It has been said that a good preacher should preach with a Bible in one hand and a newspaper in the other.  The implication being that while the preacher proclaims the good news of God's love he must also be aware of the needs and events that are going on in the world so that he can show how the good news can be applied to life's circumstances and situations.  Please understand that I am aware of the fear that has gripped our world in recent weeks and seems to escalate with each passing day.  And yet I have continued in our series about God's grace, not because I am locked into it and feel that I must preach this because this is what I have prepared, but because I feel that it speaks to our current situation.

   I believe our experience of God's grace is applicable at any time but especially at this time, in a time of fear and hopelessness.  Right now the people of the world are in need for us to offer them hope and I pray that they find us a hopeful people, and ask you and me the reason for the hope that is in us.  The reason for our hope, the reason we do not fear the future, is because we have experienced the grace of God.  The steadfast, unwavering love of God.  We must take it in that the love that God expressed for you and me on the cross at Calvary was not a mere whim but a settled attitude toward you and me and the world.  God is a God of grace.  It's an important message for us to hear in a world full of fear.

   This morning we are given a beautiful picture of grace in our text  John 8:1-11.  Let us hear God's word.

Then each of them went home while Jesus went to the Mount of Olives.  Early in the morning he came again to the temple.  All the people came to him and he sat down and began to teach them.  The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery; and making her stand before all of them, they said to him, "Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery.  Now in the law Moses commanded us to stone such women.  Now what do you say"  They said this to test him, so that they might have some charge to bring against him.  Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger of the ground.  When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up an said to them, "Let anyone among you who is without sin be the fist to throw a stone at her."  And one again he bent down and wrote on the ground.  When they heard it, they went away, one by one, beginning with the elders; and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him.   Jesus straightened up and said to he, "Woman, where are they?  Has no one condemned you?"  She said, "No one , sir."  And Jesus said, "Neither do I condemn you.  Go your way, and from now on do not sin again."
(John 8:1-11) (NRSV)

   It is dawn and the city of Jerusalem begins to shrug off the night's sleepiness.  A rooster crows to welcome the morning.  The shopkeeper raises his awning, opens his shutters and displays his wares.  A dog yawns, stretches and then begins to slowly walk down the lane to begin a day like every day - to look for scraps.  A young woman puts a large earthen jar onto her shoulder and slowly picks her way to the well for the day's water.  The city is waking up and if you listen carefully you can hear the clamour of the city rise as more and more people awake and begin their day.

   And the day is like any other day - except down at the temple.  There a young carpenter from Nazareth is sitting teaching the people.  The Pharisees thought that they had scared Jesus off, by threatening to have him arrested, but there he is again at dawn teaching the people.

   Having spent the night on the Mount of Olives he is eager and full of desire to teach the people again.  And his teaching is very compelling for everyone who has come to the temple today is standing around him.  Each one listens intently.  All the people are there.  Some are nodding their heads in agreement to what he is saying.  Others look puzzled and unsure as they listen; some look angry, but all agree that his words stir something within them.  They have never heard one speak with such authority - his words sound like they come from God himself.  They cannot tear themselves away.  In fact, those on the outer edges of the crowd try to lean in over the people in front of them to hear what Jesus is saying.  They try to ignore the commotion at the temple gates.  They turn a deaf ear to it at first but then the clamour is so loud that they can no longer hear and even the teacher stops speaking and rises to see what is going on.

   Shouts of, "Make way!", "Watch Out!" and, "Get out of the way!" follow a small group of Pharisees and scribes heading right toward the master.  Their faces display anger and fury.  At the centre of the little mob is a woman - barefoot, hair dishevelled, clothes in disarray, she is being pushed and shoved, herded by the religious men, toward Jesus.

   They break through the crowd and roughly make the woman face everyone.

   "We caught this woman in the act of adultery," they yell furiously.

   The crowd takes a collective gasp and immediately the whispers start.

   "It's how she makes her living you know."

