#castthefirststone

Have you ever had a song or a part of a song stuck in your head?  You know like, . . .  “Mahna Manhna.”   You’re welcome.

Back in the early eighties I heard a song once, only once as far as I can remember.  It was in the kitchen of our family home on Golden Grove Rd. in Saint John.  We were that family that always had a radio playing in the kitchen.  And one afternoon I hear a song, didn’t catch the name of the artist but the words of the chorus stuck in my head.  For over thirty years they have lived there, and every once in a while I’d try and track down what the song was.  And low and behold the other day thanks to the power of the interwebby I found it.

The song was recorded by a young Christian artist by the name of Robyn Pope who had limited success for a few years in the United States.  Why it was played on a secular radio station in Saint John New Brunswick is beyond me.  But the line that has been stuck in my head for the past thirty years, is “Cast the first stone if you think you’re so hot, if you think that she’s wicked and you think that you’re not.”

To put it into context, here is first verse and chorus song by Robyn Pope. 

Maybe you know the story and maybe you don’t.  It was read this morning from the book of John Chapter 8 the first eleven verses.  It’s pretty self-explanatory; really all you have to do is read it to get a sense of what is happening.

And today I’m sure that if someone was tweeting about this event the hashtag would be #castthefirststone.  We are in our second week of our “Hashtag This” series, and over the next few weeks we will be looking at various words and phrases from the bible that deserve a hashtag.

A woman had been caught committing adultery, a sin that was considered a crime under Jewish law.  As a matter of fact the Rabbis said “Every Jew must die before he will commit idolatry, murder or adultery.”  A view that obviously wasn’t shared by everyone.  In particular, a view that must not have been shared by this woman, at least not in practice.

You’ve either heard the story or you’ve heard the phrase “Cast the first stone” which is the central part of what happened that day.  This morning we are going to look at the characters who made up the story.

1) The Accused Let’s start by clearing a couple of things up right away.  First you ever get the impression that the woman here was an innocent spectator? You kind of get the idea that she was just standing on the side of the road and they grabbed her and dragged her to Jesus.  I don’t know how many times I’ve heard this message preached and I’ve always gone away feeling sorry for the woman.  Hold it.  The woman was an adulteress.  The Bible says that she’d been caught in bed with a man who wasn’t her husband.  Now I don’t know for sure what she was doing in bed with the man who wasn’t her husband but I’d be willing to bet they weren’t playing checkers. 

Now in 2016 Adultery may not seem all that serious.  Across the border in the presidential race one candidate is an adulterer and the other candidate is married to an adulterer and it hasn’t seemed to hurt either of them.   And all most of us probably know at least one adulterer or adulteress, but in Jesus day it was a pretty dangerous accusation.

The second impression that you get from hearing some of these sermons was that she was just caught in the act right then and dragged from the scene and thrown at the feet of Jesus, but it doesn’t even imply that it had just happened. 

So we probably should presume, because we don’t know any different that the woman was fully clothed and her husband or her partner’s wife or whoever had caught them, had reported them to the powers that be and now action was being taken.

The third impression that you get is that the man got away with it.  You hear preachers asking that question “Where was the man”?  And then saying things like “She couldn’t have been alone.”  As if this was some grand conspiracy where only the woman involved in adultery was punished.  And then the preachers start speculating that the person that she had been caught with was one of the religious leaders or someone important.

Maybe, but according to one source the Mishnah, or Jewish codified law states the penalty for adultery would be strangulation and it even lays down the method.

It then reiterates that death by stoning is the penalty for a girl who is betrothed and then commits adultery.  So, maybe the guy had already paid the price.

We know nothing else about this woman other than the bare facts laid down in John’s narrative.  She was caught in adultery and was being sentenced.  There was no defense for her; she couldn’t appeal to a higher court. 

She had started writing the story and her accusers would finish it for her.  As a Jewish woman, in a Jewish culture, raised in a knowledge of the Jewish law she would have known the consequences of her actions. 

