Thankful For Grace And Forgiveness

If you were here for our service last Wednesday evening, you know that we studied the same passage that I'm looking at this morning. The passage comes from the Gospel of John 8: 2-11. That passage is all about God's grace and forgiveness. This passage is an excellent example of how forgiveness works.

Over the years I have preached quite a few sermons about forgiveness. Inevitably someone the same day or possibly the next week will come and talk about how hard it is to forgive someone. Or they have also expressed that the things they have done in life would be, in their opinion, unforgivable.

There are a lot of people that live under this same heavy burden. They know the pain they have caused, and they live daily in the shame and guilt. Maybe you fall into that category today. But the good news that I share with each of these persons is the same good news that is available to everyone. Jesus came to forgive and to give grace to all who will trust in Him.

How do I receive this forgiveness? You simply go in prayer and ask. Let's talk about forgiveness today that is given to us by the grace of God. Prayer

John 8:2-6a – “At dawn he went to the temple again, and all the people were coming to him. He sat down and began to teach them. 3 Then the scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman caught in adultery, making her stand in the center.

**********4 “Teacher,” they said to him, “this woman was caught in the act of committing adultery. 5 In the law Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say?” 6 They asked this to trap him, in order that they might have evidence to accuse him.

If you look at verse 1, you'll see that Jesus got up early in the morning and went to the mountain to pray. If you've been with us in our study, you would know that in chapter 7 Jesus had boldly declared some truths at the Feast of Tabernacles in the city of Jerusalem. What He declared stirred the religious leaders. Now Jesus goes back to the temple again in the wee hours of the morning and all of the people were coming to him. So, Jesus did what he does best.

The religious leaders thought this would be a prime time to put Jesus on the spot. They bring to Jesus a woman who had been caught in the act of adultery. Now let's not read over that too quickly. They didn't bring her to Jesus to determine if she was innocent or guilty. She was guilty.

One interesting thing about this situation is the guilty man. In the law of Moses that was recorded back in Deuteronomy, it called for both guilty parties to be killed, but in this instance, they only brought the woman. This is our first indication that they were more interested in testing Jesus than they were in keeping the law. DO you see it? They were clearly more concerned with wiping out the Messiah than they were with wiping out the sin.

I never really liked tests. Did you? I really disliked the midterms and the finals where you had to regurgitate everything that you had learned up to that point. It was a lot of pressure. The Pharisees waited until Jesus was teaching a crowd of people, and then they sprung a pop quiz on Him. All of this was a plan to discredit Jesus in any way that they could. Again, they weren't so much interested in the sin that was committed as they were in disproving Jesus as the Messiah.

They bring this woman that was caught in adultery to Jesus, and they ask Him, “In the law, Moses commanded us to stone such women, so what do you say?

The easiest response would have been for Jesus to refuse to answer the question and not get involved. He could have just affirmed the truth of Scripture and moved on, leaving the woman to face the consequences for her sin. But Jesus didn't do that. Being full of compassion and grace, Jesus loved this woman and knew what was really happening. He knew she was guilty, but He refused to leave her at her worst moment.

We are all like this woman; we are all guilty of breaking the law of God. Paul told us in his letter to the Galatians that none of us can keep the whole law. None of us are righteous. We are sinners to the core, and yet Jesus chose to die for us, the righteous for the unrighteous.

So this test was set up to put Jesus on the spot. If Jesus said they should stone the guilty woman, then He would be viewed as cruel and a man without mercy. This would surely turn the people against Jesus. If Jesus ignored the woman's blatant sin, then the leaders could say that Jesus had no regard for the law and the Scriptures. It seemed like the perfect trap.