Jesus and The Woman

I'm memorizing John 7:53-8:11 right now. I picked this particular passage because I love the story, and more specifically the way Jesus deals with this woman.

In my years of listening to sermons, chapels, devotionals, etc., I've heard a lot of different parts of this story brought out, but tonight as I was reading something new caught my eye.

The final two words of the story: "of sin".

Jesus has already done a stellar job of telling off the religious leaders who have tried to use this woman as a pawn to trap him. "If any of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her."

Shazzam! Even the elders took that to heart, dropped their stones and left in shame.

They've all gone. All of them. Only Jesus and the woman remain, in a silent tableau; Jesus, by now a famous teacher, prophet, and teller-off of the religious leaders; and the woman. Caught in the act of adultery.

No doubt this day would go down in the woman's list of Terrible, Horrible, No-Good, Very Bad Days. Did she love the guy? Was she selling her body to feed herself or her family? Was it even her choice?

We don't know any of that. What the scripture says is that Jesus, who'd been intensely interested in the dust for the past couple of minutes, straightens up, tells the woman that he doesn't condemn her, and sends her on her way, with one last, significant instruction:

"Go now, and leave your life of sin."

POW! There it is. She was guilty and Jesus knew it. And yet he did not condemn her, neither in public or in private. In fact, he defended her!

I mean, seriously. I could see him standing up for someone who really was innocent. But this? This is revolutionary. He knew, and still he saved her life.

He knows me. Better than any of you. I can put on a pretty good show, but He knows me. He knows the things I keep hidden. The sins I excuse or hide or pretend aren't there.

He knows I'm guilty, but still he saved my life.

Don't rush past this miracle of miracles. Stop and ponder; savor it for a minute: Jesus knows, but still...

Still, day after day he intercedes for my dirty, unworthy, sinful soul before his Father. Not because I deserve it, or because I'm sorry. Not even because he thinks I won't do it again. He knows. But he does it because he loves me THAT MUCH. Me! He loves ME!

And not just me- he does this for all of us who will let him. He wades through a landslide of sins. A mountain of filth. Our filth. A garbage dump of our fallenness.

He knows. And he loves us still.





John 7:53-8:11

Then each went to his own home. But Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. At dawn he appeared again in the temple courts, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them. The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group and said to Jesus, "Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?"
They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him.
But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, "If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her."
Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.
At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. Jesus straightened up and asked her, "Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?"
"No one, sir," she said.
"Then neither do I condemn you," Jesus declared. "Go now and leave your life of sin."