   "No, no, I heard that her husband is away, and has been for the past 2 months, and she's had a male visitor every night for the past week."

   "The little cheat."

   Many bend and reach for a stone.  For a brief moment all eyes are fixed on the woman.  She moves her hands to hide her nakedness.  She is clearly shamed and dazed.  Only moments before she had been in bed with a man she did not know, when all of a sudden the door was broken down and she was yanked from bed.  She barely had time to cover her body before she was dragged into the street by a group of men and marched to the temple.

   She stands now before an angry crowd.  Adultery was a serious offence.  Its punishment was well known but rarely practised.

   "We caught this woman in bed with a man - not her husband.  The law says we are to stone her.  What do you say?", shout the Pharisees.

   You can almost taste the self-satisfaction of these religious rulers.  They loved being around such people because it made their righteousness shine.  They could parade their goodness when such people, like this woman, were in their midst and, in fact, the woman only served to magnify their so called righteousness.

   But not only that, you could hear the sound of victory in their voices.  They had been unable to arrest Jesus the other day, so now they sought to discredit him.  They had him NOW, they thought.  If, on the one hand, he said, "Yes, let her be stoned," then they could accuse him of treason to the Roman authorities.  For the Romans had taken the power of capital punishment away from the Jews.  Even when Pilate suggested to the scribes and Pharisees later on that they take Jesus and try him themselves, they reminded him that it was not lawful for them to put anyone to death.

  But if, on the other hand, he said, "No; let the woman go free," then they could accuse him of teaching things contrary to the Law of Moses, and discredit him before the crowd.

   They had him, they thought, and you could see the relish with which they took it all in.

   The Lord of course was quite familiar with the severity of those parts of the Mosaic Law designed to safeguard the sanctity of sex, the holiness of marriage and the moral purity of the nation.  But, as Jesus himself once put it, a greater one than Solomon was in their midst.  If they thought they could snare the all-knowing one like that, they were mistaken.

   And as quickly as everyone was focusing on the woman everyone soon forgot about her and all eyes were glued upon Jesus.  How would he respond to this question.  What would he say?  There was a hush among the crowd.

   And Jesus does a most astonishing thing - he bends down and begins to write in the sand with his finger.  Have you ever wondered what he wrote in the sand that day?  Many ideas have been suggested and we will never know for sure until we meet him face to face in heaven.

   But I would like to suggest that Jesus wrote four words in the sand that day.  They are suggested by the text itself.

   If you and I were in the crowd that day we would see, we would lean in and look at the ground; and if we couldn't see we would whisper to those at the front of the crowd, "What is he writing?" and they would say, "He is writing the word conscience."

   Conscience?  You wonder to yourself, "That's silly," but in a moment you  understand why.  For Jesus, being pestered by the Pharisees for an answer, straightens up, looks them all in the eye, and says, "If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her." (NIV)

   And those words act as an arrow, shot from the bow of the Saviour right in the heart of conscience.

   It is a wonderful reply, designed to disarm all hypocrisy and falsehood.

   As John Phillips writes, "His answer did not lower the standard of the law nor did he allow his infinite love to run away with his sense of right and wrong.  Rather he upheld the law in such a way that he put the onus back on them." ¹  And it pierces their conscience.

   It is a stinging reply.  And once again there is silence; but this time it is broken by thud, thud, thud - rocks falling from the hands of the conscience-stricken.

   The King James Version reads, "Those who heard it, being convicted by their conscience, went out one by one, beginning with the oldest even to the last."

   You know through the gospel of John Jesus compares himself with light.  Indeed at the end of this encounter Jesus announces in verse 12, "I am the light of the world.  Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life." (John 8:12) (NRSV)

   Sometimes we find it difficult to wrap our minds around some of the metaphors Jesus uses and applies to himself.  But here we see it vividly - Jesus as the light - it's in those words:  if any of you is without sin, let him cast the first stone.

