THE WOMAN CAUGHT IN ADULTERY
By Dr. David Jeremiah
John 8:1-11
In this lesson we meet a woman transformed from a life of adultery to the adoration of Jesus.
Who goes to heaven in the final analysis? Is it the most religious, or the most forgiven? Man works hard at creating ways to justify himself in the sight of God, all the while overlooking the only thing God requires - receiving by faith His gift of forgiveness.
At a time when Jesus' ministry with the masses was escalating in popularity, the Pharisees and Sadducees laid a trap for Jesus. Their bait was a woman who came into contact with Jesus and was forever changed by His actions and words. A woman taken in adultery found adoration for her new Lord .
The more Jesus taught, the more the teachings of the Pharisees and Sadducees were seen by the people to be inadequate and hypocritital. Jesus had denounced many of their religious practices, referring to them on occasion as white-washed sepulchers full of dead men's bones. This did not make Him popular, obviously with the scribes and Pharisees, and they were Iooking for any opportunity to destroy His influence in their community.
So while He was teaching in the temple, the scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman before Him and charged her with having broken the seventh commandment in the Mosaic Law: "You shall not commit adultery (Exodus 20:14). They cite the law of Moses, which required adulterers to be put to death (Leviticus 20:10; Deuteronomy 22:22), and they submit their case to Jesus for judgment According to verse 6 in this text, they were trying to trap Him. They sought to impale Him on the horns of a dilemma. They didn't mind using the brokenness and shame of the woman for their own selfish purposes. Fortunately for the woman, she found both mercy and justice in Jesus.
THE ACCUSATION OF THE SCRIBES AND PHARISEES (8:3-6A)
It was a favorite tactic of the Jewish religious leaders to try and trip Jesus up on matters of the Law. They felt if they could catch Him misinterpreting, or violating, the Law of Moses, they would have grounds to discredit Him and accuse Him before not only the people but before the Sanhedrin as well.
They tried to trap Him once with a concocted story about a woman who had married each of seven brothers in succession after the one she was married to died. Whose husband, they asked Jesus, would she be in the resurrection with? Jesus' answer to them was that they erred because they didn't know the Scriptures�there is no marriage in heaven (Matthew 22:29-30). In another instance, they tried to trap Him on the subject of paying taxes to Caesar, but His answer totally confounded them: Give Caesar what is his and God what is His (Matthew 22:21). They were never able to trap Jesus with their tricks.
But the trap they laid for Him with the woman caught in adultery was perhaps the most serious test He had been given. While He was teaching a group of people in the temple courts, the Pharisees and scribes pushed their way through the crowd and made the woman stand before them. Jesus knew better than to think they were there because they hated sin, hated immorality, hated unrighteousness, or hated the woman. They svere there because they hated Him, and wanted to trap Him in failing to do what the Law of Moses prescribed.
Here was the trap: if Jesus said to stone the woman, He would be taking it upon Himself to pass a sentence which only the Romans could do, and He would be violating His own principles of mercy ("Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest," (Matthew 11:28). On the other hand, if He said, "Let her go," He would be violating the Law which required that she be punished. The Law was very clear that evil was to be kept out of the land, and certain types of sin were to be punished by death. God's standards were: holiness in the Old Testament, holiness in the first century and holiness in our day. In our age of focusing on the grace of God, I fear that sometimes we forget that God's standard is holiness, and He does expect us to live holy lives.
This was a difficult situation for Jesus to deal with because it was, in essence, the fundamental problem underlying all biblical theology: How can God be just (maintain the standards of holiness He Himself has set) and at the same time a justifier of the ungodly (show mercy and forgiveness toward sinners) (Romans 3:26)? How can Jesus love the sinner and hate the sin? This is a legitimate question for Jesus to have to answer�but His answer is once again not the one His opponents wanted or were even expecting.
THE ANSWER OF JESUS (8:6B-8)
The first part of Jesus' answer to the scribes and Pharisees was nonverbal: He bent down and began to write on the ground with His finger!
