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Topic: Go and sin no more...
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becauseHElives
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Member # 87
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posted
![[thumbsup2]](graemlins/thumbsup2.gif)
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Strive to enter in at the strait gate:for many, I say unto you will seek to enter in, and shall not be able. ( Luke 13:24 )
Posts: 4578 | From: Southeast Texas | Registered: Jun 2002
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oneinchrist
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Member # 6532
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Good post Jeannie!,
I am in complete agreement as to the personal application of this truth into our lives........that God gives us good reason(forgiveness of sin and hope in the resurrection) to turn away from evil doings and that God will give us strength(as we go to Him in prayer for help) in facing particularly difficult temptations or challenges that we each have or will have in the future.
With love in Christ, Daniel
Posts: 1389 | From: Wind Lake, WI | Registered: May 2007
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Found in Him
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Member # 7596
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Go and sin no more
The Reformed Witness Hour
“Jesus went unto the mount of Olives. And early in the morning he came again into the temple, and all the people came unto him; and he sat down, and taught them. And the scribes and Pharisees brought unto him a woman taken in adultery; and when they had set her in the midst, They say unto him, Master, this woman was taken in adultery, in the very act. Now Moses in the law commanded us, that such should be stoned: but what sayest thou? This they said, tempting him, that they might have to accuse him. But Jesus stooped down, and with his finger wrote on the ground, as though he heard them not. So when they continued asking him, he lifted up himself, and said unto them, He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her. And again he stooped down, and wrote on the ground. And they which heard it, being convicted by their own conscience, went out one by one, beginning at the eldest, even unto the last: and Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst. When Jesus had lifted up himself, and saw none but the woman, he said unto her, Woman, where are those thine accusers? Hath no man condemned thee? She said, No man, Lord. And Jesus said unto her, Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.”
The account before us serves a twofold function. In it Jesus purposes to put to shame the legalism or the self-righteousness of the Pharisees who felt they had no sin. But in it He also teaches this woman who was caught in her sin of adultery. He confronts her also. And, as He does, He teaches her about her sin, about pardon, and the requirement of a godly life. And it is that instruction in particular that we wish to consider. Even though the two ideas are inseparably connected and, therefore, we must speak of them both, nevertheless, it is Jesus’ instruction to this adulteress that we are more particularly interested in. We consider our life of sanctification as it stands in inseparable union with our justification and the consciousness of the forgiveness of sins.
So the Pharisees come to Jesus and say, “Master, Teacher, this is what the law says. She has to be stoned to death. What do you say?” Notice how they try to place Jesus in opposition to the law of Moses: This is what the law says, but what do you say?
Obviously this was not a sincere question to which they sought Jesus’ answer. This was a sanctimonious question that sought to engage Jesus in disputation. And Jesus knew that. He refused to be drawn into such foolish and unlearned debate and questioning. He shows this to them simply by not answering them. He, instead, ignored them and stooped down and, with His finger, He wrote in the dirt. He acted like He did not even hear them, or that they were not even there. The foolish Pharisees themselves must have interpreted this response of Jesus as weakness. I suppose maybe they thought that finally they had ensnared Him. He did not know how to answer them.
“He that is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone.”
By these words Jesus called the accusers before the judgment seat of God and demanded them to look at themselves as God would view them. He forced them to look at their own lack of innocence before God. He forced them to see their own guilt. And then, if they felt no guilt before God, they could pick up the first stone and cast it at her.
This remark served its purpose well. Jesus had now, once again, publicly shamed them before men, even as they had sought to do this to Jesus. They could not cast the first stone, not because they felt any guilt or shame over their own sin, but lest they appear the worst hypocrites of all before the people. So, being convicted of their own evil consciences, they departed from Jesus, starting from the oldest and wisest of the Pharisees to the youngest and more foolhardy.
The result was that Jesus was left alone writing in the dirt as before.
But He was not completely alone. I mean, His disciples were standing there; probably the people He had been teaching were still standing there; and, Oh yes, there also stood in their midst that woman caught in adultery. She did not run away with her guilt. She did not sneak out of the midst of the crowd. She evidently felt she should yet remain until Jesus Himself had passed His verdict upon her.
Now, what would Jesus say to this woman? The people who were standing round about them were waiting to hear what Jesus was going to say. This woman was, after all, a terrible sinner. She deserved the punishment of stoning. What would the Master teach her, and what would He teach them? What, indeed, would be His judgment?
Now, the words that Jesus does say to her in these verses may seem as if He pardons her without the slightest sign that she was sorry for her sin. It may seem as if Jesus did not even care whether she was such a horrible sinner, as if He was now closing His eyes to her sin, as if it was not all that serious of a matter. But such was not the case. We know that God and Jesus never overlook sin, or allow the sinner to walk from Them feeling free to sin. But Jesus, being the divine Son of God, remember, was able to look under the surface and see into the heart of this woman. And, no doubt, what He saw in this woman was that, through her experience, she had become shamefully aware of the horror of her sin and its consequences. She had been jarred into the awareness of the wretchedness of her state of sin before God, and her extreme guilt, both by what the Pharisees had done and by what Jesus had said.
That this is the case is evident first of all by the fact that she did not run away from Jesus, but stood and waited for what Jesus would say. Even though she could have slipped out of the midst of these people now, she did not run. Even after her accusers were gone, she stayed there.
