Reader’s Guide: “The Word for Today” Sunday, June 2, 2013 Read – Acts 4:32-37 Acts 4:32-5:11 needs to be read as a single unit. I would suggest that you go back and read Acts 5:1-11 if you haven’t already done so. We will be looking at this unit over two days making the necessary connections. This is not the first time Luke has told his readers about the followers of Jesus having all things in common. Right after the dramatic story of Pentecost Luke tells a similar story (Acts 2:43-47). Together these stories paint a picture of the early followers of Jesus living in harmony with one another. Luke has told us that the number of believers has grown to at least 5,000 people. It is hard to imagine so large a group living in the way described here. Perhaps Luke is meaning for his readers to imagine a smaller group – more like the original 120 people – as he tells this story. At any rate, the “experiment” of communal ownership seems not to have lasted long and may have ended in “failure” simply because as the church grew administration of such an enterprise became impossible. The rest of the book of Acts and the NT as a whole assume private ownership. So why does Luke tell us this story? Readers of Luke’s gospel will recall that Luke has made much of the perils of wealth and the proper use of possessions in the writing of his gospel. That theme is carried forward here – especially if one reads the story of Ananias and Sapphirah together with this story. Luke’s point all along has been that possessions have a strangling way of possessing those who have them – as the dreadful story of Ananias and Sapphirah illustrates. As one reads the story more closely, especially in light of what is said about Ananias and Sapphirah, the communal sharing of possessions was apparently a voluntary gesture – not something that one had to do but certainly Luke would have recommended it. Getting loose from possessions lest they possess a person is Luke’s point. Luke has told stories of the proper use of possessions – Zacheaus to name one – and as the book of Acts moves forward there will be others as well. One more thing may lie in the background of this story. In the book of Deuteronomy in the discussion about the sabbatical year and how the people of Israel were to redistribute the Land every fifty years the statement is made, “There will, however, be no one in need among you, because the LORD is sure to bless you in the land that the LORD your God is giving you as a possession to occupy” (Deuteronomy 15:4). The Land is the LORD’s and remains the LORD’s even though people are given the blessing of occupying it! Luke may well have been carrying that theme forward here. “There was not a needy person among them” (Acts 4:34). It is an illusion to think anyone possesses anything. What we call our own is really God’s gift to us. We are reminded of the old song many of us may have sung as the offertory for years – “We give thee but thine one, whate’re the gift may be; all that we have is thine alone, a trust O Lord from thee” – that song recognizes a truth all Christian stewards have come to realize. Everything we call our own is really God’s. What we give back to God was first given to us. The community Luke envisions shares this view. And his first example, Barnabas, illustrates the proper understanding and use of possessions. The story also gives Luke an opportunity to introduce Barnabas who will be a major character in the second half of the book of Acts.