Acts 5, Ananias and Sapphira

We do have examples in the early Church of liturgical rituals of reconciliation for the baptized. I’m going to suggest to you that the Story about Ananias and Sapphira is one of these in Acts 5. Over the years I’ve stayed away from this story because all the commentaries that I’ve ever read either supported a frightening image of a God waiting to strike these lost sheep, or ignored the first twenty verses of this chapter completely. Since Luke’s parable of the prodigal son is intimately involved with the parable of the lost sheep something has gone astray in our previous understanding of this story about Ananias and Sapphria. When the Story about Ananias and Sapphria is read in its literary form it is far from frightening, instead it is very comforting!

The first thing to think about is that the wAW, the wisdom statement of the Appropriating the Wisdom section of this Story is: ‘speak to the people all the words of this new life.’

The second is that the wW, the wisdom statement of the Wisdom section is: ‘and they were all healed.’

This means that this Story is off to a very good start, for the wAW is how or why the wW is put into practice. So, ‘speak to the people all the words of this new life’ is how ‘and they were all healed’ is put into practice.

In other words: Jesus’ life-giving words proclaimed by the apostles, were how they were all healed was accomplished.

Tomorrow we’ll find out about they, because the wW gives specific meaning to the sS, the story statement of the Story section.