Rising Tensions

John 8:2-11

“And the little children shall lead us …”

They are not so little any more, but we are grateful for the engagement of our Young Disciples this morning and for the ministry of Pastor Ashia with them. Our children seek to lead us, fulfilling Isaiah’s prophecy, to the peaceable Kin-dom that brings the wolf and the lamb together. Maybe this year …

I’m never one to rush things too much. There are thousands of yesterdays and thousands of tomorrows. But we only get one today. Still … This Sunday, the fifth Sunday of Lent, is a transition of sorts, into Holy Week. That starts next week, not this coming week, with Palm Sunday, next Sunday. But this morning we highlight the rising tensions between the established religious authorities who perceived Jesus as a threat to that authority and their privilege. And we anticipate the coming protest that will increase the tension with Rome with the triumphal entry into Jerusalem.

We’re feeling that tension in other Lenten disciplines we’ve been engaged in this year: in the poems and artwork of our Lenten Devotionals; in the questions and prayers on our daily prayer cards; and, in the book study that a number of us gather for on Thursday morning. The call to discipleship is ramping up. The Good News we’ve been hearing this year during Lent has always been challenging us to, not just hear it, but embody it. And in the week, and weeks, ahead it is becoming more urgent.           

So far, the Good News is … all are invited to the Kingdom banquet. The parable of the Great Dinner in Luke fourteen.

The Good News is … so good it catches us by surprise. The Wedding at Cana in John two.

The Good News is … that together, the impossible is possible. The feeding of the multitude in Mark six (and every Gospel writing).

The Good News is … protection and care for the vulnerable. The law of Moses in Deuteronomy twenty-four and the blessing of the children in Matthew nineteen.

And this morning, the Good News is … rooted in justice, mercy, and faithfulness from John eight.

Pray with me … Good and gracious God, the world can be a harsh place, but we have known love, we have known justice, and we have known mercy. In the moments ahead and in the week to come, help us to be sustained by these acts of care that we, too, may embody mercy and justice for those who we may otherwise condemn. Remind us of mercy shown so we may be mercy shared. Amen.

The Good news for this morning and this week is … justice, mercy, and faithfulness. And to illustrate that Good news we turn to one of the most popular New Testament stories in our canon of scripture. It is found in the eighth chapter of John, though it almost certainly did not originally belong to the Gospel of John. I’d like you to take out your pew bibles, if you haven’t already and turn to the Gospel of John in the New Testament section, that’s toward the back. Find page XXX, and locate chapter seven, verse fifty-three. Then go to chapter eight, verse eleven. Does anyone notice anything a bit odd in this pericope, this set of verses?

Yea … they are bracketed. (And I know we have basketball heavy on our minds around here, but it’s not that kind of bracket!) These brackets indicate that these verses were not in the earliest Greek manuscripts we have of this Gospel, but found their way into some manuscripts of the Gospel at a later date. The coupling of “Scribes and Pharisees” is not something that John does anywhere else. And, except for these few verses, the “Mount of Olives” appears nowhere else by name in his writing. To some extent these verses disrupt the movement of the seventh and eighth chapters. And yet, this is a story that illustrates the confrontation and conflict between Jesus and the Jewish authorities at the heart of these two chapters. In the Gospel of John, Jesus is already in Jerusalem and tensions are rising.

Listen for the Word of God. Read John 8:2-11. The Word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

One of the most popular stories in our New Testament, right? We all remember this “That anyone among you who is without sin cast the first stone!” How many times have we used that admonition – seriously, or jokingly. (One of the oldest jokes I remember, as a preacher’s kid myself, had Jesus issuing this warning to the crown only to have a rock sail over his shoulder and strike this woman. Jesus whirls around, and once he sees who would dare, he mumbles, “Mother … sometimes you drive me crazy.” Maybe funnier for our Catholic siblings, with their veneration of Mother Mary. Funnier or more blasphemous … anyway!)

