Readings: Psalm 34:1-8, Hebrews 7:23-28, Jeremiah 1:4-10, John 8:1-11
Preached at Bridgehampton Presbyterian Church, NY, October 27, 2024
I've been preaching a series about Jesus and Individuals, taking a series of snapshots and observing how Jesus reacted with both individuals and groups of people. We saw a sinful woman at the home of Simon, we saw how He dealt with a group of Scribes who came from Jerusalem to contend with Him. We saw an encounter He had with a disturbed man in a graveyard and the reaction of the townsfolk when He healed the man.
As we've looked at those stories a number of common themes have emerged.
• Self-Righteousness in people blocked His love from working in their lives.
• He loved people... regardless of their social standing and was concerned to reach those others rejected.
• While loving the sinner, He was opposed to their sin and wished to deliver them from it.
Those three themes emerge again in the account that we heard today about Jesus and a woman caught in the act of adultery.
THE TIME Most commentators suggest this was during the latter part of the ministry of Jesus. We also know from verse 2 that events took place early one morning.
THE PLACE Again we can identify it precisely. The incident takes place in the temple, just after Jesus has come down from the Mount of Olives.
THE CIRCUMSTANCES Jesus is teaching in the temple. People are gathered around Him. They are seated, or sitting on the floor, listening, asking questions. It's an idyllic rabbi and student’s picture. Into this cozy gathering barge some scribes and Pharisees, dragging with them a woman. They force her to stand before them and before the people.
They explain what is happening. “Teacher” they call Jesus. This was something of a turnabout. The day before they were calling Him a deceiver and telling folks He was doing the Devil's work. “Teacher” they say, “This woman was caught in the act of committing adultery.” They go on to tell Jesus what the law of Moses required. That she should be stoned to death. (As though, being a teacher, Jesus didn't know what the law of Moses required. )
Of course, they are not really concerned about justice being done. Nor have they any feelings towards the woman except to use her as bait to place Jesus in a compromising situation. Maybe they had set the whole thing up in the first place. It is suspicious how they only bring the woman along with them, and not the man who was with her.
They obviously suspect that Jesus would not stone her Himself. After all, He had already been teaching them that He had come to fulfill the law in a new way. And they already knew what kind of company He had been keeping. Elsewhere we have heard them grumbling about “Harlots and tax-collectors” being His friends.
They know how to play the game. If Jesus let her go...firstly, they would prove beyond any shadow of doubt that He was not fulfilling the law of Moses, He was an enemy of the law of Moses. Secondly, it would validate their conviction that as one who had friends who were sinners, He was relaxing all laws of morality and was as guilty of sin as they were. Whatever course of action He took they would catch Him out. You can almost picture them plotting, rubbing their hands together in glee, “Hey, hey, hey, we've got Him this time!”
For the Scribes and Pharisees their concern for legalistic morality went far beyond their concern for their fellow human beings. The way they treat the woman, shaming her, dragging her along, declaring her guilty without a trial, simply using her as a prop for their hateful scheming and desire to protect their own power against the threat of the love of Jesus, is a disgrace.
You know anybody can moralize. It's easy. You just point your finger and say, “You mustn't do that” “The Bible says you need to repent” “You are going to hell if that's the way you're going to live.” It's easy to pump yourself up through pulling others down. “Oh my gosh, look at the way they are acting. We are above that sort of behavior. Look at what she's wearing. Listen to how they are talking. I wouldn't be seen dead acting like that...” And so it goes.
You can do all that, and as you do so, you stifle any remnant of compassion you may still have in your being. But, beware, for when you point the finger, the finger points back at you. When you shine a light on other people’s behavior, watch out, for the light is also shining down on you.
Jesus did not come to moralize the world. He came to save it. His teaching took morality beyond the law and into the heart.
Of course, the church must speak out about sin, challenge it, and call it what it is. Of course, the church must call people to personal morality and speak about social and political morality, because the Bible does. A quick look at the teaching of the Old Testament prophets reveals God's Word to be very political and with a bias towards justice, the downtrodden and those whose cries are often ignored.
