YE WITHOUT SIN, CAST THE FIRST STONE

The tragic death of Steve McNair, the retired quarterback for the Tennessee Titans professional football team, shocked football fans all across the nation, especially the fans in the Nashville area. Although I am not a rabid football fan, I had watched McNair make some spectacular plays. He was a very skilled and tough football player. I know his family and friends grieve over the loss of McNair. I grieve for his four sons who will no longer have a father. I am aware of his generosity in helping needy children and others.

I want to make it as plain as I am able: My study today really has little or nothing to do with Steve McNair. My deep concern is the funeral address by Joseph W. Walker III, the preacher for the Mt. Zion Baptist Church in Nashville. His sermon is deeply troubling. The Tennessean (Friday, July 10, 2009) published an article about Walker's sermon at McNair's funeral. The article has the title, "Ye without sin, cast the first stone." The article quotes Walker as saying: "Drop the stone. Next time you write about Steve McNair, drop the stone. Next time you text somebody, drop the stone. The next time you Twitter, drop the stone. Those of you in barbershops, those of you walking the streets or on the comer, drop the stones" (p. 9-A).

Walker based part of his sermon on John 8 - the story of Christ's meeting with a woman who was caught in the act of adultery. The newspaper quoted Walker as saying: "There was a woman one day caught in adultery, and the religious people brought her to Jesus. And they said to Jesus, The law says she should be stoned. Jesus knelt down and drew in the sand. He looked up and said, 'Ye without sin, cast the first stone.' They began to drop their stones from the youngest to the oldest. And I have come to declare from the youngest to the oldest in America and over the world, it's time to have a stone-dropping service" (p. 9-A).

I shall read the entire account from the gospel according to John. "Jesus went unto the mount of Olives. And early in the morning he came again into the temple, and all the people came unto him; and he sat down, and taught them. And the scribes and the Pharisees brought unto him a woman taken in adultery; and when they had set her in the midst, they say unto him, Master, this woman was taken in adultery, in the very act. Now Moses in the law commanded us, that such should be stoned: but what do you say? This they said, tempting him, that they might have to accuse him. But Jesus stooped down, and with his finger wrote on the ground, as though he did not hear them. So when they continued asking him, he lifted himself up, and said unto them, He who is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone at her. And again he stooped down, and wrote on the ground. And they who heard it, being convicted by their own consciences, went out one by one, beginning at the eldest, even unto the last: and Jesus was left standing alone, and the woman standing in the midst. When Jesus had lifted up himself, and saw none but the woman, he said unto her, Woman, where are you accusers? Has no man condemned you? She said, No man, Lord. And Jesus said unto her, Neither do I condemn you: go, and sin no more" (John 8:1-11).

What did Walker want his audience to learn from this incident? Was he arguing that Christians and other religious people cannot judge whether adultery is sinful or whether a person is guilty of adultery? If we cannot judge in such matters, how can the church withdraw from ungodly people? There was a brother at Corinth who was sleeping with his father's wife. Paul said that even Gentiles did not live like that. He commanded: "In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when you are gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of the Lord Jesus, to deliver such a one unto Satan for the destruction of his flesh, that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus" (1 Cor. 5:1,4-5).

Stoning for adultery was authorized under the Mosaic covenant. The Lord said to Moses: "The man who commits adultery with another man's wife, even he who commits adultery with his neighbor's wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death" (Lev. 20:10). Deuteronomy, the second giving of the law, contains a similar command. "If a man be found lying with a woman married to a husband, then they shall both of them die, both the man who lay with the woman, and the woman: so shall you put away evil from Israel" (Dt. 22:22).

There are several problems with the usual interpretation of the story in John 8. If the woman were actually caught in the very act of adultery, where was the man? A woman cannot commit adultery by herself. If the scribes and Pharisees were really concerned about sin in the nation of Israel, they should have brought the man also. Jesus knew beyond any doubt that the scribes and Pharisees were tempting him. They hoped to catch Jesus between a rock and a hard place, as one of college professors loved to say. But he immediately saw through their hypocrisy.