Jesus words about casting the first stone are repeated in an endless variety of contexts inside and outside the church, used to check “moral self-righteousness”. That may simplify, even undercut, the radical claim of this story. The subtitle of this passage in all of our bibles – “The Woman Caught in Adultery” – reduces it, as well. But we’re gathered this morning to open it back up so we, too, might hear of and embody the justice, the mercy, and the faithfulness of the one we follow.

Now … If you’re like me , one of the most fascinating things about this reading would be the way in which Jesus’ engages with the Scribes and Pharisees’ test, how he negotiates it. Did you notice that? Hear that? What did Jesus do when the charges against this person were presented to him? First thing? He bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. I’ve always imagined a dry, sandy ground that took well to “doodling.” And I’ve always thought he wrote something like, “When will these fools just leave me alone?” or just doodled a sheep and its shepherd. But the truth is, we have no idea what he wrote, or doodled, in spite of much speculation. No idea, because it is the act bending down and writing, itself, that is important. It is Jesus’ nonverbal response that is significant.

Can you imagine yourself coming to me with something you think will “test me”, or get me to say or do something that could be used against me with the larger body, and after presenting me with the problem, I just bend down and begin writing in the sand?! (Come to think of it, I should use this practice more – It would keep me out of some trouble, wouldn’t it? Not that any of you would test me or Pastor Ashia in that way. Others …)

This is an act of refusal and disengagement. You would feel that immediately. The religious authorities certainly recognize it as such, and press him, “kept on questioning him.” When he finally straightens up, he doesn’t answer their legal question, but moves past all that to the more pressing and all-encompassing issue of separation – “sin” as it is most often translated in our bible. And before anyone can say another word, he goes back to writing on the ground. None of you are without your own sin. I am finished with you. So, “they went away, one by one, beginning with the elders.” Not even the most senior and revered members of the community are able to “cast stones.”

And, as we’ve already noted, that’s pretty much where we stop with this story.  Keeping it one about “moral self-righteousness” or Jesus’ “leniency toward adulterous women”. And that’s too bad. Because only now does the story really get though-provoking and life-changing.

As our Lord “straightens up” for the second time, he addresses the one in front of him, not with a focus on how past actions should affect the present – how past “sins” should affect present “mercy” – but on the future. Essentially: There is no one left to condemn you. What are you going to do now?  Because that is the focus, the heart of Jesus’ and of the Christian worldview. Not “what happened then,” but “what happens now”.  We are invited to embrace a new future every day, every moment if we’re open to it, that will allow us to live forgiven and free. That’s almost scarier than “getting what we deserve”, isn’t it? Mostly because, if that’s how we are treated, then we have to treat others with the same mercy, the same justice.

This story is about neither the scribes and Pharisees’ “sin” of self-righteousness nor the woman’s sinful past. It’s about the challenge to our embedded sense of entitlement and our desire for power over others. It’s about the possibilities of new life in the Way of Christ that arise from that challenge, and our ability to offer what we so willingly accept: mercy and the justice of God.

Mercy is what we ask for when we have messed up mightily in our relationships, our marriages, our parenting, our friendships. It is, then, what we must offer all those we judge to have messed up their lives and their relationships, too. Mercy is not logical, or equally beneficial. Mercy does not make us money or make us look good. Mercy … is what makes us God’s own. And receiving and extending mercy in the most awful and improbable places is what makes us know that God is still at work in our “messed up” lives and in this “messed up” world.

And that’s Good News, indeed.

This Sunday, the fifth Sunday of Lent, one week before Palm Sunday and its final challenge to Rome and an established religious practice that judges, excludes, and condemns those who challenge it, tensions are rising. God’s way? Or the way of the world we live in? It’s a matter of life and death. Both of which will be re-defined by a Love that chooses not judgement and control as its weapons, but justice and mercy as its means.

Let us, too, “go on our Way”, embracing the Good News of God’s mercy and having faith in the truth of God’s justice. For this Good News is … getting ready to face its deepest test. Take this week to decide if you really want to be part of the parade next week, shouting “Hosanna, Save us!” to the only Way that actually can: mercy and faithfulness.

Thanks be to God. Amen.

Reverend Joel Weible, Pastor

Pewee Valley Presbyterian Church / March 22, 2026