But the unique revelation that Christianity offers is the grace of God and the forgiveness that Christ offers through a blood stained cross and the renewing, life giving, game changing power of the Holy Spirit. The Pharisees and Scribes offered to the people a religion of morality. Jesus, for sure spoke about right behavior and the danger of sin but did so from the foundation of love and compassion.
It is the reception of the love and compassion of Christ that forms morality and through His Spirit the power to overcome sin is found. The gospel good news is not “Sort your life out and then you will be acceptable to God” But, “God loves you and as you love God back, your morality will fall into line... for your heart’s desire will be seeking to do God's will.”
Returning to the scene in the temple. Jesus. The crowd. The Pharisees and Scribes mistreating this poor lady and breathing daggers at Jesus. They challenge Him. “So, teacher,” “What do you say about this... woman!”
What Jesus says... is …. nothing. He instead begins to write on the floor, in the dust. There must have been a moment of roaring silence. The Pharisees and Scribes must have been thinking, “Oh Yeah. Got Him now.” Maybe they were looking around at the people and sensing they were starting to come around to their point of view. “See. What did we tell you about this guy?”
Jesus sits up and says, “Whichever of you has committed no sin may throw the first stone at her.” Then He carries on writing in the dust. Some commentators wonder if He was writing down sins related to the crowd gathered around Him.
Slowly, starting with the eldest, they file out of the temple. What He said frightened them because it sent them back to their own consciences. He had shown them to themselves. Maybe they were afraid His next words would show them to the world. We read in Hebrews 4:13 'There is nothing that can be hidden from God; everything in all creation is exposed and lies before God's eyes. And it is to God that we all must give an account of ourselves.” We can fool some people some of the time. We can even fool ourselves. But we can never fool God.
This came home to those people as they walked out of the temple. A wound had been opened. Their consciences were struck. The sad things was, that as often happens to people, rather than have the wound treated and healed by Jesus, they hope it will heal itself. Bible Commentator, Matthew Henry, writes, “It is folly for those who are under convictions to get away from Jesus Christ, for He is the only One who can heal the wounds of conscience. To whom will they go?”
Then Jesus stands up. He is alone with the woman. He, as He was without sin, could have cast the first stone. Instead, He asks her, “Where are your condemners?” She answers, “No-one left.” Jesus declares “Then neither do I condemn you.”
He then adds... “Go. And sin no more.” Though she was indeed, as we all are, a fallen human being, she is offered respect and He talks to her, not about her past, but about her future. That seems to be how the love of God deals with us. We can't change our past. But we can learn from it. We can move on from it. Forgiveness opens that doorway. The gift of the Holy Spirit enables to walk on in peace and the security of God's acceptance and love. And that changes the way we desire to live!
A FEW LESSONS FROM THIS PASSAGE
1. We should reserve our condemnation of others and concentrate on our efforts to reach them with the grace and salvation of Jesus Christ. Matthew 7:1 “Do not judge, or you too will be judged.” John 3:17 “For God did not send God's son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.”
2. We should realize that we cannot change anyone by telling them how to live or giving them a set of rules. We must show by example that Jesus Christ is alive, changing and renewing our lives, by His Spirit bringing joy, peace and fulfillment to us. Then others will seek Him.
3.We should consider if our presence as Christian people makes others feel accepted or condemned. Notice how the holiness of Jesus bought to her soul a sense of peace and acceptance, while the alleged spirituality of the Scribes and Pharisees brought to her fear and rejection.
4. We, like Jesus, should not be intimidated by self-righteous people who tell us what Christians should or shouldn't be doing. Rather we should hear Christ's call to reach out to the down-trodden, to the lost, to the sinful, to the hurting and the needy, regardless of personal cost or reputation. We should offer the forgiveness of Christ and explain that, through a living relationship with Jesus Christ, and in the power of God's Holy Spirit, the possibility “To go and sin no more” is available to us all.
Of course, we will fall. Of course, we can never be perfect. But we can strive to be a better version of the person God wants us to become. Every time we gather to worship, is an opportunity to nurture our personal faith for whatever journey may lay ahead of us. Amen.
The Reverend Adrian J. Pratt B.D.
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