“The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and placing her in the midst they said to him, “Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. Moses commanded us to stone such. What do you say about her?” This they said to test him, that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus…said to them, “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.” …they went away, one by one…and Jesus was left alone with the woman…” John 8:3ff

“The first step toward love is a common sharing of a sense of mutual worth and value. This cannot be discovered in a vacuum or in a series of artificial or hypothetical relationships. It has to be in a real situation, natural, free.” (Howard Thurman. Jesus and the Disinherited (p. 98). Beacon Press. Kindle Edition.)

We like to notice the sins of the other person – we do not like to see the sins that exist within ourselves. Our view is clearer and often much sharper when assessing the weaknesses, the failures, and the foibles of others. What I like about the story of the woman caught in adultery is the ability of Jesus to remind us that we all carry some secrets or hidden sins that none of us would care to have aired in public.

Thurman writes: “To them the woman was not a woman, or even a person, but an adulteress, stripped of her essential dignity and worth. Jesus said, “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone.” After that, he implied, any person may throw. The quiet words exploded the situation, and in the piercing glare each man saw himself…In that moment each was not a judge of another’s deeds, but of his own.” Jesus met the woman where she was, saw her as the person she hoped she might be – and gave her value.

Jesus’ refusal to condemn the woman, well, that is what gives us all hope. Jesus says in John 3:17 “The Son did not come into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world should be saved through him.”

Why do we spend so much time condemning and judging others? It is because we all have insecurities — and so one of the ways we try to feel better about ourselves is to put others down.

Jesus is the one to give us all value – for he sees us as children of the Heavenly Father — and as beloved children, loved because G-d created us. To live as if G-d is always judging us then we live life in fear — critical of all we encounter. But, if we live in faith, a gift to us through the Holy Spirit, then we can live into Christ’s love for us, dropping the need to judge others, and living into the crown Christ has set above each one of us.

Pastor Dave