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THE WRONG SIZE

When Ananias and Sapphira were challenged to give the proceeds of their land sale to the church, they probably made some calculations. And the money remaining to provide for them after the sale seemed too little.

From Ananias and Sapphira’s perspective, the part of the money that they held back probably seemed reasonable considering their circumstances (Acts 5). But they didn’t take into account God’s ability and desire to multiply whatever they had left if they gave the full amount of the sale to Him. Their perception of size was humanly flawed.

Just a few years earlier, Jesus revealed this human problem to his disciples when He fed 5000 families with a boy’s lunch box (John 6). The disciples had the same doubts as Ananias and Sapphira. And it almost caused them to hold back as well. “‘There’s a young boy here with five barley loaves and two fish. But what good is that with this huge crowd?’” (v. 9, NLT). It was plenty good when it landed in the hands of Jesus!

The Lord’s measurement standards are different from ours. His view of the size of our offerings is directly related to our faith. And the enemy is always ready to whisper lies of inadequacy in our ears. Paul warns the believers in Rome about this when he says: “..Be honest in your evaluation of yourselves, measuring yourselves by the faith God has given us” (Romans 12:3, NLT)

Do you feel that whatever you’re holding on to is too little to make a difference? Or are you worried that you’ll have too little left if you let go?

Let us confess our tendency to underestimate God’s power and desire to multiply our offerings to Him. Let us remind ourselves not to evaluate the size of our circumstances by human standards. “Then Job replied to the Lord: ‘I know that you can do anything, and no one can stop you. You asked, ‘Who is this that questions my wisdom with such ignorance?’ It is I - and I was talking about things I knew nothing about, things far too wonderful for me” (Job 42:1-3, NLT).