Ananias and Sapphira at COP28’s Global Stocktake (Acts 5)

Climate Bible Study: February 2023

At its best moments, I believe that the Paris Agreement exhibits the spirit of Acts 4:32-35: 

• All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had. With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And God’s grace was so powerfully at work in them all that there were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned land or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to anyone who had need.

This spirit is what we hope was set in motion when the Paris Agreement went into full effect at COP26 in Glasgow in 2021.  The next big event in the Paris Process occurs this year at COP28 in Dubai: the first Global Stocktake, followed by subsequent stocktakes at five year intervals. As per Article 14, the parties “shall periodically take stock of the implementation of this Agreement to assess the collective progress towards achieving the purpose of this Agreement and its long-term goals (referred to as the “global stocktake”).”   How are we doing with actually implementing our carbon reduction targets?  The Global Stocktake is when we crunch the numbers.
 
If the work of COP26 in 2021 is followed by the work of COP28 in 2023, what might it mean that the spirit of Acts 4:32-35 is immediately followed by the infamous tale of Ananias and Sapphira in Acts 5?: 

• Now a man named Ananias, together with his wife Sapphira, also sold a piece of property. With his wife’s full knowledge, he kept back part of the money for himself, but brought the rest and put it at the apostles’ feet. 

• Then Peter said, “Ananias, how is it that Satan has so filled your heart that you have lied to the Holy Spirit and have kept for yourself some of the money you received for the land? Didn’t it belong to you before it was sold? And after it was sold, wasn’t the money at your disposal? What made you think of doing such a thing? You have not lied just to human beings but to God.”

• When Ananias heard this, he fell down and died.  And great fear seized all who heard what had happened.  (Acts 5:1-5)

Ananias’ corpse is carted off.  Three hours later, his wife Sapphira appears and—in what feels to me like one of Peter’s lowest moments as a pastor and a leader—Peter seemingly springs a trap for the new widow.  “Peter asked her, ‘Tell me, is this the price you and Ananias got for the land?’ ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘that is the price’” (Acts 5:7-8).  She too falls down dead and her body is carted off.   A line is then repeated, almost like a chorus in a Greek tragedy: ”Great fear seized the whole church and all who heard about these events.” Thus, we know that the lesson of this event was meant for us, for the  “whole church” at the beginning of an important moment in her history.
 
It's hard to admit, either to myself or publicly, but actually: I hate this story in the Bible.  In this instance, I despise Peter more than I do Sapphira, or Ananias.  I am willing to allow that there may be much I misunderstand about these verses, but I have never read a  commentary on this passage that has brought me back around. Nonethless, here are a few points I think are applicable to the Global Stocktake of 2023.
 
First, the beginning of something is always a fraught, vulnerable time—whether for the Church in circa 33 CE or the Paris Process here in the 2020s.   If we don’t build on a foundation of the truth, the structure will surely crumble at some future date.  Second, while we could say “God judges lying,” we could just as easily reframe it as, “God is not afraid of reality, and neither should we be.”  Peter tells Ananias: “Didn’t [the land] belong to you before it was sold? And after it was sold, wasn’t the money at your disposal? What made you think of doing such a thing?”  Peter is incredulous.  There is no reason why Ananias had to lie, just as there was no obligation for him to give in the first place.  God is able to work with whatever situation we give to him, or with whatever situation he gives to us.  Let’s just be honest about it.
 
In my mind, there are two ways that the Global Stocktake at COP28 in 2023 can go.  One way is that the nations will choose to be honest, transparent, and accurate.  In which case, the GST (as it is called in the shorthand) will likely reveal some harsh realities: 1) that seven years after the adoption of the Paris Agreement, 2022 set a record for global CO2emissions, 2) that the oceans set a record for warming in 2022, and that 3) 2022 was the sixth or fifth warmest year on record.   But another way that the GST could go is if the governments prove dishonest, non-transparent, and if their handling of the data is inaccurate.   In other words, there is the danger of “spin,” of rejecting the demands of realism.  If this is the way that the GST goes, then that will be a revelation of a different sort: we will have taken stock of the urgency and the cooperative goodwill that went into the Paris Agreement, only to find it waning. 
 
There is a third lesson to derive from the Acts 5 story and it has to do with exercising spiritual leadership.  This story might be named after Ananias and Sapphira, but they are not the main characters.  Peter is.  He is the one who exercises agency.  He is the one who discerns and speaks and directs.   Far be it from me to tell an apostle in the canon that I would have handled it differently, nonetheless, I recognize that Peter had a responsibility in this moment of the Church’s beginning, and that he had a responsibility when presented with a lie.  What responsibility does the Church have toward the Global Stocktake of 2023?  What moral leadership are we being called to exercise?  What role will we play in this crucial moment?  Let’s direct our intercession to the honest, transparency, and honesty required of this moment, believing that God is not afraid of reality, and neither should we be.  It is to this that we direct our prayers as Climate Intercessors resumes our network in 2023. 
 
You are very dear to God,
Lowell Bliss
on behalf of the Climate Intercessors Leadership Team