The Writing on the Ground (6b)
In fact, He wrote on the ground twice, these non-verbal actions serving as bookends on either side of His verbal answer. No one knows what Jesus Wrote on the ground. Speculations on this passage has run rampant through the years, but no one knows. Whatever He was writing, however, the act created one of the most awesome silences the world has ever known. Can you imagine the scene�the frustration of the scribes and Pharisees? But then He broke the silence.
The Words to the Accusers (8:7-8)
His answer has been immortalized (and misapplied more than a few times) in the annals of literature: "He who is without sin among you, let him throw a stone at her first" (John 8:7). After these words, He bent down and began writing in the dirt again. Some have suggested that He was writing in the dirt the sins of those men who were standing there, for it says in verse nine that they were so convicted that they went away, one by one, beginning with the oldest. If this is indeed what happened, it must have been a horribly awesome and convicting moment for those men. They brought a poor woman whose sins they were parading before all present, and they ended up having their own sins enumerated instead. Something like that must have happened, so quickly did they turn and leave, one by one.
In a moment, Jesus demonstrated the folly of judging another unless you are ready to have vour own sins judged. Judging invites condemnation, since none are without sin (Matthew 7:1-5; Romans 2:1). The woman's sin they wanted Jesus to judge was suddenly hard to see in light of the enormous sins that remained unconfessed in their own lives. In trying to destroy the credibility of Jesus, they had only weakened their own credibility.
The Walking Away of the Accusers
The accusers walked away because they were convicted by their conscience. There was some combination of what they had proposed to Jesus, what He said in reply, and what He was writing on the ground that caused them to be pricked internally by their conscience (not in their conscience, but by their conscience).
The conscience is a powerful tool when it has not been seared beyond operability by sin. In other words, if we refuse or deny the dictates of the conscience enough times it has less and less of an impact on our lives. But the Holy Spirit uses the conscience of man to speak to us and often bring us to righteousness. The conscience is not infallible as a guide, but more often than not it will serve its purpose of arresting us when we are contemplating, or carrying out, a sinful thought or deed. The conscience of the woman's accusers served its purpose in this instance. As the accusers leave, Jesus is left alone with the woman in a moment fraught with expectation. She was guilty as charged, but her accusers have left under the condemnation of their own guilt. What will happen to her now?
The Woman Alone with Jesus (8:10-11)
It is interesting that when the men came and talked with Jesus, they called Him Master. But when she spoke to Him, she called Him Lord (John 8:11). And 1 Corinthians 12:3 says that no one can call Jesus Lord except by the Holy Spirit. So something had happened in her heart already. She knew who she was talking to. She had begun to be changed from the inside out. When Jesus asked whether anyone remained to condemn her, she said, "No one, Lord." "Neither do I condemn you," Jesus said. "Go and sin no more."
Many of the early church fathers tried to have this portion of Scripture removed from the text of John because they felt like it showed Jesus condoning immorality. But that is to miss the point of what Jesus was accomplishing in the woman's life. There were several reasons He did not condemn her. First, He had already forgiven her. He didn't condemn this woman for the same reason He does not condemn us. He was on His way to the cross where He would bear the penalty for her sins. She couldn't be condemned if He also was going to be condemned for the same sin. So He took her condemnation upon Himself. John 3:17 says God's Son came into the world not to condemn the world but to save the world.
Then He said to her, "Go and sin no more." It is interesting to note the order in which these two comments are presented. He didn't say, "Go and sin no more. I don't condemn you." He said, "I don't condemn you. Now go and sin no more." He didn't say that if she would go out and not sin any more, and show Him that she was really serious about reforming herself, that He would then not condemn her. No, without reference to her life at all, He extended forgiveness to her. And that's what He does with us as well. He says, "Come to Me in the midst of all your sin no matter who you are. I don't condemn you. Now go and live a life that's honoring to the One who has given you such great forgiveness."
THE APPLICATIONS TO OUR LIVES
This brief encounter, mentioned only in the Gospel of John, offers significant lessons for every saint who finds himself in the place of condemnation and guilt of sin.