Does Christ's refusal to authorize the stoning of the woman indicate he was repudiating the Mosaic covenant? It does not mean that at all. But he fully understood what the Jewish leaders were trying to do. They had no interest in the woman's sin. To be very blunt: The Jewish leaders were being hypocritical, which Jesus fully understood. Jesus refused to go along with their game. He said to them: "He who is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone" (John 8:7). Their consciences convicted them and they sneaked away like whipped dogs (John 8:9).

This story reminds men of an incident that occurred many years ago. I was involved in a business meeting between two companies. The two companies were trying to work out a merger. The people in that meeting told of a young man from North Carolina who was a member of the United States House of Representatives from North Carolina. He was from a very wealthy family. He often made trips to Virginia on business. He had a wife in North Carolina and one in Virginia. The wife in North Carolina could not have children. The wife in Virginia had two by the man.

I was amazed at the attitude of the men and women attending that meeting. Someone observed: "Well, a man has a right to have children." Where did he get that right? I have read both the American Constitution and the Word of almighty God and have failed to find that right in either document. Most men probably want children, but do they have a right to have children? What if wife number two could not have borne children, would the man have right to a third wife or a fourth or a fifth? People who make such ridiculous observations have the moral values of barnyard animals.

I spoke out against the immorality of the man in North Carolina. One of the men said: "Do you not remember what Jesus said to the woman taken in adultery? 'Neither do I condemn thee.'" That is only part of what he said. He also said: "Go, and sin no more" (John 8:11). Did Jesus believe adultery was wrong? Only one who is deliberately blinded by his own prejudice believes that Jesus did not oppose adultery. He not only opposed adultery; he opposed all sin. He led the Apostle John to write: "He who overcomes shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son. But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone: which is the second death" (Rev. 21:7-8).

Walker seems to be saying what many postmodern theologians believe, and that is, we have no right to judge. If that is what he means by saying, "Drop your stone," he could not be more wrong. It is true that we have no right to consign a person either to hell or to heaven. But we not only have a right to judge behavior; we have an obligation to do so. As I have already mentioned, if that were not the case, the church could not withdraw from the vilest sinners. Yet Paul commanded the Thessalonians: "Now we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you withdraw yourselves from every brother who walks disorderly, and not after the tradition which he received of us" (2 Thess. 3:6).

The word "disorderly" literally means to be lazy or idle. Paul explained the meaning of the word when he told the Thessalonians: "For we hear that there are some who walk among you disorderly, working not at all, but are busybodies" (2 Thess. 3:11). If the church could not judge whether laziness was a sin, how could they follow Paul's commandment to withdraw from the disorderly?

The church at Corinth had a sacred obligation to withdraw from the incestuous brother. Paul told the Corinthians: "Now I have written unto you not to keep company, if any man who is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an exhortioner; with such a person no not to eat. For what have I to do to judge them also who are without? Do not you judge them who are within? But them who without God judges. Therefore put away from yourselves that wicked person" (1 Cor. 5: 11-13).

The word "without" refers to people who are unbelievers - not members of the church of our Lord. The word "within" means people who are members of the body of Christ. The church cannot withdraw from non-members. But we can and must withdraw from Christians who are fornicators, idolaters, drunkards and such like. If the church is not kept pure, how can Christ present it to the Father in the last day "not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish" (Eph. 5:27)?

I am fairly sure Walker does not believe that either Christ or his disciples condoned sexual immorality. But his repeated admonition, "drop the stone," leaves the wrong impression. Jesus specifically and dogmatically condemned all forms of sexual immorality. The word "fornication" means more than premarital sex, although it includes that (1 Cor. 7:1-2). It means any and every form of sexual immorality. Do you remember what Jesus taught his disciples in the Sermon on the Mount? "You have heard that it was said of them of old time, You shall not commit adultery: but I say unto you, That whosoever looks on a woman to lust after her has committed adultery with her already in his heart" (Mt. 5:27-28). I have said before on this program but it bears repeating: Jesus not only condemned the act of adultery; he condemned thinking adultery. We cannot know men's hearts except by their actions, but Jesus could. He knew that thinking about adultery could often lead to the act itself. He condemned both the act and the thought.

