Ananias and Sapphira and the Donation of Death

The Old Testament is just so over-the-top outlandish that making fun of it sometimes feels like making fun a kid with braces and a mullet. (Just so we're on the same page, I was the kid with braces and a mullet... I imagine that I was pretty easy to make fun of). Not always, but today is one of those days.

So I am going to tell you the story of Ananias and Sapphira. It is found in Acts 5, and is often told in Sunday School for whatever reason. These were two really great people who found themselves with some excess funds when they sold some land. They decided to donate a bunch of it to the church. If I gave an appreciable portion of my money to a church, they could probably buy a fern. I have a feeling that these two contributed more than a fern. And in a time when Christians were apparently being treated worse than historical accuracy in a Mel Gibson movie, the fact that they were willing to part with a suspiciously large chunk of their bank account is pretty admirable 

Passion of the Spielbergheart

Now, the thing is, according to the New International Version of the Bible (biblegateway.com is probably loving me right now), ANANIAS DIDN'T EVEN LIE ABOUT HOW MUCH OF THE MONEY HE WAS GIVING. I cannot stress this enough. In this story, Ananias did literally nothing other than give a bunch of money to the church. He just "kept back part of the money for himself," which is kind of like putting a paycheck in your bank account. He was for all intents and purposes a really swell guy. But God decides to smite him anyways.

Try as I might, I can't seem to draw togas. Or anything else, really.

It was Sapphira who lied about it being all of the money they got for the land. Which really wasn't even all that bad; the church was still getting a ton of money from her, and I seem to recall Peter, who apparently knew that God was about to smite our philanthropists before it happened, doing some pretty serious lying... Something about a rooster...

Case in point...

So I guess the lesson here is that if you get a bunch of money, you should probably just give it to your local Gospel Hall and be done with it. Think of it as life insurance.

I want to start posing for pictures like Renaissance characters.