This month's Pastor's Pen...

Each month, in our church newsletter, I write a short devotional for the front page.  It's called The Pastor's Pen, but maybe it should be Steve's Scribblings or something like that.  If you read these posts, you'll see that they sometimes wander...

Here is this month's Pastor's Pen...

...Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground.  When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.”   -John 8:6-7

Are you one that likes to doodle?  If you have a blank sheet of paper in front of you, do you like to draw pictures or shapes or lines or circles?  I know some people who seem to have more doodles than notes following a lecture.  It doesn’t look like they got anything out of the talk when they’re done.

In a sense, that’s what Jesus is doing in this passage.  A woman was caught in adultery, the men who presented her wanted to stone her to death.  And they were well within their rights.  The law was very clear, and it called for stoning. 

I wonder what Jesus was drawing with his fingers as they were presenting their case.  His presence and His silence seemed to make the men very uncomfortable.  So much so that when He got up and suggested anyone who had never sinned might throw the first stone, they didn’t argue, though I would think that might be human nature.  They didn’t defend themselves. They quietly gave up, dropping their stones and walking away.

I’m really intrigued that Jesus would just sit there and doodle in the sand, while those around him were so angry they wanted to kill someone.  This picture of Jesus writing in the sand is an image of almost childlike innocence, seen at a time of intense anger and even hatred in those around him. 

He didn’t buy into the emotions of those around him.  He remained calm and in control, while so many around him were pushing Him to be angry as they were.  This is a model for us.  We see so many around us who are angry, and sometimes fighting to make us angry.  People who are out of control, trying to push our buttons so we, too, may loose control.

The image of Jesus quietly writing in the sand is an image that can help us remember that our Christian faith allows for a very different response.  Can we respond in love when those around us a filled with hate?  Can we keep innocence when others want to destroy?  Can we offer forgiveness in a culture that has already condemned?