Jesus Forgives a Woman Caught in Adultery. (John 8 1-11)
Transcript
When it comes to religion, the prevailing mood in our country is "live and let live." This attitude is woven into the very fabric of our nation.
Our nation's history has fostered a good dose of tolerance, perhaps due to the diversity of ethnic groups that have settled here since the war, coming from all over the then British Commonwealth at our request to help rebuild the nation after the war.
However, this tolerance can sometimes turn into intolerance, especially when witnessing for Jesus Christ to those from another religious background. If you've ever shared your faith, you’ve likely encountered this attitude.
But it seems to me that where people get really aggressive is not when people have a different religious background, things get really charged when moreso when I speak to people who consider themselves intellectuals.
In discussions about spiritual matters, their questions come like bullets from a machine gun: "They laugh at believe the Bible? You believe the story about Jonah being swallowed by a whale? You believe the Red Sea was parted and they walked across? You mean to tell me you believe that a virgin gave birth to a child?" This is the attitude I’m referring to.
Whether speaking to intellectuals or unbelievers, I've had people react vehemently, asking, "You mean to tell me that all you have to do is believe? That would be a license to sin! What about those who have never heard of Jesus Christ? What about sincere people who have done their best?"
Some ask questions because they genuinely seek answers; others ask to simply dispute and argue. This morning, I want to address the latter group—those who ask questions and hurl darts at believers, seemingly only wanting to argue.
What should you do when you find yourself in such a situation? I believe the answer is illustrated in John chapter 8. In this passage, Jesus was confronted with a challenging situation. By looking at how He responded, we can learn valuable lessons for handling difficult encounters.
It's going to be a two perter again today and tomorrow. Today we are going to look at the story of the woman caught in adultery, and tomorrow we are going to look at disputes that rose our of Jesus actions and what they mean.
There are several things you need to understand to fully appreciate what we are looking at here over the next couple of days.
As I have explained several times in the opening chapters of the gospel of John, initially everyone who comes into contact with Jesus Christ believes in Him.
This is certainly true up through chapter 4. However, starting in chapter 5, the story changes, and for the first time, we see some who do not believe. This pattern continues in chapters 5 and 6.
Chapter 7 marks a turning point; the plot thickens, in fact, from chapter 7 all the way through to chapter 12, unbelief intensifies, breaking out into conflict and open hostility. Chapter 8 is set in the middle of this escalating tension.
Remember throughout the gospel account of John he has is a clear intention: John writes all of this so that people might believe in Jesus and, by believing, have life through His name.
However, starting around chapter 7, a subplot of unbelief begins to develop, ultimately leading to the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.
Another important point is that chapter 8 is closely connected to chapter 7. In chapter 7, Jesus travels from Galilee to Jerusalem, and chapter 8 continues to describe what happened during His trip to the Feast of Tabernacles.
Additionally, I need to mention that the first 11 verses of chapter 8 are not present in some early manuscripts. After careful study, I believe these verses were part of John's original text. I'm not going to delve into all the reasons for this conclusion, but let me say this: if these verses were not originally in John, there would be a significant gap in the narrative.
The questioned verses actually begin at 7:53 and continue through 8:11. If we exclude these verses, the text would read like this:
John 7:52, "They answered and said to him, 'Are you also from Galilee? Search and look, for no prophet has arisen out of Galilee.'" Then, the next statement would be 8:12, "Then Jesus spoke to them again, saying, 'I am the light of the world.'"
Clearly, this sequence does not make sense. For this and several other reasons, I believe John 7:53 through 8:11 are genuine and an integral part of the gospel of John.
On a human level it is understandable why some might have an issue with this text because, an incorrect understanding might have lead some to conclude that Jesus is giving a licence to sin. And in a patriarchal society to be seen to be potentially lenient on the sexual sin of adultery was scary for men in particular.
With this background, let's examine this passage.
The chapter is divided into two parts. The first part, which we are looking at today involves an incident where a woman caught in the act of adultery and she is brought before Jesus. (8:1-11).
The second part, beginning at verse 12, is an interrogation where the Pharisees hurl one accusation or question after another at Jesus arising out of what they have just witnessed.
Let's start with the incident with this woman.
1 But Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. 2 At dawn he appeared again in the temple courts, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them. 3 The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group 4 and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. 5 In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” 6 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. 7 When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” 8 Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground. 9 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. 10 Jesus straightened up and asked her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” 11 “No one, sir,” she said. “Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin.”
(John 8: 1-11)
Verse, one tells us that Jesus went to the Mount of Olives, where He spent the night. We were told in Chapter 7, verse 52, that the men went back to their own houses, some believing and some not. (we talked about that yesterday.
However, remember, Jesus had no home to go to at this point, no place to lay His head, so He went to the Mount of Olives.
Early the next morning, He came again come to the temple. Remember, this is an follow on to chapter 7, which concluded with the last day of the Feast of Tabernacles.
The next morning, it says, many people would be on their way out of town. Some o the visitors to the city, who had come just for the Feast of Tabernacles, enjoy the festival and maybe linger around the temple for a few hours, maybe even a few days, before heading home. Jesus was one of those who returned to the temple.
Verse two tells us that He sat down and taught them. The act of sitting down is significant. To sit down in the temple area and teach was to take on the position of a rabbi. By sitting, Jesus was assuming the authority of a teacher.
So, as crowds of people people milled about the 35 acres of the temple area a crowd quickly gathered around him. So Jesus now is in the midst of teaching a small crowd in the temple area when, suddenly, the scribes and Pharisees brought before Him a woman caught in adultery.
It say they sit her in the midst of all this and said, “Master, this woman was taken in adultery, in the very act. Now Moses in the law commanded us that such should be stoned. What do you say?”