   Jesus is the light - he shines in the darkness of sin and with that light exposes the darkness of sin.  Like a large spotlight, Jesus is able to illuminate all the sin that keeps us from him.

   One of my favourite sermons by the eminent Robert Mccraken is one entitled, "Conscience, a Pathway to God."  And the title tells it all.  It's true.

   We have been given a conscience for a reason, and that is to bring us closer to God.  Our conscience is a gift from God forming a pathway to repentance and fellowship with him.

   My friends, some of you have felt God speak to you through your conscience.  Some of you have felt the sting of his light shine upon the darkness of a wrong you have committed.  And it hurts.  Your sin is like an open wound.  I urge you not to ignore that sting.  The Pharisees made two fatal errors on this day - the first error is obvious, they are righteous hypocrites - but the second error is that as their consciences were pricked and they dropped their stones, they walked away from the only one who could heal that conscience.  They left the only one who, through the power of his pure light, could bring light into their lives, the light of forgiveness and restoration.

   Don't make the same error.  If you hear God speak to you through your conscience don't walk away from him.  He only wants to help.

   And I think these last three words will be a help to you.  Because the next word he wrote in the sand, I believe, is compassion.  You know sometimes Jesus' words can be very severe and hard.  He was severe in his judgement of hypocrisy, he was severe toward those who used the temple to sell stuff, and he was severe in telling us what it cost to follow him.

    But Jesus was also very tender and compassionate.  And, after he has shone his light upon your conscience, do not walk away from that light because if you do, you will walk away from a heart that is only filled with compassion for you.

   Do you see it in this passage?  After everyone leaves, Jesus speaks to the woman, where are those accusers of yours?  "Has no one condemned you?"  Use your imagination, do you see, do you see the expression on Jesus' face?  Jesus says it with smile on his face.  It's a smile of deep love and compassion toward the sinner.

   My friends, never doubt God's compassion toward you.  Never doubt that his heart is always for you.  Never doubt that God longs for you to be in full companionship with him no matter how big your sin is in your eyes, no matter how big a mistake you feel you have made, and no matter how many mistakes you have made - know that always, always, God's response to you is one of compassion.

   And can you see the smile on the woman's face as she looks around her and sees the temple empty?  The men who had previously dragged her there were gone.  The crowd who were getting in on the act to stone her were gone.  There was only one left, Jesus.  And can you feel her joy as she realizes that all of her accusers are gone and she is left with the one who made it all possible?  She thinks there still is one who can condemn me; but then she looks at his face, and she says, no one, Lord.

   She felt his compassion and she made him Lord of her life.  She put him on the throne of her heart.

   And it's in the next instant that she knows the third word that he wrote in the sand.  The word forgiveness.

   For he responds, " neither do I."

   Do you see the progression here?  Jesus shines his light of purity and holiness upon our conscience, we feel the sting of it, and instead of running from him, we see his compassion and love for us and respond to it in repentance and seeking his Lordship in our lives.  And he gives us the forgiveness we are looking for.

   Jesus does not CONDONE her sin, he CONQUERS it.  He does not DISMISS her sin, he DIES for it.

   The final word that Jesus writes in the sand is JOY.  Everyone else left the temple courtyard that day with a guilty consciences; the woman left it with joy in heart.  For she had the final words of Jesus ringing in her ears:  go and sin no more.  Don't read that only as a command, but as a joyful declaration that she was now free from the power of sin and she did not have to submit to her wrong desires any more.  She was free and had a new Lord and master, Jesus Christ himself.

   And so with each of us.  My friends, some of you have been hurt badly by the church, some of you have experienced rejection and humiliation by Christian people, but you need to know that that is not how Jesus would treat you.  He loves you.  He will not condone your sin, he will conquer it.  If you confess him to be your Lord and Saviour, he will take that sin that weighs heavy on your conscience and he will take it away.  He will not dismiss your sin, he will die for it.  He will give you forgiveness and joy in the place of heaviness if you will but trust him.

Copyright MBC and Tom Cullen - October 2001

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