Many of the Pharisees - though not all of them by any means - were hypocrites. The scribes and the Pharisees expressed concern that Christ's disciples were transgressing the traditions of the elders by not washing their hands when they ate bread. Jesus said to them: "You hypocrites, well did Isaiah prophesy of you, saying, This people draws near unto me with their mouth, and honors me with the lips, but their heart is far from me. But in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men." Later in the same chapter Jesus asked his disciples: "Are you also yet without understanding? Do you not understand, that whatsoever enters in at the mouth goes into the belly, and is cast out into the waste? But the things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart; and they defile the man. For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies: these are the things which defile the man; but to eat with unwashed hands does not defile the man" (Mt. 15:1, 16-20). Do you have doubt whatsoever that Jesus unequivocally condemned all sin, including sexual immorality?

What did the Holy Spirit inspire Paul to write about sexual immorality? "But fornication and all uncleanness, or covetousness, let it not be once named among you, as becomes saints; neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not convenient: but rather giving of thanks. For this you know, that no whoremonger, nor unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God .... And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them" (Eph. 5:3-5, 11). Would Walker have us to throw down our stones when such evil is widespread in our nation and even in some churches?

Most of those cities in the first century were full of idolatry. When people worship idols, they almost always engage in the grossest kinds of sexual immorality. The Christians at Thessalonica had "turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God" (1 Thess. 1:9). Paul admonished the Thessalonians: "Furthermore then we beseech you, brethren, and exhort you by the Lord Jesus, that as you have received of us how you ought to walk and to please God, so you would abound more and more. For you know what commandments we gave you by the Lord Jesus. For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that you should abstain from fornication" (1 Thess.4:1-3).

Should we throw down our stones, figuratively speaking, when we know that some people are discriminating on the basis of race or nationality or ethnicity? I am in the process of reading Dr. Hannah Arendt's very disturbing book, Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil (New York: Viking, 1964). Adolf Eichmann and the Nazis murdered 6,000,000 Jews - not because they had committed some heinous crimes - but because they were Jews. We know Eichmann was a monster. Should the Jewish courts have said: "It's time we have a stone-dropping service. Drop you stone. Next time you write about Eichmann, drop your stone. Next time you text about Hitler, drop you stone. Next time you Twitter about Himmler or Goering, drop your stone?"

Three Israeli judges found Eichmann guilty and had him executed. The court convicted him on fifteen counts. Dr. Arendt comments: '''Together with others,' he had committed crimes 'against the Jewish people,' that is, crimes against Jews with the intent to destroy the people on four counts: (1) 'by causing the killing of millions of Jews': (2) by placing 'millions of Jews under conditions which were likely to lead to their physical destruction'; (3) by 'causing serious bodily and mental harm' to them; (4) by 'directing that births be banned and pregnancies interrupted among Jewish women'" (p. 244). Hitler referred to the killing of Jews as "the final solution." The judges in Israel did not believe they should drop their stones.

There is no question that Christians and all others must be very careful about judging. We need to remember these familiar words from our Lord's Sermon on the Mount: "For with what judgment you judge, you shall be judged; and with what measure you mete, it shall be measured to you again. And why behold the mote that is in your brother's eye, and consider not the beam that is your own eye? Or how will you say to your brother, Let me pull out the mote that is in your eye; and, behold, a beam is in your own eye? You hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of your own eye; and then you shall see clearly to cast out the mote in your brother's eye" (Mt. 7:2-5).

Romans 1 is a severe indictment of the sins of the Gentiles. The Jews probably enjoyed Paul's criticisms of the Gentiles. The Jews thought of themselves as being instructors of the foolish, "a teacher of babes, which have a form of knowledge and of the truth of the law." Then Paul asked the Jews: "You therefore who teaches another, do you not teach yourself? You who preach that a man should not steal, do you steal? You who say that a man should not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you commit sacrilege? You who make your boast of keeping the law, through breaking the law do you dishonor God" (Rom. 2:20-23)?

One of the great needs from every pulpit in the land is the "preach the whole counsel of God" (Acts 20:27). I know it is not politically correct to do that, but every preacher or teacher who wants to have God's approval has no choice. Failing to preach the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth will condemn the preacher and his listeners, unless they see the error of their way and turn from it. We must imitate the Apostle Paul. He told the Ephesian elders: "I kept back nothing that was profitable unto you but have shown you, and have taught you publicly and from house to house" (Acts 20:20). Should not we modern preachers be ashamed to do less?

Winford Claiborne

The International Gospel Hour

P.O. Box 118

Fayetteville, TN 37334