir was discovered as a hoax. For forty five minutes, Margaret Jones interacted with Tom Ashbrook and the callers about her life in South Central Los Angeles. Callers after callers wanted to know what Ms. Jones thought about the issues on gangs, violence, guns, drugs, etc., all because she lived it as a former gang member in the South Central Los Angeles.
At one point, Jack a black man a former gang member called in and asked Ms. Jones what advice she would give to young children who may idolize the lifestyle of gangs that there are other options available to them. To this black man, a real formal gang member, Jones, a fake formal gang member, spoke with a voice of authenticity and authority on gang life. She spoke of the disparity that exists now in education between the inner city schools and the suburbia schools; she passionately spoke how this must change to curtail the gang activities; you hear her talk and you think she knows what she is talking about.
But, now the fact is known, her voice of genuine authenticity, respect, heartfelt warmness is nothing more than hollow, disingenuous, insulting betrayal. It was a fake.
Today’s Bible passage speaks to the two realities, genuine or fake. We see the genuine quality in the early Christian community and exemplified by the life of Barnabas. And, we see the fake quality in the tragic lives of Ananias and Sapphira.
- Untainted and pristine expression of self-giving, Jesus’ conscious in the church
Through chapter 4, what you see is the community of believers growing in a remarkable pace without any blemish. You see the untainted and pristine growth of the church in Acts 4:32-37.
The attitude that defined the church’s pristine and unblemished growth is summed up by this phrase from verse 32, “One in heart and mind.” This was the self-giving, Jesus’ conscious.
And, the way you see this Jesus’ conscious of being one in heart and mind expressed is through voluntary sharing. “No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had” reads verse 32. You see the result of believers sharing in verse 34, “There were no needy persons among them.” How was this possible? It says that time to time meaning as occasions rose, those who owned lands or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to anyone as he had need. The lands, the houses, the assets were sold and the proceeds from the sales were put into a common purse, which then could be made readily available to meet any need on demand.
What you don’t see in this description is the idea of enforcement. The apostles didn’t impose or force people to share.
But, what you see is people acting with Jesus’ conscious. Verse 32 says that the central message of the apostles was “to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus” and it says, “much grace was upon them all.” They preached resurrected Jesus Christ; where Jesus Christ was preached lives were changed; where lives were changed, people became Jesus’ conscious; and they were defined by the spirit of sharing and giving.
This makes a perfect sense when you consider that the gospel is really about God’s voluntary sharing of his most prized possession, his very own Son Jesus Christ, with the utterly undeserving people like us.
When the self-giving spirit of the gospel, the very life of Jesus Christ takes deep root, is experienced and appreciated, when the self-giving spirit of Christ overtakes and dictates a person, the natural consequence is this growing understanding life is not about me, life is not about accumulating more stuffs, more money, more space for me, but is about becoming God’s conduit to bless others. When the self-giving gospel of Jesus Christ dominates our thinking, our beliefs, the result is this life altering countercultural conviction that ever deepens, “I exist to bless others,” “I exist to help others in need,” “I exist to help others to draw closer to God.” When the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ shapes us, we move from the world shaped by what I want for myself to the world shaped by how I can give more, how I can do more to be God’s conduit of his blessing. When the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ dominates us, defines us, we become hands and feet of our Lord Jesus Christ, we become Jesus’ mouth piece, we become the expression of self-giving love of Christ. When self-giving love of Jesus Christ gets hold of our hearts, the burden to care, to love others grows while the attachment for things for self weakens. When you and I are immersed in the gospel, we become Jesus-conscious rather than self-conscious. This is what you see in the early church.
- Barnaba’ Jesus conscious act.
Now, let’s talk about Barnaba’ Jesus conscious act described in 4:36-37. This is the first time Luke introduce to us a man named Joseph, a Levite from Cyprus. The apostles called him Barnabas, which means Son of Encouragement. He is truly a remarkable and humble man of God you are going to grow to love as we journey through the book of Acts.
Verse 37 says that Barnabas sold a field he owned and brought the money and put it at the apostles’ feet. As explained, you do not see any kind of external force working here to compel Barnabas to sell his possession. You also don’t see that he sold everything; he sold a field that he owned.
His action was not a result of some outside coercion, but an outflow of the inner transformation. He was one in hear and mind with all the believers. He didn’t consider his possession as his own, but as means to bless others in need. He was not self-conscious, but Jesus’ conscious, overflowing in desire to bless others in Jesus’ love.
- Ananias and Sapphira’s engrossed self-conscious act
Now, in chapter 5 we are introduced to a man named Ananias and his wife Sapphira. They have beautiful names. Ananias means “God is gracious” while Sapphira means “beautiful.” Would they live up to their great names? Would Ananias testify to the gracious character of God through his action? Would Sapphira live out a beautiful life that glorifies God?
There is one thing common about Ananias and Sapphira with Barnabas. They both sold a piece of property that belonged to them. But the similarity ends here.
Verse 2 declares that with his wife’s full knowledge he kept back part of the money for himself and brought the rest to the apostles’ feet. Now this doesn’t sound bad at all knowing that they were never forced to sell their possession in the first place. It was done all on voluntarily. Whether they sold their property and kept part of the sold price, it would have been no body’s business, but their own, their decision, their choice, their will.