We might ignore the words of the law laid down in the Old Testament but for her that wouldn’t have been an option so she would have known that Leviticus 20:10 “If a man commits adultery with his neighbor’s wife, both the man and the woman who have committed adultery must be put to death.

When she started down that path, she would have known the ultimate destination if she got caught.  She may very well have thought that she wouldn’t get caught but she knew what the law dictated would happen if she did get caught.

We might feel sorry for her, we might feel that the punishment didn’t fit the crime, after all what would happen today if adulterers & adulteresses were put to death.  Other than the fact that the unemployment problem would be solved with all those jobs opening up, Hillary would be a widow, the Donald Trump question would have already been answered, Hollywood would be a virtual ghost town and most of us would lose some friends.

And as much as we might feel that this was extreme and unjust action, in her country, under her religion according to her traditions and customs she was simply getting what she deserved no more no less.

Which brings us to 2) The Accusers The scriptures tell us they were the teachers of religious law and Pharisees.  These men were the court of Israel.  They were the legal experts of the day.  When you had an issue that needed to be resolved this is where you brought it. 

And so it was to these men that the woman was brought.  Probably by her husband who explained the situation and presented the witnesses.  You see it wouldn’t be enough that he had caught her in the act because the law may have been harsh but it tried to be fair and so it said in Deuteronomy 17:6 But never put a person to death on the testimony of only one witness. There must always be two or three witnesses. 

That is reiterated in Deuteronomy 19:15-19 You must not convict anyone of a crime on the testimony of only one witness. The facts of the case must be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses. “If a malicious witness comes forward and accuses someone of a crime, then both the accuser and accused must appear before the Lord by coming to the priests and judges in office at that time. The judges must investigate the case thoroughly. If the accuser has brought false charges against his fellow Israelite, you must impose on the accuser the sentence he intended for the other person. In this way, you will purge such evil from among you.

Now that’s the bare bones of the situation, but it’s not all the story.  To put a wrinkle in the story these men did not have the right to put this woman to death, and they knew it. 

“But Denn, you said”, I know what I said.  I said that the penalty for her crime was death under Jewish law.  Right?  Right. 

But they weren’t under Jewish law, remember they were an occupied country and they were under Roman law, and under Roman law nobody but the Roman Authorities could impose the death sentence.

You might recall that is why the Jews took Jesus to Pilate to be condemned to death; they didn’t have the authority to do it.  I don’t know what they were going to do with the woman, but it wasn’t going to be death.  Or at least there had been a pretty good chance that it wouldn’t be.

But then they started spouting off things like John 8:5 “The law of Moses says to stone her. What do you say?” And that’s when the reality of the situation started to sink in.  She knew that the penalty for adultery was death but it had been a while since the penalty had been carried out and she wasn’t really all that interested in seeing a return to tradition.  But why now?  What was happening here? 

Well, to be truthful I don’t think that this woman or what she did was all that important to the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law of Moses.  Oh they would have looked at her with contempt, and probably made some rude comments about her private life. 

They may have granted her husband a divorce and made life pretty miserable for her.  But she was just a secondary concern; they had bigger fish to fry.

The woman was just an excuse; she was bait for the bigger fish.  You see this young carpenter from Galilee, Jesus was getting on their nerves and they were looking for some way to discredit him.  It wasn’t the first time nor would it be the last; remember these were the same guys who asked him in Luke 20:22 “Now tell us—is it right for us to pay taxes to Caesar or not?”

And in Matthew 19:3 Some Pharisees came and tried to trap him with this question: “Should a man be allowed to divorce his wife for just any reason?”

and in Mark 8:11 When the Pharisees heard that Jesus had arrived, they came and started to argue with him. Testing him, they demanded that he show them a miraculous sign from heaven to prove his authority.  Kind of a recurring theme wouldn’t you think?

