New Testament in a Year

5 But there was a man named Ananias (with his wife Sapphira) who sold some property ² and brought only part of the money, claiming it was the full price. (His wife had agreed to this deception.)

³ But Peter said, “Ananias, Satan has filled your heart. When you claimed this was the full price, you were lying to the Holy Spirit. ⁴ The property was yours to sell or not, as you wished. And after selling it, it was yours to decide how much to give. How could you do a thing like this? You weren’t lying to us, but to God.”

⁵ As soon as Ananias heard these words, he fell to the floor, dead! Everyone was terrified, ⁶ and the younger men covered him with a sheet and took him out and buried him.

⁷ About three hours later his wife came in, not knowing what had happened. ⁸ Peter asked her, “Did you people sell your land for such and such a price?”

“Yes,” she replied, “we did.”

⁹ And Peter said, “How could you and your husband even think of doing a thing like this—conspiring together to test the Spirit of God’s ability to know what is going on?^[a] Just outside that door are the young men who buried your husband, and they will carry you out too.”

¹⁰ Instantly she fell to the floor, dead, and the young men came in and, seeing that she was dead, carried her out and buried her beside her husband. ¹¹ Terror gripped the entire church and all others who heard what had happened.

¹² Meanwhile, the apostles were meeting regularly at the Temple in the area known as Solomon’s Hall, and they did many remarkable miracles among the people. ¹³ The other believers didn’t dare join them, though, but all had the highest regard for them. ¹⁴ And more and more believers were added to the Lord, crowds both of men and women. ¹⁵ Sick people were brought out into the streets on beds and mats so that at least Peter’s shadow would fall across some of them as he went by! ¹⁶ And crowds came in from the Jerusalem suburbs, bringing their sick folk and those possessed by demons; and every one of them was healed.

¹⁷ The High Priest and his relatives and friends among the Sadducees reacted with violent jealousy ¹⁸ and arrested the apostles, and put them in the public jail.

¹⁹ But an angel of the Lord came at night, opened the gates of the jail and brought them out. Then he told them, ²⁰ “Go over to the Temple and preach about this Life!”

²¹ They arrived at the Temple about daybreak and immediately began preaching! Later that morning^[b] the High Priest and his courtiers arrived at the Temple, and, convening the Jewish Council and the entire Senate, they sent for the apostles to be brought for trial.