Today our lesson was on having integrity and not being a hypocrite. The scripture the lesson was based on was Acts 4:32-5:11 about how when the church first started in its early days, the believers would share everything they had with each other and even would sell their homes and land and give the proceeds to the church to distribute to those in need.
Joseph a/k/a Barnabas because he was an encourager was one who sold some land and gave all the money from the sale to the church. Peter was the one who collected the money for distribution. Another couple in the church, Ananias and his wife, Sapphira, also had some land that they sold, but decided to only give part to the church and keep part for themselves. This would have been okay IF they hadn't led people to believe they were giving the entire amount.
Were they really believers? Were they possibly pharisees in disguise just wanting to look good? Were they really believers but wanted the praise of men? The Bible doesn't really say for sure, but we do know they lied about the amount they got for their land and both fell over dead on the spot, were carried out and buried next to each other.
I seriously doubt if any lying was done in that church for a long time after that! Today, at least our church, does not really practice sharing everything we have with all the other members of the church; however, we do have a food pantry where people can get free food items that others have donated for those in need. We often have mission projects that people give money to support. I do believe everything I have comes from God and am willing to use it for His glory.
After we read through the story, I let the kids (and my husband helped too) use finger puppets to review the story. They did a great job moving the puppets around, coming up at the right time and having the puppets face the one they were talking to. Unfortunately, they didn't speak up loud enough for the sound to be good on the video so I had to do quite a bit of editing to it and added titles and text. The edited version is above.
Another interesting part of the class was showing an excerpt from a Brain Games DVD about lying. It showed four little kids in a room alone for 15 min. with a chocolate cake sitting in front of them and they were told not to eat any of it. (They were taped with a hidden camera during that time.) An interrogator came in to see if he could get a confession from any of them. All said they didn't eat any of it, but three actually did.
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I wish more videos like this were available on the internet. I never got to go to church much as a child especially, but the times I went I always liked it, especially Sunday School.
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