Verse six is very important. It tells us they said this to tempt him into saying something that meant they could accuse him of failing to obey the law of Moses.”
They bring this woman, set her in the midst, and said, “This woman was caught in the very act of adultery. Moses says to stone her. What do you say?”
If Jesus simply said, “Do what the law of Moses commands, stone her,” He would immediately be in trouble with the Romans. On the other hand, if He said, “Show mercy and let her go,” He would immediately be in trouble with the Jews.
They had cleverly devised a trap to trick Him, so they might have something to accuse Him of publicly. The trap consisted of putting him in a position of conflict between what Roman law said should happen and what they believed the Jewish law would say
The text then tells us that Jesus stooped down and wrote with His finger on the ground as though He did not hear them.
This verse has produced much speculation over the years.
What did He write? If we opened this for speculation I could be here for days. There are many suggestions. The most common is that He wrote the Ten Commandments. Another suggestion is that He wrote only the seventh commandment. (Thou halt not commit adultery)
Frankly, I don’t think what Jesus wrote is the issue. If it were important, John would have surely told us. It is the act of silently writing itself which is significant.
Note the text says He wrote with His finger, not with an instrument. In all of Israel’s history, who alson wrote with a finger? God, when He wrote the Ten Commandments on stone with His own finger, as recorded in Exodus.
The act of writing, by his hand is what is significant here. By this symbolic act, Jesus was saying, “I am not just a teacher of the law; I am the giver of the law.” Jesus was symbolically saying, “I as God am speaking to you.”
But the people didn’t understand this. Verse 7 indicates that because they continued asking Him, “What are you going to do?”
He lifted Himself up and said, “He that is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone.” I personally suspect that Jesus wrote something related to the Ten Commandments, perhaps indeed that 7th commandment but it is the act of writing with his finger that indicated that He is God.
Then, He turned to them and said, “Whoever is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone.”
Now, what is He telling them? Is He possibly saying, "Whoever is without any sin in general"? That's possible.
It is also possible that He is saying, "Whoever is without the specific sin of adultery, let him cast the first stone." Many have suggested that perhaps He is what He is saying.
Maybe he is tying it in with His teaching on other occasion when he said, "If you are even without the sin of lust, go ahead and stone her."
But I'm going to go a step further, as a others have done before me.
Note: The text says she was caught in the very act. Now, what does that tell you? There were two people involved, right? Shouldn't he be stoned as well? Where is he? Why did they let him go and grab her?
Could it be that they were guilty themselves, and maybe the one caught in the act was among them. How else did they know where this was going on?
Is it possible that one of their Jewish leaders was involved and by not also bring the charge against him, they were all now implicated under the law.
It's a suggestion, that has been made by many over the years, and one I think has merit. Being that they let him go and brought in the woman instead.
So, He rises up long enough to say, "Whoever is without sin, let him cast the first stone."
Then the text says He stooped down again and wrote on the ground. This time it does not say He wrote with His finger, which is rather interesting.
In Exodus, God wrote the commandments twice. The text says He wrote with His finger. Then, you'll recall, Moses broke those tablets, and God had to write them again. The second time in Exodus, it does not say He wrote with His finger, which is interesting because that pattern is followed here.
At any rate, this time they are convicted, which is precisely one of the things the law is supposed to do: convict men and women of their sin.
So, the Spirit of God used the law of God and drove it home to their hearts, and they were convicted. They started walking out, beginning with the oldest, who perhaps had the most experience of the law or perhaps just recognised because of his long life he had theh most sin forgiven in his life. And they went off one by one.
The Jewish leaders left, and that left Jesus in the middle of the crowd that had gathered to hear Him teach, along with this woman.
Jesus then says to her, "Where are your accusers?" She replied, "No here anyome, Lord." In verse 11, Jesus said to her, "Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more."
You see, Jesus Christ can forgive her for the simple reason that He is God. I think it's rather interesting that when God originally gave the law, Israel turned around and broke it. Instead of instituting the punishment for breaking the law, which would have been death and wiping out the whole nation, which was discussed in the book of Exodus, God graciously forgave them and then gave them a second copy of the law.
You see, if you are a teacher of the law, all you can do is go by the law. But if you are the giver of the law, then you can exercise the prerogative of forgiving as well.
Jesus Christ in this passage is again being presented as God, because He is the one who has the prerogative to forgive. And so, He forgave the woman.
In this case, God forgave the woman after she did the worst thing she could have done in that culture at that time.
This reminds me that God does not just forgive good people; Jesus said He came to call sinners, not the righteous, to repentance.
In this case, the woman was fully aware of her sin. Jesus forgave her of her sin.
I must remind you that the issue in the story is not just that Jesus is God—though that’s there. It’s not just that Jesus forgave her—though that is obviously here.
But the real point is in verse 6: they did all of this to tempt Him, that they might have something to accuse Him of. They interrupted Him to trick and trap Him, but it didn’t work. Being God, He could uphold the law and exercise grace, and that is precisely what He did.
After all of this they will now came back for more confrontation.
That the next section of the chapter which begins in verse 12, where we are told...
Jesus spoke again and said, "I am the light of the world. He that follows me shall not walk in darkness but shall have the light of life."
Now, you must remember that back in verse two, we were told this was early in the morning, no doubt at dawn. So, as this woman walked off, if she went out the east side of the temple, she would walk right into the rising sun.
Jesus, perhaps following her with his eyes as she walked away from the crowd and into the rising sun, said, "I am the light of the world."
What does He mean by this, and how will it answer the questions, accusations and dispute, the religious leaders will bring in the light of what they have just witnessed?
