Drop Your Rock

DROP YOUR ROCK

JOHN 8: 1-11

JULY 7, 2002 CASUAL DAY

INTRODUCTION: GIVE ME LIBERTY!!

"If we wish to be free...we must fight! I repeat it, sir, we must fight! An appeal to arms, and to the God of hosts, is all that is left us...It is vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace--but there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!"

SOURCE: Patrick Henry, from Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations, 15th edition, rev. and enl., ed. Emily Morison Beck, Boston, MA: Littel, Brown & Co., 1980, p. 383.

TRANSITION SENTENCE: Today we celebrate Liberty! Maybe you are just about done with the celebration, but we continue on! Vacation and days off may end, but Liberty does not! Today we continue to celebrate our heritage as ONE NATION UNDER GOD, but some just do not like those words. The problem is the God thing! If we are ONE NATION UNDER GOD, what does this mean to us? Why is there such a struggle? I believe it is the demands we experience because we know we are ONE NATION UNDER GOD. But, what are these demands? They are the Demands of Freedom!!

THESIS SENTENCE: JESUS DEMANDS THAT WE NOT STONE ONE ANOTHER IN JUDGMENT: WE MUST DROP OUR ROCKS!

I. FREEDOM IS LOST WHEN WE FOCUS ON FAILURE (VV. 1-6)

A. Failure can be focused on individuals

1. Have you ever studied this text? Does this look like a set up to you?

2. The woman was caught in the very act!

3. Where was the man?? Leviticus 20: 10-16 states, “They both must be put to death.”

4. What was the goal of this encounter: it was a focus on failure!

5. Do we ever get caught in the trap of focusing on the failure of others? Do we enjoy seeing someone fall? If not, why do we dwell on the failure of others? You know, we remember and when we get a chance we help others remember. And, if this isn’t enough, we help the person who failed remember!

B. Failure can be focused on God

1. Have you ever studied this text? Does this look like a set up to you?

2. Not only is this woman being set up, Jesus himself is trying to be trapped (verse 6).

3. What was the hunger here? What was the desire of these “Religious” men?

4. Why would anyone live to trap another? Have we changed at all?

5. In our desire to be right, must everyone else be wrong? Are we open to the truth of God, the Father of Jesus? Or are we closed to any truth, but our truth? DO WE WANT TO SEE GOD FAIL?

ILLUSTRATION: Former televangelist Jim Bakker speaks of events that occurred immediately after his release from prison:

When I was transferred to my last prison, Franklin [Graham] said he wanted to help me out when I got out-with a job, a house to live in, and a car. It was my fifth Christmas in prison. I thought it over and said, "Franklin, you can’t do this. It will hurt you. The Grahams don’t need my baggage." He looked at me and he said, "Jim, you were my friend in the past and you are my friend now. If anyone doesn’t like it, I’m looking for a fight."

So when I got out of prison the Grahams sponsored me and paid for a house for me to live in and gave me a car to drive. The first Sunday out, Ruth Graham called the halfway house I was living in at the Salvation Army and asked permission for me to go to the Montreat Presbyterian Church with her that Sunday morning. When I got there, the pastor welcomed me and sat me with the Graham family. There were like two whole rows of them-I think every Graham aunt and uncle and cousin was there. The organ began playing and the place was full except for a seat next to me. Then the doors opened and in walked Ruth Graham. She walked down that aisle and sat next to inmate 07407-058. I had only been out of prison 48 hours, but she told the world that morning that Jim Bakker was her friend.

Afterwards, she had me up to their cabin for dinner. When she asked me for my addresses, I pulled this envelope out of my pocket to look for them. In prison you’re not allowed to have a wallet, so you just carry an envelope. She asked, "Don’t you have a wallet?" And I said, "Well, yeah, this is my wallet." After five years of brainwashing in prison you think an envelope is a wallet. She walked into the other room and came back and said, "Here’s one of Billy’s wallets. He doesn’t need it. You can have it."