Swift Punishment (Acts 5:5-10)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 10/10/2017 11:42 AM

My Worship Time                                                                                    Focus:  Swift Punishment

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                 Reference:  Acts 5:5-10

            Message of the verses:  “5  And as he heard these words, Ananias fell down and breathed his last; and great fear came over all who heard of it. 6 The young men got up and covered him up, and after carrying him out, they buried him. 7 Now there elapsed an interval of about three hours, and his wife came in, not knowing what had happened. 8 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." 9 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 will carry you out as well." 10 And immediately she fell 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.”

            Since I have been studying the first chapter of Revelation in preparation to teaching Sunday school I have been looking at the description of our Lord Jesus Christ.  We notice that in this description we see that the Lord has “His eyes were like a flame of fire (Rev. 1:14b).”  Hebrews 4:12-13 helps us understand this a bit better “For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.”  This is what Jesus Christ is doing as He is the Lord over the Church and so as He looked at what we will call cancer developing in His church he dealt swiftly with it using the Sword of the Spirit to rid the cancer from His new church.  Now we have spoken about the fact that many times in the church today that this is not done by our Lord instantly like He did at this time, but He still has the eyes to see all things that are going on in His church and will still deal with sin in His own time, but it will be dealt with.  Long-suffering is an attribute of our Lord and in my study of this attribute I have learned that in many cases this long-suffering has to do with God’s patience with His own children and for that I am thankful very much.

            John MacArthur writes “The physical cause was perhaps a heart attack, brought on by the terrifying realization of his embarrassing guilt and his shameful exposure.  English history records a similar incident, when the Dean of St. Paul’s cathedral died of terror after King Edward I gave him an angry look (F. F. Bruce, The Book of Acts [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1971], 114).  In this case, however, it was divine judgment, and not fear of Peter, that killed Ananias.  It is a sobering truth that God sometimes takes the lives of sinning believers.  Death is God’s ultimate form of physical discipline for sinning believers.  He wants His church pure (2 Cor. 11:2; Eph. 5:27).

            As we continue to look at this section we see that about three hours after the death of her husband the same thing happened to Sapphira as she answered Peter in the same way her husband did and thus died just as her husband died.  John MacArthur concludes “The action of God was meant to impress upon the church the seriousness of the sins of the saints.  It had that effect, as the next verse records.”  We will look at that verse in our next SD as we finish up this section from this section found in John MacArthur’s commentary on the book of Acts.

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  I can learn from this section that I must keep a short list with the Lord, asking Him to search my heart each and every day, and I never want to lie to the Lord, as He knows all things.

My Steps of Faith for Today:  Keep a short list with the Lord.

Answer to yesterday’s Bible question:  “Perilous” (2 Timothy 3:1).

Today’s Bible question:  “To what was Jesus referring to when He stated ‘If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you unto myself…’?”

Answer in our next SD.

10/10/2017 12:06 PM