Acts 4 and 5 are startling on how not to run a marketing campaign for your church (or so you would have thought): there's persecution, imprisonment, fear and two church goers are struck down dead for lying. BUT:
More and more men and women believed in the Lord and were added to their number.
Acts 5.14
Mohler:
Acts 5.12-16 reminds us once again that the Lord builds his church, not humans. You may imagine how some Christians might have thought that no one would join the church once word had got out of what happened to Ananias and Sapphira. But the church is not built on marketing strategies or pragmatic advertisement schemes or feel-good programs. The church is built on the power of God’s word and Spirit. Persecution, fear, and negative reports could not keep God’s Spirit from saving sinners and bringing them to Jesus. We should never look for alternative means to spread the gospel that downplay the centrality of God’s word or undermine the truth about his judgment or his salvation. The apostles watched the Spirit at work in bringing men and women to Christ because they were committed to sharing the message of Christ in the power of the Spirit, and so could leave the results to God. We must follow in their footsteps; we must be faithful as they were.
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