Being With Jesus:
John 8:2-5
At dawn he appeared again in the temple courts, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them. The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?”
In one of my favorite books, What’s So Amazing About Grace, Philip Yancey writes,
“Grace means there’s nothing we can do to make God love us more—no amount of spiritual calisthenics and renunciations, no amount of knowledge gained from seminaries, no amount of crusading on behalf of righteous causes. And grace means there’s nothing we can do to make God love us less—no amount of racism, pride, pornography, adultery or even murder. Grace means that God already loves us as much as an infinite God can possibly love.”
That’s why I love this story of the adulterous woman’s life-transforming encounter with Jesus; it just exudes grace! And it reminds me of how God looks right into what Lewis Smedes called this, “glob of unworthiness that is me and offers to accept me, own me, hold me, affirm me, and never let go of me even if he’s not too impressed with what he has on his hands.”
A glob of unworthiness—that’s me…you, too! And that’s God—loving us, without limit—because of his incredibly great grace! King David, who knew a lot about personal failure and unworthiness, wrote in Psalm 103:8-14,
“The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love…he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us. As a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him; for he knows how we’re formed, he remembers that we’re dust.”
That theology of unconditional love, undeserved mercy and unlimited grace is what’s fleshed out here in this story in John 8. And it’s not only the message Jesus wrote with his finger as he stooped to scribble in the dirt, he wrote it with his blood as it dripped to the dirt from the cross. Grace is his life-message! Amazing grace, how sweet the sound! It’s the one thing that’ll touch your core need today; it’s the only thing that’ll transform our lost world.
In 1988, a concert was held in London’s Wembley Stadium, and throughout the day, bands blasted the crowd high on booze and drugs with their ear-splitting music. But for some reason, the promoters scheduled an opera singer as the closing act, Jessye Norman. At the finale, she walked out with no band or singers —unknown to the crowd, which was shouting for more Guns ‘n Roses. Jessye began to sing, “Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound. That saved a wretch like me!” And remark-ably, 70,000 fans got quiet.
By the second verse, “Twas grace that taught my heart to fear, and grace my fears relieved”, they were putty; by the third verse they were digging into their memories to sing along, “and grace will lead me home”. As she sang, “When we’ve been there ten thousand years, bright shining as the sun; We’ve no less days to sing God’s praise, than when we first begun” a transcendent reverence had enveloped the stadium.
What on earth wields that kind of power over a beleaguered psalmist, or an adulterous woman, or a stadium full of drug-addled rock-n-rollers? Grace!
Now don’t miss the point of this story: The adulterous woman reminds us that every sinner has a future, but every saint has a past. We’re all born broken, and we become whole only by the mending of grace, God’s glue. And no matter how bad, how unworthy, how disqualified you think you are, you are not beyond the renewing reach of God’s grace. That’s why prostitutes, publicans, and other sinners responded to Jesus so readily—still do. They knew their sin; that’s why forgiveness was so appealing.
And no matter how good, worthy and qualified you think you are, apart from grace, there’s no good in you. In fact, on your best day, apart from grace, Isaiah said your righteousness is as filthy rags. (Isaiah 64:6) That’s why, as C.S. Lewis said, “[Adulterous women] are in no danger of finding their present life so satisfactory that they cannot turn to God; [it’s] the proud …the self-righteous [that] are in that danger.”
So wherever you fall on the continuum—from super-saint to seedy sinner—just remember: every saint has a past, but every sinner has a future. And grace is there waiting for you! Grace! It’s only by grace that the brokenness we’re born with, and live with, is mended.
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“To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you.”
(C.S. Lewis)