5th sunday of lent C

A thief picked a man's pocket on a crowded elevator. As the result of quick police action, he was
arrested and brought before the local judge. "You are charged with stealing another person's
wallet," said the judge. "How do you plead: guilty or not guilty?" To which the pickpocket
replied, "How can I tell, your honor, until I have heard the evidence."
In today's Gospel, a woman accused of adultery is not asked to plead "guilty" or "not guilty."
The evidence is already in. She was caught in the act and, according to the law, the punishment is
death, by stoning. The religious leaders handling the case bring the woman to Jesus.
Jesus had spent the night in prayer on the Mount of Olives. Now, at dawn, He has returned to the
Temple. People have gathered around Him to hear Him speak, and the scribes and Pharisees see the
accused woman's situation as an opportunity to discredit Him. In full view of the crowd they lay their
trap. "Teacher," they say, "This woman has been caught in the act of adultery. Now in the law Moses
commanded us to stone such. What do you say about her?" (John 8:4-5). It is a "no-win" situation for
Jesus -- or so it seems. If He approves of the punishment of stoning the woman to death, the people
will regard it as a contradiction of His message of mercy and compassion. If He disapproves, He will
be in opposition to the law and could be prosecuted as a religious agitator. Either way, Jesus will
suffer humiliation, or even worse.
As the crowd presses Him for His answer, Jesus says: "Let him who is without sin among you be the
first to throw a stone at her" (John 8:7). And "when they heard it, they went away, one by one...and
Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before Him" (John 8:9). "Where are they?" Jesus asks.
"Has no one condemned you." "No one, Lord," the woman replies. "Neither do I condemn you," Jesus
answers. "Go, and do not sin again" (John 8:10-1).
For most of us, I think, that New Testament episode has great appeal. We want to sing Jesus' praises,
and rightly so, for befriending that helpless woman. We want to sing Jesus' praises, and rightly so, for
telling her to go and sin no more. We want to sing Jesus' praises, and rightly so, for foiling the attempt
to discredit Him. We want to sing Jesus' praises, and rightly so, for teaching those self-righteous
scribes and Pharisees a good lesson. But our songs of praise will have a hollow ring if we fail to apply
this lesson in spiritual growth to ourselves.
In a "Peanuts" cartoon, Charlie Brown says to Linus: "Perhaps you can give me an answer, Linus.
What would you do if you felt that no one liked you?" Linus replies, "I'd try to look at myself
objectively, and see what I could do to improve. That's my answer Charlie Brown." To which Charlie
replies, "I hate that answer!"
"Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her." Jesus was telling the selfrighteous
religious leaders to look at themselves objectively and see what they could do to improve.
And they hated that answer. Now, Jesus is telling each one of us to look at ourselves objectively and
see what we can do to improve. And we hate that answer! Like those scribes and Pharisees in the
Gospel Lesson, we know others who need to better themselves, but we really hate to admit our own
need for spiritual growth. Psychiatrist M. Scott Peck, whose books sell in the millions, puts it this
way:
If we cannot see and confess our need for growth and change, then we have no option but to eliminate
the evidence pointing to our imperfections...strangely enough, people are often destructive because
they are attempting to destroy evil. The problem is they misplace the locus of evil. Instead of
destroying others they should be destroying the sickness within themselves.1
Just outside a small town in Maine, there is a road sign with six arrows on it pointing the way to six
other towns. From top to bottom, the sign reads,
Freedom - 45 miles
Liberty - 33 miles
Harmony - 96 miles
Unity - 52 miles
Union - 20 miles
Hope - 27 miles
Six marvelously-named towns within easy driving distance of each other. Remarkable! But what is
even more remarkable is that the road sign is located on the edge of a town called Friendship!
What a beautiful life-pattern we can construct from the names of those seven towns:
Freedom -- Look at yourself objectively, for evidence of self-centeredness and egoism and pride.
Then begin to make a sincere, conscious effort to free yourself from that burden.
Liberty -- Look at yourself objectively, for evidence of self-righteousness. Then begin to make a
sincere, conscious effort to liberate yourself from the burden of judging other people's motives and
actions, and of controlling and manipulating other people's lives.
Harmony -- Look at yourself objectively for evidence of areas in your life that are burdened with
hostility and alienation and unforgiveness. Then begin to make a sincere, conscious effort to eliminate
all that discord and, in the Apostle Paul's words, to "put on love, which binds everything into perfect
harmony" (Col. 3:14).
Union -- Look at yourself objectively, as a child of God, for evidence of estrangement from your
loving Father. Then begin to make a sincere, conscious effort to heal that separation and to once again
experience the intimacy of the Father's presence.
Unity -- Look at yourself objectively for evidence of divisiveness. Then begin to make a sincere,
conscious effort to be a living answer to Jesus' great prayer for unity: "...that they all may be one; even
as Thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they may also be in Us...The glory which Thou hast
given Me I have given them, that they may be one even as We are one" (Jn. 17:21,22).
Hope -- Look at yourself objectively for evidence of gloom and doom. Then begin to make a sincere,
conscious effort to always and everywhere rejoice in God's promise of eternal life.
Freedom, Liberty, Harmony, Unity, Union, Hope -- six stops on the road to Friendship. Six steps
toward genuine friendship with Jesus Christ and with our brothers and sisters everywhere. Six inward
looks based on clear and convincing evidence of our need for spiritual growth.
"Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her." Notice, Jesus didn't
command the scribes and Pharisees to befriend the helpless woman. From where they were coming,
spiritually, they were incapable of treating her with friendship and compassion. Instead, Jesus told
them to take an honest, inward look at themselves. In order to be capable of genuine friendship they
needed first to confront the evidence and acknowledge their need for spiritual growth.
"You are my friends if you do what I command you," Jesus said to His disciples (John 15:14). "This is
My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you" (John 15:12).