Put Down The Stone

¹But Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. ²At dawn he appeared again in the temple courts, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them. ³The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group ⁴and said to Jesus, "Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. ⁵In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?" ⁶They 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. ⁷When 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." ⁸Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.

⁹At 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. ¹⁰Jesus 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 NIV

The Pharisees made really good judges. They had studied the law and they knew what people should and shouldn't do. They also knew the different types of punishment for different types of sin. In this case of adultery, they knew there should be a stoning (according to their law).

One of the problems with the Pharisees being able to point out everyone else's problems is that they couldn't ever see their own. Or could they? Maybe they were aware of their faults.  They just hoped nobody else ever found them. That would explain why they spent so much time pointing out everyone else's faults, to deflect any attention from themselves.

This didn't work for Jesus. He doesn't look through people or around people. Jesus looks into people. When the men approached Jesus with the adulterous woman, He didn't see what they had hoped. He didn't see a sinful woman surrounded by righteous men who have no other desire but to uphold their laws and keep order in their land. No, He didn't see that.

What did Jesus see? I believe that He saw a woman who had fallen into some bad choices. He saw her past and he saw a woman in need of love. Jesus looked at the men, and one by one, He could see their hidden sins---the ones they didn't want anyone to know about. He probably even saw that some of those men had been her partner, or someone else's in the same situation. He saw that their desire to punish her did not have pure intentions. He saw the evil in their hearts. Whatever there is to see inside of us, whatever is hidden, Jesus can still see it.

What did He do? He heard the request. He scanned the crowd. Then, He simply said, OK. He said, OK, fine.  Go ahead and stone her. That is, go ahead "if" any of you are without sin. At that, they all walked away.

Now, had they not believed He was who He said He was as they later claimed, then why would they have walked away? After all, how could He possibly know their sins? Yet, something in them was aware that He did know and they had to walk away.

Which person are you in this story? Are you the woman who has fallen? If so, make a decision today to leave that life of sin. Are you the Pharisee? If so, put down the stone---Jesus is speaking.