Secondly, it is evident from the words that she said to Jesus. He had asked her, “Woman, where are those thine accusers? Hath no man condemned thee?” Certainly she knew she was guilty. That was obvious to her, to the people, to Jesus Himself. She knew that, even though her accusers had walked away, she was guilty. She did stand condemned. But she only answered the question, making no excuses for herself: “No man, Lord.”
Lord! She called Jesus her Lord! Only the grace of God could have worked in the heart of this sinner to bring that name to her lips. One cannot help but notice the contrast between the sarcastic “Master” that the Pharisees spoke and the sincere “Lord” by which she now addresses Jesus. By it she acknowledges that Jesus was her King and Ruler, the One who had power and authority over all things and over her, too, to forgive her sin. He had power to condemn her in her sin. She recognized Him as the Judge of heaven and earth. By it she acknowledged that her life and salvation were in the hands of this Man who now stood before her, who had exposed the hypocrisy of the Pharisees. What she showed, therefore, is repentance and sorrow over sin. And, and this is the important thing, she recognized Jesus as her only deliverance from that sin in her life. “Lord.”
Her repentance was the same as ours when we acknowledge our sin before God and sorrow over that sin. She recognized the very same thing we do: that Christ is our only salvation from sin. Christ, as the Son of God, had the right to grant her the forgiveness of sin. And He did this by saying, “Neither do I condemn thee.” Oh, she deserved to be condemned. She deserved to be stoned to death for her sin according to the law. She was guilty as guilty could be. No one would deny that, least of all, now, she. She was under condemnation and guilt. But Jesus told her that He would not condemn her.
And if Jesus, the Judge of heaven and earth, will not condemn, that means that the accused is innocent in His sight. This woman’s sins were covered in His blood. She who of herself was unrighteous was now made righteous in Christ Jesus. She was justified by faith. Jesus had not yet gone to the cross; but when He did, her sins would be taken by this Lord and He would bear the punishment for them, and pay the price for them, and free her from guilt and condemnation.
Her sin was forgiven. We rejoice in that too. We do not take the side of the Pharisees and become offended with Jesus. We rejoice because, as horrible a sinner as she was, when we look at our own hearts, we would say that we are no better than she was.
We would say that, would we not? We had better. Or else we, surely, could pick up that first stone and throw it at her. We rejoice, therefore, because our sin, even as the sin of this woman, is forgiven us only for the sake of the death of Jesus Christ. Oh, the joy of being forgiven!
He does not demand of us something we cannot do, because He has not only performed a work for us on the cross, but He has performed a work in us. He did not die just to earn forgiveness for us, but He died in order that He might destroy the power of sin and death in our lives. Christ died in order that we might be cleansed, or washed, from the pollution of sin. And when He did this, He broke the bands that sin had on us and set us free. We now live in the liberty of Christ. Sin and Satan have been conquered, and Christ rules in our lives. Through that power and rule of Christ in us as our Lord, we receive the strength to say “No” to sin and Satan, the strength in our lives to go out and sin no more.
Now, I realize that though this is a reality, yet, nevertheless, we still do sin. I know that. I am not a perfectionist. I realize that this work of sanctification will not be complete until the day of our death, when we will shed the old man of sin and enter into heavenly glory and into perfection. While we are yet in this life, there still is sin. We are weak and helpless to defend ourselves. And if we were to stand in our own strength, then we will fall into temptation and sin. Nevertheless, we cling to Christ Himself. And when we cling to Christ, then, through that work of sanctification in us, we are given the strength to fight against sin.
It is on the basis of that work of sanctification that Christ gives us the command, Go and sin no more.
There is another reason, too, why we receive this command: Gratitude—pure and simple gratitude. If a man saved us from drowning, we would be extremely grateful to him, willing to do almost anything he asked of us. Well, people of God, Christ has delivered us from the pits of fiery perdition. He has delivered us from hell and all its agony and darkness, and given us the joy of a place in heaven. How thankful we should be! And, therefore, how we ought to strive and struggle and wrestle and fight with ourselves and our sin.
Jesus knows that we are not perfect. Jesus knew that this woman was far from perfect. He knew that she would still have to fight against that sin and temptation in her life. Yet, in His strength, she could do that. Every one of us has his own pet sin. Every one of us has a tendency to commit that sin over and over again in life. Maybe that sin is of a public nature. Maybe it is a sin that we alone, and God, know. We have our sins. And we are aware of them. Well, Jesus instructs in the words of this passage that we can, through Christ who strengthens us, overcome those sins. They ought not to hold sway over our hearts. We are called to forsake sin. And that, through the power of our Lord Jesus Christ.
We can never do that on our own—even if we make a conscious attempt to do so. I do not care how determined we may be to overcome sin in ourselves. We can say to ourselves, Never again. But on our own, we will never conquer them. To do so takes total dependence on Jesus Christ alone. And that, in turn, takes a continual work of God’s grace in us. Prayer, consistent prayer, living close to Jesus Christ, exercising ourselves in the means of grace—all these are necessary, you see, to draw our strength from Jesus Christ. And when we draw that strength from Christ, we can fight sin.
Then we can turn around and go, just as did this woman, with the joy of forgiveness and with a conviction of faith, and we can fight against sin. We can go forth as conquerors through Christ. In gratitude to God for our salvation, we will go and sin no more.
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~To Him That is able to keep you from falling and to present you before His glorious presence without fault and with great joy...to the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all ages, now and forevermore! Amen.~ Jude 24
Posts: 1503 | Registered: Jan 2009
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