In chapters 2 through 7 of the Gospel of John we have seen in Jesus’ interaction with many people who demonstrated in their lives some of the characteristics of people who have not had their lives changed by Jesus. We have talked about spiritual blindness, spiritual thirst, prejudice, helplessness, spiritual hunger, and unbelief. Now in chapter 8 when Jesus interacts with the scribes and Pharisees, He brings them face to face with their hypocrisy.
Jesus is now once more in the temple court where He begins to teach the people about Himself. As Jesus is speaking, the Pharisees, who have been trying to get the better of Him in arguments with miserable results so far, have finally come up with a plan to trick Him into a dilemma. They bring to Jesus a woman who they say has been caught “in the very act!” of adultery. It begs the question where were they and what were they doing when this took place. They explain to Jesus that in the Law of Moses they are commanded to stone such women. They were only partially right in that stoning was for only certain circumstances, but maybe they were right because they knew more than they were telling.
The dilemma for Jesus, they assumed, was that if Jesus said “Stone her”, He would be obeying the Law of Moses, but would run afoul of Rome because the Roman authorities forbade the use of capital punishment except for crimes against Rome and with the explicit permission of Rome. If Jesus said “don’t stone her.” He would be in violation of the Mosaic Law. They hoped that in either case they would have a “gotcha.”
Jesus didn’t answer them. Instead He stooped and wrote on the ground with His finger, ignoring them completely. What He wrote of course is not known, but the subsequent story seems to indicate that they knew what He wrote. The Pharisees were zealous beyond belief to keep the Law, in particular the Ten Commandments. But Jesus might have written some of the other sins with which we are all familiar. He might have written greed, lust, jealousy, gossip, immorality, dissensions, enmity, strife, anger and the list might go on. They kept hounding Him to answer their question while watching Him write. Finally, facing them once again, He simply said “He who is without sin among you, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.” Silence reigned. Finally, the oldest in the group turned and walked away, followed by the rest until all had left and Jesus remained with the woman.
Jesus turned to the woman and asked “Where are your accusers? Did no one accuse you?” She replied “No one Lord.” Amazing! She acknowledged Jesus as Lord. Jesus then told her that He did not condemn her either but to go and sin no more.
Following this Jesus once again turned to teaching about Himself. Here He declares another of the “I am” statements. “I am the Light of the world.” What follows is another of the arguments between Jesus and the Pharisees. The debate gets pretty heated at least from the Pharisees’ side. Jesus once more declares where He has come from, what His task is, who His Father is, what His message is. He tells them that contrary to their self righteous opinion, they are “from below”, a euphemism for “the pit of hell”, while He (Jesus) is “from above” and if you don’t believe this “you will die in your sins.” “If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” The Pharisees make two statements in their defense. They remind Jesus that they are children of Abraham and because of that they have never been slaves of anyone. Did they forget their history? Were they not slaves in Egypt? And are they not forgetting the present when they were subjugated by Rome? It’s tough being on the wrong side of an argument! Then they told Jesus that “we have one Father: God.” Jesus reminds them that they have failed the test on both statements. As a child of Abraham they do not live like Abraham – in faith. And they do not obey God so are not children of God either. Rather they are children of Satan.
Since they could not win the argument they resort to insult. “You are a Samaritan, and you are demon possessed.” I’m sure that really made a point!
Jesus threw one final point at them by declaring that not only was He a Jew, but He was greater than Abraham because “before Abraham was, I am.” He is the everlasting Son of God. At this the Pharisees were so incensed that they picked up stones to stone Him on the spot, but Jesus escaped.
Hypocrisy is a dangerous game. It is a disconnect between the image we have of ourselves, and the truth that others see. The hypocrite is lying to himself. But in addition to that, as the interaction between the Pharisees, Jesus and the woman indicates, the Pharisees had the mistaken view that they had the moral authority to condemn the woman. It is so easy to find ways in which others have failed and to judge them for it. But there are two things we must consider before we try that. First is that we must have the moral authority to do so by our own life. Second, we must take the view that Jesus took which was that before we judge anyone, our first priority must be to point them to Christ. Jesus did not condone the sin of the woman. But He accepted her recognition of Him as Lord and told her to sin no more.
God’s work through the church today must be redemptive. That is, our first priority must be to point people to Jesus, not judge them. It is never our responsibility to “clean people up” to make them fit for our church. That’s God’s job. He told us to go and make disciples of Jesus. If we have any other priority than that, hypocrisy lurks at the door. As Jesus so vividly explained in Matthew 8:5 “You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.”
I have had many occasions when I have been challenged by people who insist that in my position I should be confronting some behaviour which I admit was inappropriate in some way. I have refused by saying that was not my job. My job is to point or lead people to Christ. His job is to transform their lives, full stop. There are circumstances where it is time to challenge wrong-doing, but the first priority is redemptive and that must remain so in all our dealings.
Faith for Life 