And so the question they pose to Jesus is this, “Will you side with the Jewish law, the law of your forefathers or will you side with the Roman oppressors?”    It was really a lose, lose situation for Jesus. 

If he said “stone her” then they could go to the Romans and say, “Look here’s a man who’s challenging your authority.  On the other hand, if he says “don’t stone her” then they go to the Jew’s and say “See, he’s challenging the authority of scripture.

The woman was a nothing to the Pharisees and rulers of the law, she had no name, no personality, no feelings, and she was simply a pawn.  A piece to be played in the game they waged against Jesus.  They were using her the same way they would use a tool.

3) The Forgiver And so it’s in this little soap opera that we see Jesus at his best.  Because unlike the Pharisees, Jesus knew the woman, he had been there when she was created, he knew her when she was being knit together in her mother’s womb, he knew the numbers of her hair and he knew the condition of her heart. 

And unlike the Pharisees he cared about the woman, it was for her that he left heaven and came to earth, it was for her that he was willing to live as a mortal for thirty-three years, and ultimately it would be for her that he would allow himself to be nailed to a cross and die.

You gotta get the picture.  Jesus is teaching a crowd of people, and as was the custom of the day when a Rabbi had something very important to teach he did it sitting down with people gathered all around him.  And so there he sat, and there they stood. 

A woman who if not full of remorse was almost certainly full of shame, her head bowed, her eyes looking at the dirt, knowing that she was guilty.  Surrounded her were the religious teachers, her judges, the ones who had her very life in their hands.  And they were demanding an answer. 

And he didn’t say a word, he just bent over and started doodling in the dirt, and they stood there looking down on him demanding that he make a decision concerning this woman’s life.  And he continued to write in the sand, kind of an interesting reaction. 

Wonder why he did that?  There have been at least four suggestions.  1) To give him time, he didn’t want to be rushed into a rash statement, so this was a little bit of a time out.  Perhaps he was thinking things through and more importantly taking time to ask his Father what he should do. 

2) Perhaps by doing this he was forcing the Pharisees and scribes to repeat their charges, so they could hear exactly what they were saying. 

3) Maybe he did it so that he wouldn’t have to look in their eyes.  The leering, lustful looks of the religious leaders, the morbid curiosity of the crowd, and the shame of the woman all combined to twist his heart in knots.  So he hid his eyes.

4)  The most interesting suggestion by far is that as he sat there doodling in the dust, he was actually jotting down the sins of the men who stood before him.  This goes a little deeper than mere speculation.  Again let’s remember that the Bible wasn’t written in English, it was written in Greek which was a much more expressive language then English.  English is kind of a lazy language.  We’ll take one word and make it mean half a dozen different things. 

Like the word fast.  It can mean quick, it can mean go without food, it can mean to tie something up, it can mean that the colors won’t fade, it can mean to be loyal, it can mean to be sexually promiscuous or it can mean that your watch gained time. 

The Greek word that would normally have been used here for writing should have been graphein which simply means to write.  But John adds the prefix of Kata to the word which means against.  Making the word katagraphein which meant to write down a record against someone. 

And so some have suggested that Jesus was confronting the men with their own sins.  Bob beat his wife last week, Fred cheated on his taxes, Joe stole from his neighbor, and Jacob slept with Marks wife.  I’ve also heard it suggested that he was writing the names of their girlfriends in the dust for all to see.

But whatever he was doing the leaders continued to demand an answer and so Jesus gave it to them John 8:7-8 They kept demanding an answer, so he stood up again and said, “All right, but let the one who has never sinned throw the first stone!” Then he stooped down again and wrote in the dust.

 Maybe this was when they noticed what the words actually said that he was writing out, I don’t know but something struck a chord because the Bible says John 8:9-11 When the accusers heard this, they slipped away one by one, beginning with the oldest, until only Jesus was left in the middle of the crowd with the woman. Then Jesus stood up again and said to the woman, “Where are your accusers? Didn’t even one of them condemn you?” “No, Lord,” she said. And Jesus said, “Neither do I. Go and sin no more.”