But, here Luke chose to use the expression, kept back that meant in Greek, ‘misappropriating funds for one’s own benefit’ or simply ‘embezzling.’ Let’s take a look together and see why their action rose to the level of embezzlement.
The same word is used to describe the action of Achan in Joshua 7 in the Old Testament translated in Greek, called Septuagint. When God miraculously destroy the wall of well-protected and fortified city of Jericho, he commanded the Israelites in 6:17, “The city and all that is in it are to be devoted to the Lord,” except Rahab and her family who trusted God of Israel. To devote to the Lord was meant giving over things or persons to the Lord by totally destroying them. But, when Achan saw the plunder, a beautiful robe from Babylonia, 5 pounds of silver and 1 ¼ pounds of gold, he coveted and took them. Here is the word, taking, embezzling. These were to be destroyed because they were given, devoted to God. But, Achan out of his love for things, he embezzled from God; he thought he could get away with it. If you read on in chapter 7, you find that Achan faced a terrible death, a judgment from God, just like what we see in Ananias and Sapphira.
Both cases of Achan and Ananias and Sapphria happened at the very important time in the history. In the case of Achan, Achan belittled God and his command when the Israelites were just beginning to take God’s Promised Land. In the case of Ananias and Sapphira, they thought they could cheat, deceive, lie against God and get away with it when God was beginning to establish his church. In both cases, God dealt them with the immediate and harsh judgments as object lessons. God would not be taken lightly, dismissed as though he doesn’t exist, or won’t act, or could be deceived. It was important for God to make this very clear to the Israelites and now to the church from the beginning.
Apostle Peter was able to discern by God’s help what was really going on beneath the appearance of Ananias’ generous spirit and act. Here are some observations from what Peter told Ananias.
- Ananias allowed Satan to fill his heart.
- Ananias’ deception, his lie was foremost against the Holy Spirit, against God.
- The deception, the scheme was to appear before people and ultimately before God that they were giving all the money they got from selling their property. They wanted to look good like Barnabas did. The only problem was that Barnabas didn’t sell his property and donated the whole thing just to appear really cool nice guy. He did it because he was acting out of Jesus-conscious.
- The money belonged to them when they sold the property. It was at their disposal, meaning that they were under no outside compulsion to sell their property in the first place, or to give everything.
As I already mentioned, for Ananias to keep back with his wife’s full knowledge has the meaning of embezzling. To embezzle is to appropriate fraudulently to one’s own use. Yes, it was their property. Yes, it was still their money when they sold the property. But, where it gets wrong is the fact that they wanted people to think that they were donating the entire money from the sale to be used for good purpose, while keeping, embezzling some for them. It would not rise to embezzling if they didn’t give the deceptive appearance of giving all the money. It would have been perfectly fine to give just the portion or nothing at all, for they were under no compulsion to give in the first place.
The greatest sin was the fact that Ananias and wife thought they could deceive, not alone the church, but the Holy Spirit and God. What would make people believe that they could deceive God? It might be that they really didn’t believe that God exists and the Holy Spirit is living and active. They might have had the intellectual knowledge about God and the working of the Holy Spirit, but had no real heart knowledge of God and the work of the Holy Spirit. They might have thought that God wouldn’t hold them responsible for lying. Whatever it was their thinking, their action to deceive God and people reveals that they had low and defective view of God.
Along this audacity to think that they could deceive God, they were motivated by the two selfish desires, the desire to look good before others and the desire for what money can do for them. The desire to look good before others is the sin of hypocrisy and the desire for what money can do is the sin of materialism. Hypocrisy and love of money made them engrossed with self-consciousness, rather than Jesus’ consciousness.
Conclusion
There are two road maps lay out for us; we either live by Jesus’ conscious or engrossed in self-conscious. We can either be defined by genuine care, genuine generosity, and integrity like Barnabas was. Or, we can be defined by foolishness and attempt to fool God and people, be engrossed with ourselves, and be filled by Satan’s lies.
God is most offended by us when we treat him like he doesn’t exist, he doesn’t know our thoughts, when we can fool him. This undermines who God is all powerful, all knowing God who deserves everyone’s utmost attention and worship.
John Calvin says, “God cannot stand unfaithfulness, and pretending to be holy is contemptible mockery.” He also said, “we should reflect how one day we will have to stand before God’s judgment seat. If we are trying to deceive God and not be punished for our misdeeds, we are despising His sacred power and majesty.”
When we are self-conscious with the engrossed self-awareness, self-preoccupation, we will justify the means to exalt ourselves. The only remedy to this sin of engrossed self-consciousness is to being saturated by Jesus’ consciousness where we become acutely aware of Jesus’ presence and we get preoccupied with matters that Jesus cares.
Going back to the story of Margaret Jones who wrote the fake memoir, “Love and Consequences,” she faces now all her books being recalled by the publisher and even possibly being sued by the company. She sought to be an acclaimed writer, but because she used deception, all she now has is “Shame and Consequences.” Wouldn’t it be tragic to live a fake life and be discovered and face shame and consequences?
[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/26/books/26kaku.html?pagewanted=2&ref=books
[2] http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/04/books/04fake.html?_r=1&ref=books&oref=slogin
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