Eoghan
Puritan Board Senior
[BIBLE]Acts 5:1-11[/BIBLE]
When we read this passage it stands out "like a sore thumb" - we see it as a harsh judgment that goes too far. Or is it? I am struggling to understand this passage in it's context and in order to do that I am going to have to abandon my preconceived notion that it is simply too harsh and Peter was having a bad day.
To answer that I need to look at the context of the church before the incident and after. I also need to look at the extent of their sin which definitely seems to be premeditated fraud. The judgment that was passed on them - was it really so severe? To be called before the throne of God is a privilege for Christians and when God removes the godly from the land it is seen as a sign of judgment. So is temporal death really so bad?
Still chewing it over and will probably expand on the themes above. I would be interested in what others think and how they have come to terms with this passage. I did listen to one sermon which pointed out the extent to which lying is a blight on business - leading to lawyers who in multi-page documents try to nail down what could otherwise be a simple handshake.
[In one scene from Babylon 5 a commercial telepath sits in on a business negotiation. She reports that the company will not meet the deadline specified in the contract but (reading his thoughts) could do so if they paid overtime and took on other workers. In B5 telepaths are routinely used to verify the veracity of what is being said. We forget the extent to which sins such as lying make life much more problematic.]
When we read this passage it stands out "like a sore thumb" - we see it as a harsh judgment that goes too far. Or is it? I am struggling to understand this passage in it's context and in order to do that I am going to have to abandon my preconceived notion that it is simply too harsh and Peter was having a bad day.
To answer that I need to look at the context of the church before the incident and after. I also need to look at the extent of their sin which definitely seems to be premeditated fraud. The judgment that was passed on them - was it really so severe? To be called before the throne of God is a privilege for Christians and when God removes the godly from the land it is seen as a sign of judgment. So is temporal death really so bad?
Still chewing it over and will probably expand on the themes above. I would be interested in what others think and how they have come to terms with this passage. I did listen to one sermon which pointed out the extent to which lying is a blight on business - leading to lawyers who in multi-page documents try to nail down what could otherwise be a simple handshake.
[In one scene from Babylon 5 a commercial telepath sits in on a business negotiation. She reports that the company will not meet the deadline specified in the contract but (reading his thoughts) could do so if they paid overtime and took on other workers. In B5 telepaths are routinely used to verify the veracity of what is being said. We forget the extent to which sins such as lying make life much more problematic.]
