5:7 The answers to questions such as whether someone tried to find Sapphira to tell her of Ananias' death lay outside Luke's purpose in writing. He stressed that she was as guilty as her husband and so experienced the same fate.
5:8 Peter graciously gave Sapphira an opportunity to tell the truth, but she did not. He did not warn her ahead of time by mentioning her husband's death because he wanted her to tell him the truth. She added a spoken lie to hypocrisy.
5:9-10 Peter's "why"question to her means virtually the same thing as his "why"question to Ananias (v. 3). Putting God to the test means seeing how far one can go in disobeying God--in this case lying to Him--before He will judge (cf. Deut. 6:16; Matt. 4:7). This is very risky business.
Some readers of Acts have criticized Peter for dealing with Sapphira and Ananias so harshly. Nevertheless the text clearly indicates that in these matters Peter was under the Holy Spirit's control (4:31) even as Ananias and Sapphira were under Satan's control (v. 3). Peter had been God's agent of blessing in providing healing to people (3:6), but he was also God's instrument to bring judgment on others, as Jesus Christ had done.
"Peter was severe, and the fate of the two delinquents shocking, but the strictures of Christ on hypocrisy must be borne in mind (Mt. xxiii). . . . The old leaven of the Pharisees' was at work, and for the first time in the community of the saints two persons set out deliberately to deceive their leaders and their friends, to build a reputation for sanctity and sacrifice to which they had no right, and to menace, in so doing, all love, all trust, all sincerity. And not only was the sin against human brotherhood, but against the Spirit of God, so recently and powerfully manifest in the Church."261
5:11 Luke reemphasized the sobering effect these events produced in all who heard about them (v. 5; cf. 2:43). People probably said, "There but for the grace of God go I!"
Here is the first use of the word "church"in Acts.262The Greek word, ekklesia, means "called out assembly."This was a common word that writers often used to describe assemblies of people that met for political and various other types of meetings. The word "church,"like the word "baptism,"can refer to more than one thing. Sometimes it refers to the body of Christ as it has existed throughout history, the universal church. Sometimes it refers to Christians living in various places during one particular time (e.g., the early church). Sometimes it refers to a group of Christians who live in one area at a particular time, a local church. Here it seems to refer to the local church in Jerusalem.
"When Luke speaks of the church' with no qualification, geographical or otherwise, it is to the church of Jerusalem that he refers."263
The writers of Scripture always referred to the church, the body of Christ, as an entity distinct from the nation of Israel. Every reference to Israel in the New Testament refers to the physical descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. This is true in the Old Testament also.264
Ananias and Sapphira presented an appearance of commitment to God that was not true of them. They were insincere, appearing to be one way but really not being that way. Had Ananias and Sapphira never professed to be as committed as they claimed when they brought their gift, God probably would not have judged them as He did. They lacked personal integrity.
"So familiar are we with spots and wrinkles' in the church that we can with difficulty realize the significance of this, the first sin in and against the community. It corresponds to the entrance of the serpent into Eden with the fall of Eve in the OT: and the first fall from the ideal must have staggered the apostles and the multitude. . . . The sin really was not the particular deceit, but the state of heart [cf. v. 3]--hypocrisy and unreality."265
Some interpreters have wondered if Ananias and Sapphira were genuine believers. Luke certainly implied they were; they were as much a part of the church as Barnabas was. Are true Christians capable of deliberate deceit? Certainly they are.266
"It is plain that the New Testament not only teaches the existence of the carnal Christian [1 Cor. 3:1-3; Gal. 5:16; Eph. 5:18] but of true Christians who persisted in their carnality up to the point of physical death [cf. 1 Cor. 3:15; 5:5; 11:30; Heb. 10:29; 1 John 5:16-17].267