Now as a side bar to our sermon, you may have noticed in your bibles a footnote that says that this particular story was not included in many of the early manuscripts that have been found of the New Testament. 

And that is true; the earliest manuscripts don’t include this story.  However, some scholars feel that it wasn’t included in the earliest manuscripts because those who edited the text of the New Testament thought that this was a dangerous story, a justification for a light view of adultery and therefore omitted it. 

None other than Augustine said that the story was removed from text of the gospel because some were of slight faith and to avoid scandal.

William Barclay who wrote the daily study Bible Commentary had this to say “We may be sure that this is a real story about Jesus, although one so gracious that for a long time men were afraid to accept it.”

Now back to the message.  It’s easy to draw the wrong lesson here and to get the impression that Jesus took the woman’s sin all too lightly, as if it didn’t matter.  He didn’t say “I am not going to judge you”.  What he said was “I am not going to judge you just now, go and sin no more.” 

Jesus was asking her if she was an adulterer or if she had simply committed adultery, and there is a world of difference.    It was Richard North Patterson who wrote  “No one should be judged by the worst moment of his life.”

So what he was doing wasn’t so much abandoning judgment as much as deferring judgment.  He was saying, “Go and prove that you can do better” Jesus attitude to this sinner and to us as sinners involves a number of things.

1) It Involved a Second Chance, it was as if Jesus was saying, “I know that you’ve made a mess of things, but life is not finished yet, I’m giving you another chance a chance to redeem yourself.”  Let it be known in Jesus is a gospel of second chances. 

Jesus was always interested not only in what a person was but in what a person could be.  He didn’t say that what people had done didn’t matter, broken laws and broken hearts always matter but he knew that people not only have a past but they have a future.

And isn’t that what Jesus has done for all of us, give us a second chance?  Where we can come and ask him to forgive our sins and repent, that is turn from our sins, and through his help seek to do better.

2) It Involved Mercy The basic difference between Jesus and the Pharisees was they wished to condemn the woman he wished to forgive the woman.  If we read between the lines of the story we can see that they were taking great pleasure in what they were doing and would relish in being able to stone the woman.

3) It Involved Challenge.  Jesus confronted this woman with the challenge of a different life.  He wanted her to know the reality of 2 Corinthians 5:17 This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!  But what he didn’t say was “It’s all right, don’t worry: just go on as you are doing.”  he said “it’s all wrong, go out and fight and change your life from top to bottom, go and sin no more.”

It wasn’t an easy forgiveness, instead it was a challenge which pointed a sinner to heights of goodness which she couldn’t even imagine.

4) It Involved a Warning.  It may not be said but it is certainly implied.  Here we are face to face with the eternal choice.  Jesus confronted the woman with a choice that same choice he gives each one of us, either to go back to our old ways or to reach out to the new way with him.  This story is unfinished, for every life in unfinished until it stands before God.

So where are you at?  If you can’t put yourself in the woman’s place, then you are putting yourself in the Pharisees place. 

Listen to me very carefully.  There isn’t any sin in the world that you aren’t capable of.  I had a friend of mine who told me he couldn’t imagine how anyone could commit adultery and today he is living with another man’s wife while his wife lives alone.  You best be careful before you pick up a rock and throw it. 

Maybe you’re standing where the woman stood and you know that you’ve done wrong and you can’t imagine what Jesus would want with the likes of you, and he’s saying “The story’s not over yet, go and sin no more.”  That doesn’t just involve being sorry for sinning it involves being so sorry that you turn from your sin and that is called repentance.  listen to the message that Jesus has for you today “Where are your accusers? Didn’t even one of them condemn you?” “No, Lord,” she said. And Jesus said, “Neither do I. Go and sin no more.”