NO. LIVERMORE – At the North Livermore Baptist Church August 22, service the congregation was welcomed by Pastor Bonnie Higgins at 9:30 a.m. to begin the service. The Call to Worship was read and the Invocation/Lord’s Prayer was recited. The hymns that were sung was “Love Lifted Me”, “Our Great Savior”, “Take Time to be Holy”. We concluded the service with “Go Now in Peace”. Linda Lyman is the organist and Janet Diaz is the pianist each week.
The sermon, titled “Casting Stones”, and reading the scripture from John 8:1-11. Pastor Bonnie began explaining why these scriptures are sometimes not in older manuscripts and sometimes these scriptures are placed at the end of John or in Luke in certain versions of Bibles. In some Greek manuscripts, this encounter of the woman caught in adultery and Jesus is missing. Pastor Bonnie stated that the message of this story is so important.
The background of this passage is that the Jewish leaders were jealous of Jesus and wanted revenge against Jesus. The Jewish leaders were even giving Satan the credit for the miracles Jesus had been doing. Because the Jewish leaders were jealous and envious of Jesus, they wanted him dead. So, the Jewish leaders decided to plot a trap for Jesus. This is where the woman caught in adultery comes in. As this is a sin and is against the Law of Moses, the leaders wanted to see if Jesus would go against the law.
Two things are brought out in these scriptures, the first one being the dangers of being judgmental towards others and how Jesus has a forgiving heart. Even though this happened about 2,000 years ago, the message is prevalent to today.
The scriptures tell us that Jesus was teaching in the temple to a crowd of people when some men interrupt Jesus and probably throw the woman down at His feet. These men were highly educated and knew the Law of Moses. Even though they knew the Law of Moses, they were not godly men and wanted to trap Jesus. We don’t know much about the woman, she has no name, no past except what was written in these scriptures. The men claimed they caught her in the act of adultery, adultery was considered a capital offense, so she would receive a death sentence from stoning. Even though it takes two to commit adultery, these men only brought her to Jesus, what happened to the man? Did they let him go? He would have received the death sentence too. Though, we know the men wanted to trap Jesus, was this a set up? In those days, you must be caught in the act by at least two men as witnesses before any accusations could be made publicly. These men condemned her before a trial had happened. In this culture the Jews were not allowed to serve a capital punishment, that is why they brought her to Jesus. This way if he said yes to death or no to death, Jesus was either going against His own Jewish heritage or going against Moses. Either way they thought Jesus was going to be in trouble.
As the men spoke about what they saw to Jesus, Jesus bent down and started to write something in the dirt. We don’t know what Jesus wrote, but it got their attention. Even though the woman knew she was guilty, she stayed quiet, never trying to defend herself. Even though the men continued to question Jesus, He straighten up and said, “let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her” and He bent down again and began to write in the dirt again. As they heard this, the men slowly backed away until none of them were left. As the men wanted to condemn the woman, Jesus was more interested in speaking about them.
As Jesus stood up and no one was there but the woman, He asked her if any of them condemned her by throwing the stone at her. She said no one did. This is when Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you.” Jesus told her to go and leave her life of sin.
How does this story relate to us today? We all fall short of the glory of God because of the sin we are born in. Just like this woman, we all sin and we should not condemn anyone else for what they do. It is not our job to judge others, that is left to Jesus. We have all sinned and many have come to Jesus and asked for forgiveness. We have a loving, generous, and forgiving Father that is waiting for us to ask Him to forgive us for our sins. We know that when we ask for forgiveness, He will and sets us out to a new life in Him. We are free, just like this woman was freed by the grace of God. We are all like this woman, we are all guilty of sin, and we do deserve death. Even though others will condemn us, Jesus will free us from our sins. When we feel our lives are doomed by sin, Jesus steps in and rescues us. He rescued us by serving our sentence on a cross, so we wouldn’t have too. Scripture tells us in John 17, that Jesus didn’t come to condemn us, but to save us. We see that Jesus didn’t condemn her because He came to be condemned on her behalf.
As followers of Christ, we know that we will make mistakes in this world, and we know that God will give us another chance, if we come before Him and ask for forgiveness. Jesus gives us compassion because He once stood in our place as He was nailed on a cross for us for our sins, past, present, and future sins. The Bible speaks of many people who have messed up in their lives, but God gave them another chance. He tells us to go and sin no more, and when we do, we shouldn’t be afraid to go to Him and tell Him I’m sorry, forgive me. God can restore all of us, even the woman caught in adultery.
Announcements listed in the bulletin was that the congregation will be collecting Crackers for the Food Pantry in the month of August. If anyone would like to become a member or be baptized should see Pastor Bonnie. On August 29th there will be a time for baptisms after the church service. Our fall programs will begin October 3rd. We are collecting donations for the backpacks/school supplies for the local schools. The AA meetings are held on Friday nights at the church.
For information, check out our website at northlivermorebaptistchurch.org. You can email the church at nlbcmaine@gmail.com. Pastor Bonnie’s office hours are Monday and Tuesday’s from 9:00 a.m. to noon.