Stealing From God Series

Stealing From God

Scripture Reference Acts 5:1-4 (KJV)

Acts 5:1-4 1 But a certain man named Ananias, with Sapphira his wife, sold a possession, 2 And kept back part of the price, his wife also being privy to it, and brought a certain part, and laid it at the apostles’ feet. 3 But Peter said, Ananias, why Satan filled thine heart to lie to the Holy Ghost and to keep back part of the price of the land? 4 Whiles it remained, was it not thine own? And after it was sold, was it not in thine own power? Why hast though conceived this thing in thine heart? Thou hast not lied unto men, but unto God.

There is certainly no doubt about the fact that God does not want His children to steal. The truth is that there should never be a reason to steal when we trust in Him with all of our heart.

When we trust in God with all of our heart He becomes our provider. He becomes responsible for making sure that we have all of the things that we need to continue to be able to exist on earth.

I, like you, wonder then why is there even such a thing as hunger? Why doesn’t He just demolish poverty once and for all? The answer to that question may be answered when Jesus comes back for a second time but as for now, Jesus has assured us that the we will always have the poor with us (Matthew 26:11 For ye have the poor always with you; but me ye have not always.).

When a person sets their mind to steal what are they really thinking that they are doing:

1.) Deceiving the person that they are trying to steal from

2.) Convincing themselves that although they know that they are

wrong they will not be struck down by God immediately.

3.) Believing that there is an action that they can take, a place that

they can go or even a thought that they can think and God not

be right there with them

My dear friend I am here to assure that the only one of the three that they could possibly get away with would be the first.

The only person that they would possibly have a chance of deceiving would be the person that they are stealing from and believe me that if that person is a true believer then everything that they have has been insured by God. So the use of whatever it is that was stolen will probably bring the thief more harm than good.

In this particular passage of scripture Ananias and Sapphira, for some ungodly reason, were confounded by the idea of breaking their covenant and stealing from God.

According to (Acts 5:1 But a certain man named Ananias, with Sapphira his wife, sold a possession,) they sold some property or a possession in an act to bring the money and leave it at the Apostle’s feet. This is similar to what we do everyday.

Some of us go to work on jobs that we begged God for and during our plea for the job we promised him that we would tithe every payday.

We sometimes start out doing well but soon find ourselves putting the house note from the house that we pleaded for or the car note from the car that we pleaded for before our tithe. It seems that we think that we get away with this crime or that God doesn’t mind but I assure you saint that you are only fooling yourself because it is impossible to fool an almighty God (Genesis 17:1 And when Abram was ninety years old and nine, the LORD appeared to Abram, and said unto him, I am the Almighty God; walk before me, and be thou perfect.).

Certainly with all of the people working together and no one lacking anything the apostle was probably very wealthy. It could have very well seemed that the chain of thought for Ananias was “Well, he’ll never miss it”. Many of us get caught up in this misconception. We perceive that the church seems to be doing well and our tithe and offering will certainly not be missed. Or better yet we say, “I’m not giving that preacher all of my money”. This will seem true for the consistent and faithful tithe payer because a tithe that starts out at $10.00 will quickly jump to $1,000, which in many cases seems like just too much money to give away.

Maybe Ananias was thinking that the price for his posession was just too much and maybe he could keep a portion of this great amount to buy his wife that expensive garment she always wanted. This concept may seem noble, however we must not forget our covenant with God. We promised God that if He would bless us, we would tithe consistently and faithfully of our first fruits.