Grace and Truth - All The LORD is near Daily Devotionals for 2025

For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
John 1:17

Grace and Truth
The atmosphere tingles with emotion as a wretched woman is dumped at the feet of the Son of Man (Jn. 8:1-11). The Pharisees demand an answer: "Now Moses, in the law, commanded us that such should be stoned. But what do You say?" Clever Pharisees! They would kill two birds with one stone: get rid of a worthless woman, and at the same time embarrass Jesus. The trap was well laid. If He advocated freeing her, He flaunted the law of Moses; if He agreed to stoning her, what would become of His principles of love and forgiveness?

The tension heightens as Jesus ignores them. He is stooping down now, writing with His finger in the sand. Then He stands, and His answer is devastating: "He who is without sin among you, let him throw a stone at her first." As Jesus resumes His writing, the accusers leave like whipped dogs, beginning with the oldest.

The account in John 8 does not reveal the woman's feelings and emotions as she is left standing alone with Jesus. But it throbs with the faith and hope begotten in her soul during those moments. To His question about her accusers—"Has no one condemned you?"—she quietly replies, "No one, Lord." For this woman, liberation was not simply deliverance from the clutches of some male tormentors. It involved a far greater deliverance from her own sinful life as she met the Savior and heard His words of assurance and power: "Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more." Can you imagine her returning to a life of sin and misery after that?

Grant W. Steidl
God could not pass the sinner by,Justice demands that he should die;But in the cross of Christ we seeHow God can save, yet righteous be.

A. Midlane