A reading of the holy gospel according to Saint John. Jesus went out to the Mount Of Olives. At daybreak, that means he spent the night there. At daybreak, he reappeared in the temple area. That's, you know, right across the the Valley Of Kidron from Jerusalem, from the temple area.
And when the people started coming to Jesus, he sat down and began to teach them. The scribes and the pharisees led a woman forward who had been caught in adultery. Notice, she was caught in the act. They made her stand out in front of everyone and then said, teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. Now Moses in the law ordered such a person to be stoned.
What do you have to say in this case? They were posing this question to trap Jesus so that they could have something to accuse him of. Well, Jesus simply bent down started to write something on the ground with his finger or to trace something. We don't know what he did. When they persisted in their questioning, our lord straightened up and said to them, let the man among you who has no sin be the first to cast a stone at him.
Then a second time, Jesus bent down and wrote again on the ground. And the audience drifted away one by one beginning with the elders. This left Jesus alone with the woman who continued to stand there before Jesus. She didn't leave. Jesus finally straightened up again and said to her, woman, where did they all disappear to?
Has no one condemned you? No one, sir, she answered. Then Jesus said, nor do I condemn. You may go, but from now on, avoid sin. And this is the gospel of our lord.
In the name of the father and of the son and of the holy spirit. Amen. And indeed, this is good news. This is glorious news. This is a splendid mass.
You notice the the psalm, the good shepherd's psalm, the valley of death, that God is our light. Now here we have two very dramatic stories. They're as dramatic as you can get. They're so dramatic that some people are ashamed to read the first one. Now we have here two women accused of adultery.
In one instance, the woman is perfectly innocent. She's been framed. She is accused by those who were to by their relentless, vengeance, were out to destroy her, and they very they very nearly did, almost did, but not quite. In the valley of death, the lord plucked her right out with the words of Daniel. So here we have innocence falsely accused but saved by a direct intervention of god, well, direct through Daniel.
Now in the second reading, that is in the gospel reading, it's a very different story. Here we have a woman taken in adultery. The law said she had to be taken in the act. And she was. And her accuser stood there and said, here we found this woman committing adultery and the law says stone her.
Now notice they thought they had Jesus really tight. I love this story. Because you see, if he said, No. After all, she seems to be repentant and if you're going to stone her, why don't you bring that guy in here and destroy him too? If you're going to have a stoning, let's have a double stoning.
So they thought that they had Jesus because if he said, Don't they said if he said, Go ahead and obey the law and stone her, then you see he would be rejecting his reputation for benevolence and forgiveness and kindness and understanding and sympathy and on and on. So that on the other hand, if they said, oh, no. Don't stone her. Then he would be rejecting the law, and that's what they wanted him to do. They were out to catch him.
They were out to destroy Jesus just as the accusers of Susanna were out to destroy her. They weren't looking for truth. They wanted to get rid of Jesus Christ. He was a real obstacle. He was causing a commotion up in the temple area.
Now notice how Jesus handles this. It's a dilemma and the force of a it's a it's the strongest kind of an argument because you give your opponent two or three choices, and he has to accept one of them. And anyone he accepts destroys him, frustrates him, proves against him. It's a powerful it's the most powerful debating instrument as you all know. So it looks like they have Jesus good and tight because he either has says you do obey the law or you don't obey the law.
That's a contradictory. Absolutely sound. There's no intermediate there. So they thought they had Jesus right in device. Now notice what are how quick how very careful this is done or carefully.
Jesus, they said, we took her in adultery. The law says stone her. Jesus says, very well. Very well. Let he let him who is without sin cast the first stone.
He says nothing about the guilt of the woman. He doesn't say a thing about, whether or not all his his accepting the law, all he's saying is, go ahead and stone her, but be you've got to be the one the sinless one to do it. And the result is they her notice her accusers left. They're the only ones who saw her taken in adultery. Our Lord didn't see her take he didn't see it, and it had to be in octu.
It had to be in the actual thing. So when Our Lord straightens up again, he says, Woman, where are your accusers? And she says, They've gone. Well, Our Lord had no evidence to accuse her with. So, yeah, he was pretty smart.
He may not have read Aristotle's categories, but he knew a thing or two about common sense. And he was smart, believe it or wonderful story, absolutely fantastic story. And so notice how you know, some of our good people today, they use this as an argument for adultery or for fornication. They say, look, our lord didn't condemn the woman and here she was taken in adultery. He didn't see her taken in adultery.
He didn't accuse her of adultery. And the point is this, she was guilty. Now that's my point. Susanna was perfectly innocent, a good, pure woman. This other woman is not.
She was guilty. No question about it. Even there wasn't even if her accusers left, she they they had taken her in the act. Now my point is this, in one case, you have a sinner, and in the other case, you have a sinless one. And both are saved by by god's mercy.
There is that's my point. That's my point. Because who are we to say we are sinless? And if we are Christians, who are we to say that I walk in the valley of death without any hope, without any light? See, this was Luther's, tremendous affliction.
He felt he was a he was a sinful man and there was no hope. Well, the whole point of Christianity is I am a sinless man, but I'm full of hope. It's glorious. I told you this is a marvelous, magnificent two magnificent narratives full of hope and joy and triumph for us. Not because we are sinless as Susanna was, but because we are sinful as the woman taken in adultery was.
But Christ did not accuse her, and Christ never accused any sinner whatsoever. One exception, the good people. The people who kept the law, they couldn't find any fault with themselves. They are the ones he accused, hypocrites. In the name of the father, son, and holy spirit.
Amen.