Christmas tree emits hope with its shining lights.  Meira Bienstock photo

“He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her,” reads John 8:7.

This line is about Jesus standing up for an adulteress, saving her from being stoned to death. He is telling each person that only those who have not sinned, who have not made any mistakes, who have not passed any judgment — only they can throw a stone.

In the spirit of hope, Pastor Kevin Bellinger of the Bethel Alliance Church talked about how Jesus not only taught the Ten Commandments through his actions, but what each of those commandments entail, the sub-notes in between.

He continued to share the King James Bible story as an example.

Jesus asks the adulteress afterward, where are her accusers? She says “they’re all gone, Lord,” after which Jesus responds, “’Neither will I condemn you; go and sin no more.”

This story illustrates that every human has sinned or made a mistake in their life, and to pass judgment upon anyone else would be hypocritical.

The Bethel Citizen spoke with three local ministers in the spirit of the holiday season, and they each spoke of the ways Jesus practiced and carried out the Ten Commandments in human form so that humanity could understand it. Each of them spoke of Jesus differently, yet the same. The commonality lies in Jesus’ birth and resurrection as the Holy Spirit, which brings the immense hope they all equally describe.

Pastor Chuck Mason of the Bethel Church of the Nazarene described what hope is to him.

“What you see, it’s the experience. It’s the testimonies that people share that can never be debated or taken away because we’ve experienced. That’s what the relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ is — it’s experience. It’s where we’re witnesses to what he’s done. And not only in our own lives, but in the lives of people around us, and that can’t be debated. It can’t be taken away. Because it’s our experience.”

Pastor Bellinger talked about what hope means during this pandemic.

“When the pandemic began I had to ask myself if I was going to be the kind of person who was going to shut all my doors, go hide somewhere, stop proclaiming the Word and stop helping people,” he said. “I didn’t feel like I could do that and I didn’t feel that God wanted me to do that. Pandemic or not, people still need help in some way, maybe a visit, a phone call, prayer, or a meal. So my hope is that, as Christians, we continue to do those things in our community. It requires looking deep into our own lives and pulling up strength from the Lord to step out in faith without fear.”

He also talked about how being an honest person is hard. This pandemic has the potential to draw out the best in every one of us, but it has the potential to draw out the absolute worst, Bellinger explained, talking about everyone, both Christians and others with their own beliefs.

“I feel that people have cast stones on others who have not agreed with their positions on masks, vaccinations, etc. This is hurtful to relationships and causes me great sorrow, not so much for myself but for the Church and its mission,” he said. “I see this as a time of great opportunity to minister to people and show them the love of God. It should be a time of unification and not division.”

Pastor Tim LeConey of the West Parish Congregational Church talked about the hope Jesus brings. He describes Jesus as, “the light that shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it. In the end, there is hope.” John 1:5.

He says this passage is pivotal for carrying hope, especially with the shorter days and longer nights of winter and the existing pandemic.

“In the last couple years, you know, this darkness of the past, with everything that’s happening in the world, the pandemic and just the world situation,” LeConey said. “In general politics, all of that, but Jesus is the light of the world.”

LeConey talks of Jesus also as a teacher and how Christians are supposed to carry out his message of peace, to try and love everyone, and to do the right thing, going back to the story of the stone in John 8:7.

“I’ve always felt it was more about how Jesus helped us to live in the here and now and kind of how day-to-day following him, trying to follow him. It’s more about this life and how we treat people and how we live our lives now,” LeConey said.

“I think, standing with people who are the least powerful, [those] impacted by the pandemic, you know, the people who have been hit hardest by [it] and including people who are, well, the poorest people. People living who have borne the most brunt of this the whole time. So it’s kind of standing with them and trying to speak out to people who live in other countries, you know, like Africa and other places where they don’t get the vaccines or as quickly, I guess that’s how I would answer that about how does it apply to these times — the pandemic,” he explained. “It is just speaking out for the powerless, standing with them.”

LeConey and his congregation help people by providing food and clothing, helping with things like the local food pantry, or emergency food boxes for families, offering a three-day supply of food for people who are on a pension. They also host the SMILE fund, which a program that helps people get dentures and extractions.

LeConey pairs the Christmas birth of Jesus and the hope that it brings as relevant to how we all need to have hope during the pandemic, or during any trying times ahead.

“The hope is being just something to light in these dark days and to bring us His presence. His just being as a model, as a teacher, as a friend, all everything. That is what brings us that hope I see, brings us that feeling, I mean, it’s not just about the stories in the Bible,” LeConey said. “It’s a feeling of Him being present to us. And a lot of times that comes through connections with other people; people, family, people in our church, you know, just the stuff that happens in the church is kind of a sign, a symbol of His being with us.”