NOTES for Act 6:1-7

The community is growing, and everyday concerns are accumulating and becoming increasingly difficult to handle. Much in the journey of the New Testament Church resembles the journey of the Old Testament people: just as Moses, when he could no longer manage the burden, once appointed worthy people as his assistants, so now the apostles appoint ministers to deal with practical matters.

All would be well, except that the reason for introducing new ministries was not so much the organizational and household concerns themselves as the complaints of one group of believers about unfair treatment by another group of believers like them. The breach opened by Sapphira and Ananias widens; human hostility is brought into the community, and the first crack appears in the Church. It has not yet led to a schism: the conflict was resolved in time by a sensible distribution of duties. But the roots of the first conflict lie deeper. They are in our sins, which we not only forget to reject and cease to notice, but all too often and carelessly bring into the Church itself.