Put down your stones.

John 8:1-11

“¹  but Jesus went to the Mount of Olives.

² At dawn he appeared again in the temple courts, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them. ³ The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group ⁴ and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. ⁵ In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” ⁶ They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him.

But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. ⁷ When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” ⁸ Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.

⁹ At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. ¹⁰ Jesus straightened up and asked her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?”

¹¹ “No one, sir,” she said.

“Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin.”

When did we pick up our stones again?

All I’ve seen this last week is so many fellow Christians throwing stones, either at Bruce Jenner or Josh Duggar. Don’t we realize that when we throw stones with the sole purpose of condemning them, it really only condemns us. All sin is against God, we’ve all broken God’s law to the same degree, the cost of every sin is death (Romans 6:23).. That is why we need the Cross, that’s why Jesus’ sacrifice was essential. Because sin is evil and ugly and there was no way we could possibly redeem ourselves.

When we realize the cost, the weight of our own sin, suddenly it puts a whole lot of things into prospective. Now, before you jump on me, I am not saying what either of those two men listed above did was right. I’ll let this quote from Billy Graham wrap up what I’m trying to say.. “It is the Holy Spirit’s job to convict, God’s job to judge, and my job to love.”

So please, put down your stones. Jesus would say the same thing to both those men as He did the adulteress woman.. “Then neither do I condemn you, Go and leave your life of sin.” It’s up to them to either continue in their sin or turn to Jesus. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. We need to point people to Jesus, the only One who can save them and us from sin. We’re not better than them, we ALL need Jesus, that’s the whole point.

Romans 13:8-10″

⁸ Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. ⁹ For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up in this word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” ¹⁰ Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.”

When we truly love people, we point them toward Christ. Because He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. He sets free, He redeems.

It doesn’t mean we don’t speak the Truth, but we speak it with love, not stones.