The Worst Sinners Are Often the Greatest Accusers
That day, the woman standing before Jesus was not the go greatest sinner. The greatest sinners were the men who came with their accusations, trying to trap Jesus. Because of the requirement for two or three witnesses (Deuteronomy 19:15), it is likely that the men would have had to set up the entire thing in order to have a situation where multiple witnesses were available. In fact, it is possible that one of the men accusing her was the one who set up the arrangement in order to entrap the woman in an act of sin. It is well know from history that adultery was tolerated among religious leaders. We are justified in wondering about the man who was supposedly the other part to this act of adultery. What happened to him? Why did the Pharisees not bring him to account for his sins as well? Again, he might well have been spared from being accused because he was one of the accusers.
It's a truth that we often see in others those weaknesses which we know to be true about ourselves. Yet instead of being hard on ourselves, we are hard on the others. Instead of dealing with our own sin, we focus on the sin of others. The result is that often the greatest sinners become the greatest accusers.
Religion Won't Get You to Henven and Particular Sins Won't Keep You Out
I can't say for certain, obviously, but I am not afraid to believe, based on what are are given in this passage of Scripture, that the woman caught in adultery went to heaven and her accusers went to hell. My opinion makes no difference�God is their judge. But l draw the distinction between the woman and her accusers for the purpose of pointing out the difference between religion and the forgiveness of sins. We know the woman was a sinner who acknowledged Jesus as Lord and received forgiveness from Him. Her accusers were religious hypocrites who, even when their sins were pointed out to them, would not acknowledge them. They left Jesus' presence sorry that they got caught, not sorry they had sinned.
You can't be outwardly or inwardly good enough to get to heaven. You get to heaven by accepting the forgiveness of Jesus Christ. When the woman and her accusers came to heaven's door, she would be the only one who could say she knew the Lord. This is a good example of the story Jesus told about those who would one day say, "Lord, Lord, have we not . . . done many wonders in Your name?" And Jesus will say to them, "I never knew you" (Matthew 7:22-23). Anyone who believes that their religious works or religious affiliations get them automatic entrance into heaven is sadly mistaken. No religious heritage gets us into heaven, and no sin�not adultery, not suicide, not the worst sin that we could imagine�can keep us out. The only thing that opens or closes the door to heaven is a person's attitude about their sin with regard to the person of Jesus Christ. Has that person placed faith for the forgiveness of their sins in Christ's atoning death on the cross? If so, then that person will he invited to spend eternity with God among the congregation of the forgiven.
God Loves to Take the Worst and Transform It into the Best
Have you noticed that? He takes broken things and makes them new again. All the people that we have studied in this series of lessons on people who met Jesus are people whose lives are messed up in one way or the other (we could pick 10 people out of the phone book as well, for everyone's life bears the marks of sin in some way or the other). Some were so religious they couldn't see Jesus. Some were so rich they couldn't break away to follow Jesus. Some held been so immoral they didn't think they could be forgiven. They are representative of the whole human race insofar as they were people at their worst whom God transformed into people at their best. God loves to take messed up people and straighten them out�from the inside out. That's His specialty.
You may he saying to yourself, "My life is more messed up than the people we're reading about in these lessons. No one has done what I have done." My challenge to you is to let Him prove Himself to you. Your failures or confusion may seem monumental to you, but they don't to God. He can enter into your life and completely transform you. You only have to give Him the opportunity. Don't be like the rich young ruler who walked away, unwilling to trust Jesus. Instead, say "Yes" to Him today and become one who is transformed by your encounter with Him.
Did you know...?
When the Pharisees and scribes brought the woman taken in adultery to Jesus, they were playing fast and loose with the Mosaic Law. While it is true that, in general, a woman taken in adultery was to be put to death, that's only part of the story. In truth, stoning as the manner of execution was only prescribed if the woman was a virgin engaged to be married, and was found committing adultery (Deuteronomv 22:23-24). Furthermore, the law required that both the man and the woman were to be executed, and the Pharisees presented only the woman (Leviticus 20:10; Deuteronomv 22:22) For such sticklers of legal accuracy, they didn't quite do their homework in this case. Could Jesus have been writing out these scriptural references in the dirt, reminding them of where they had fallen short?
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