H. Michael Brewer
Crescent Springs Presbyterian
August 1, 2004
JESUS’ GREATEST HITS: The First Stone
John 7:53 – 8:11
If you backed me into a corner and forced me to name my favorite Bible story, this might very
well be the one. In no other story does the wisdom and compassion of Jesus shine so brightly. It’s
ironic then, that this beloved story almost didn’t make it into the Bible. You see, the oldest and best
copies of John’s Gospel do not include this story. This story was not originally part of the Gospel of
John, but we also have evidence that the story is very old.
Here’s what we think. None of the gospel-writers chose to include this story for some reason, but
the story was so beautiful that it refused to die. Preachers and congregations loved the story so much
that they kept it alive by word of mouth until eventually some bold Christian scribe copied the story
into the Gospel of John so that it wouldn’t be forgotten. You’ve been taught that there are four New
Testament Gospels, but in a way this little story is a fifth Gospel—a very brief, anonymous Gospel
that barely sneaked into the Bible. I thank God that it wasn’t left out.
I want to approach this story by asking three questions, but first let’s set the scene. A woman is
caught in the very act of adultery, which in ancient Israel was one of the three most terrible sins, along
with idol worship and murder. In hopes of embarrassing Jesus, the scribes and Pharisees bring the
woman to him for judgment. Keep in mind, this is not a legal court, not by 1st Century Jewish
standards, so we’re not going to try to apply this story to our American trial-by-jury judicial system.
Instead, let’s stay closer to home; let’s concentrate on what this story teaches us about how to treat
other.
The scribes and Pharisees are not concerned with justice. In their eyes, this woman is nothing but
a pawn by which they hope to trap Jesus in an impossible situation. If Jesus says to stone the woman
according to Old Testament law, Jesus is in trouble with the Romans who do not let the Jews practice
the death penalty. And if Jesus says to let the woman go, then he can be accused of flouting Old
Testament law.
Here’s the first question I want to ask. What’s wrong with this picture? Doesn’t adultery generally
involve two people? Why is there only one culprit about to be stoned? Where is the man? If this
seems terribly unfair to you, I agree. We can see so clearly the double standard here. What we
cannot see as clearly are the double standards we use when we pass judgment on others. This may
rankle a bit, but the NT teaching is that you and I are not fair or impartial or pure enough to pass
judgment on anybody else. Jesus warned us about that again and again and again. Here he says, “Let
the one who has not sinned be the first to throw a stone at this sinner.” Elsewhere Jesus says, “Do not
judge, so that you may not be judged. For the measure you give will be the measure you get. Why do
you see the speck in your neighbor’s eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye?” (Matthew 7:1-
3 NRSV).
By the way, there’s probably a reason this story is slipped into John’s Gospel at this particular
place. The story serves as a commentary on something Jesus says just a few verses later when he tells
the crowd, “You judge by human standards; I judge no one,” (John 8:15 NRSV).
Or to be more literal, Jesus says, “You judge according to the flesh.” What does that mean? It
means, friends, that we see the sins of others with 20/20 vision, but we are blind or at least myopic
when it comes to seeing our own flaws. What’s wrong with this picture? We have no business
passing judgment because our judgment is always lopsided, unfair and according to the flesh.
So they stand this woman in the middle of the street and they say to Jesus, “What do you think?
Should we kill her?” Almost as if he hasn’t heard them, Jesus squats down and begins to doodle in
the dust, which leads me to my next question. Why—and what—is Jesus writing in the dirt?
People have been trying to figure this out for centuries, and ingenious theories abound. One possibility
is that Jesus is simply stalling for time so that he can give this thorny problem some thought.
Or it may be that by ignoring the scribes and Pharisees, he forces them to repeat their question,
allowing the crowd to consider how cruel and heartless they are.
One popular idea is that Jesus stooped down and wrote a list of the sins committed by the people
in the crowd, forcing each person to examine his or her own conscience. A tongue-in-cheek variation
on that notion is that the crowd is made up mostly of upright, married Jewish men and Jesus is writing
down the names of their girlfriends!
Another theory is that Jesus is adopting the practice of Roman judges who wrote out the charge
against a criminal, read it out loud, and then wrote out the verdict and sentence and read those aloud.
This is the only instance in the Bible in which Jesus writes something, and we don’t know what it was.
You may have your own ideas, but nobody knows for sure. But let me tell you two things that we can
be certain of. First, we know that judges in that time and place usually stood up to deliver a verdict.
When you picture this scene what do you see? The scribes and Pharisees are standing. The crowd is
standing. The accused woman is standing. As he scribbles in the dirt, Jesus is the only one who isn’t
standing up. Jesus intentionally lowers himself, accepts a humble position, and rejects the posture of
judgment.
The other thing we can be sure of is that whatever Jesus wrote, it didn’t last long. Trampling feet
and ox-carts and wind must have erased those words within a few minutes. If Jesus was writing sins
in the dust—the sins of the crowd or the charges against the adulteress—that record certainly wasn’t
permanent. That’s a pretty good metaphor for the way in which God deals with our sins in Jesus
Christ. Our mistakes are swept away, the charges against us trodden underfoot, our sins blown away
and in God’s eyes it is as if they never existed.
After Jesus speaks to the crowd, they slowly drift way, from the oldest to the youngest. Jesus
looks up from his doodling and says, “Woman, where are those who accused you? Has no one
condemned you? Neither do I condemn you. Go your way, and from now on do not sin again.”
This raises for me one last question. Is Jesus soft on sin? I’m sure I’m not the first to ask this
question. In fact, I suspect this is the very reason this story almost got left out of the Bible, a concern
that Jesus would seem to be lax in matters of morality. Of course, a close reading of the story shows
no such thing. Jesus never denies that adultery is a serious sin, nor does Jesus tell this woman that her
behavior is okay. Quite the opposite, Jesus tells her to go and do better, to sin no more.
Every saint has a past, and every sinner has a future. Jesus apparently believes that the possibilities
of the future matter more than the burdens of the past. The Gospel of Jesus Christ has always been a
Gospel of second chances and fresh starts, and our Lord sees not only what a person is, but also
what that person might become.
I remember an episode of All in the Family from many years ago. Edith and her gruff, judgmental
husband Archie are attending Edith's high school class reunion. Edith encounters an old classmate by
the name of Buck who, since graduation, had become excessively obese. Edith and Buck have a
delightful conversation about old times and the things that they did together, but remarkably Edith
doesn't seem to notice how extremely heavy Buck has become. Later, when Edith and Archie and
talking, she says in her whiny voice, “Archie, ain't Buck a beautiful person?” Archie looks at her with
disgust and says: “You’re a pip, Edith. You know that? You and I look at the same guy and you see
a beautiful person and I see a blimp.” Edith gets a puzzled expression on her face and says, “Yeah,
ain't it too bad.”
Yeah, it is too bad. It’s too bad that the scribes and Pharisees didn’t see a woman, only a pawn.
It’s too bad the crowd didn’t see a human being, only a sinner. It’s too bad Jesus was the only one
who saw a life worth saving and a person worth loving. Jesus took sin seriously; he took it more
seriously than anyone else who ever lived. He took it all the way to the cross. Jesus isn’t soft on sin,
but he is very much in love with sinners.
Soli Deo Gloria!