When the Gospel Meets Our Sin






A woman is brought to Jesus caught in the act.

 Where is her partner who should be stoned with her?
Where is her husband?
Where is "his" wife?

 All great questions.
All troublesome realities in a messy and disastrous situation.
What's worse is that this woman simply served the part of a pawn in their plot to discredit the power and authority of Jesus.

 Jesus on trial:
If He agrees with the law, He's in trouble with Rome.
If He lets her off the hook, He's in trouble with the Law.

 What does Jesus do?
He tells them whoever doesn't have sin can cast the first stone.

 The funny thing is - He was the only one that day who could have cast a stone. And yet He doesn't. But He doesn't just let her off the hook either.

Jesus was neither a legalist or a liberalist. He was savior, redeemer, friend, and Lord in one simple statement...

 John 8:10–11 (ESV) Jesus stood up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” 11 She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.”

No sentence more adequately exemplifies John's assertion that Jesus was FULL of grace AND truth.

GRACE: Notice who goes on trial here... not the woman or her "partner" wherever he mysteriously disappeared to... No, they have come to put Jesus on trial with trumped up charges that will prove hollow (John is foreshadowing big time here). The grace is Jesus takes the abuse when she is the guilty party.

TRUTH: He was true in regards to the law. She could have been stoned, she should have died for her sin.

GRACE: Just as He did with Adam and Eve, Jesus (God the Son) spared her from the curse of sin. He stepped in and offered advocacy between the righteousness of the Father and her disgrace. He refused to condemn her.

TRUTH: She could not leave this moment the same way. She could not go back to her life of sin. No, Jesus has just intervened in her life, how could she ever misuse that kind of mercy!? She must GO and leave her life of sin.

This is the Gospel.
Adam and Eve should have died the moment they ate the fruit. But the Lord intervened and gave them grace and truth on how to live from then on.
This woman should have died but Jesus intervened, He would pay for her sin as well, but He gives her a new law to live by from then on.

This is the Gospel.
God sent Jesus to intervene for you, to take your place and bear your punishment. You cannot truly recognize that for what it is and live the same. Truth will expose you, Grace will spare you, and Truth will now lead you forward.

Go... in grace and sin no more.

PRAYER:
Thank You Father for forgiveness first. Thank You for the justification by faith accomplished for me in Christ Jesus Your Son. Help me walk differently by the Power of your Grace and the Word of Your Truth. I never want to go back from where You found me and saved me. Amen

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

God’s View of You

Sometimes I think we imagine that God is mostly disappointed with us. That He puts up with us and bears with us because He has to (after all He is love), but most of the time our glaring weaknesses weary Him and make His day miserable. Of course, this is the devil’s doing in our minds. The truth of scripture bears out that the world has to get staunch-raving evil before God is totally weary of us. And the stories in the Old Testament remind us with each passing character that God is patient, loving and kind to His very flawed inconsistent servants. Saul is a case study of this. His lineage will not hold the kingdom, that has already been stated from the mishap of offering the sacrifice instead of waiting for Samuel to arrive in 1 Samuel 13. His next great gaff will happen in the chapter to come in 1 Samuel 15 where his own kingship will be taken from him and the anointing placed on one soon to come. Yes, God will regret making Saul king and we’ll talk about that next. But for now...
Read more

The Stain of Slavery

One of the greatest pains in my heart over the history of the church is the fact that many "Bible-believing" Christians used the Bible to promote, continue, and enable slavery in America's past. It may have happened elsewhere, but I'm an American, and I know it happened here. Then, some repeatedly make the claim because of a tiny amount of verses where God informs Israel on how to take slaves, it means the Bible is a pro-slavery document. How absurd. The overarching narrative of the Bible is that God sets the slaves free. The second book testifies to this part of God's character.  Getting to Jeremiah's day, one of the reasons Israel's nation was handed over to exile was because they enslaved each other. This attitude was so engrained into the culture of Israel that they had a hard time giving up slavery even in the face of national catastrophe.  In Jeremiah 34, the king is promised that he will die in Babylon, but he will die in peace. Jeremiah 34:3–5 (ESV...
Read more

Leaders Who Later Fail

Remember Johanan from Jeremiah 41? The man who saved many others from the threats of the murderous coup? He seemed like a noble leader. But time reveals a lot.  Jeremiah 42:5–6 (ESV)  Then they said to Jeremiah, “May the LORD be a true and faithful witness against us if we do not act according to all the word with which the LORD your God sends you to us. 6 Whether it is good or bad, we will obey the voice of the LORD our God to whom we are sending you, that it may be well with us when we obey the voice of the LORD our God.” These are the words of the presumptive leaders of Israel in the land while the nation is in exile. The previous chapter saw a hero arise to protect a few remaining survivors. His name was Johanan. On the surface, he seems like a good man, seeking the will of the Lord in his leadership position. Jeremiah returns with directives from the Lord: Jeremiah 42:10 (ESV) If you will remain in this land, then I will build you up and not pull you down; I will plant y...
Read more