Well, well, it's been many a
moon since I've been here. Many a moon. John chapter 8 used
to come up here every year. And I guess it's been 12, 15
years maybe. I don't know. Been a long, long
time. Long, long time. I met Wayne and Vicki at Rescue
Baptist Church They came down from Oregon and was staying in
a tent. You all was camping out, weren't you? And that's where I met him at. But I am very, very thankful
to be here and hope that the Lord will make me a blessing,
really make me a blessing. Let's read these first eight
verses together and hopefully God will let me say something
about them. 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 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. What sayest
thou? That's what we always want to
find out, what Christ has to say, what the Lord has to say
about anything. Because whatever He has to say
about something, it'll be right, it'll be true, it'll be a blessing. But what sayest thou? This they
said, tempting Him, that they might have to accuse him, but
Jesus stooped down and with his fingers wrote on the ground as
though he heard them not. So when they continued asking
him, he lifted up himself and said unto them, he that is without
sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her. Again, he
stooped down and wrote on the ground and they which heard it
being convicted by their own conscience went out one by one
beginning at the eldest, even unto the last. And Jesus was
left 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 those thine accusers? Hath no man condemned
thee? She said, No man, Lord. And our
Lord said unto her, Neither do I condemn thee. Go and sin no
more. I want you to notice the setting
here. Our Lord was there early in the morning, very early. And here comes these group of
Pharisees, and they take this woman, bring her to the Lord
Jesus Christ. He's sitting teaching. They rudely,
rudely interrupted him. And what you have here, you know
how you can always tell a self-righteous person They find the sin in somebody
else and they never see it in themselves. That's what our Lord
says, those, He said, He spake a parable that they who counted
themselves or thought themselves more righteous than others. You
have good people here or religious people and a very bad person.
That's the way it is looking at it. And instead of having
any understanding, any pity, any feelings of mercy towards
this woman, They delighted in bringing her and put her before
the Lord Jesus Christ. And they think, and then there's
a lot of people like this, by pointing out the darkness in
others, they think they cause their own light to shine just
a little bit brighter. But our master, he's the light
of the world. And without him, we all walk
in darkness. Without him, we'd still be in
darkness. But the Lord is teaching here
now, setting down early in the morning, And I'm telling you,
great big crowd around him, he's setting down, teaching. And all
of a sudden, in verse two and three, it says this, and scribes
and Pharisees, so it's still early in the morning, 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 the law and Moses commanded
us, commanded us that such should be stoned, what sayest thou?
The law commands us. They went to the law. Religious
people love the law. They love to be told what to
do, where to go, how to do it. But they said the law commands
us that a woman like this should be stoned. Pick up stones and
stone her to death, kill her. then they said, What do you say?
Now, here s the problem these people put to our Master, the
Lord Jesus Christ. When the scribes and the Pharisees
brought this woman, they brought her for just one reason, and
it says it right there in verse 6, They didn't care about stoning
this woman to death. They wanted to dishonor and teach
that the Lord Jesus Christ was gonna dishonor the law. And this
they said, tempting him that they might have something to
accuse him of, accuse him of. And so they put this problem
to our master, to our Lord Jesus Christ. And they said the law
of Moses, God's law, and it was certainly more severe than the
Roman law, And they brought this woman, they knew the gentleness,
they knew the graciousness of our Lord Jesus Christ. The scripture
said, he shall not cry, nor cause his voice to be heard. And a
bruised reed he won't break, and a smoking flax he won't quench.
That means that he is so tender towards those things that would
easily be cut out. And they thought they could compel
him to condemn himself by opposing Moses' law. They said, if we
can get him to oppose Moses' law, then we know, then we say,
he's a lawbreaker. He's a lawbreaker. He don't oppose
Moses' law. He's putting himself in Moses'
place. And then if he lets this woman go and don't condemn her
according to the law, then we've got him. They thought that we
put a real problem to him. And oh my, they thought they
could compel him to condeal himself by opposing the law of Moses.
And I hope we all can learn some things here and God would, the
Holy Spirit would enlighten our understanding. One, two things
I wanna deal with tonight, the claims of the law and the working
of grace face-to-face, the workings of grace in Christ and the claims
of the law. Now they brought this woman taken
in adultery. It says there in verse three
that they brought a woman, brought unto him a woman taken in adultery
in the very act. Now she's a sinner, nobody can
deny that. There's no way, she's a sinner. She's a sinner. They caught her
in the very act. And the law says take her, in
Leviticus 20, 10, it says take her and stone her to death. And I'll tell you, the law condemned
her to be stoned to death and that's a terrible fact that nobody
can deny. As far as the law was condemned,
she was without hope, without any way at all of ever being
saved by that law. She was under his curse. Our
Lord Jesus Christ says that no flesh should be justified by
the law on the side of God. It says that whatever the law
saith, it saith to him that under the law that every mouth may
be stopped. When we're facing the law, we
shut our mouths. What are we gonna say? I was
preaching on how the people, we're not under the law, and
this woman, I said, do you think anybody here ever think they've
kept the Ten Commandments? And the woman in the back raised
her hand. I said, you're sadly mistaken.
But I'll tell you this, what they brought, they brought the
Lord, said, now the law said, And that's the first thing a
Pharisee will say. That's the first thing a reformer
will say, or somebody who is self-righteous will say. The
law said. The law said. And that's what
they wanted to use against her. And let me tell you something,
where there's guilt, whether you feel it or not, the law can't
do nothing to anybody but condemn them. That's all it can do. And
I thank God I don't have to deal with it. And one of these accusers
was clamoring, clamoring for her death. But let me ask you
something, where's the man at? Did anybody ever ask that question
here? Where's this man at? If she has taken an act, there
had to be somebody there. She was married and this other
fellow's probably married and that's why they said it was adultery.
Where was the man at? Why didn't they bring that man? I'm gonna tell you what I think
it is. I think it's what somebody in their book, one of their deacons
probably said in the front yard in the synagogue. And they didn't
wanna embarrass themselves and bring him. But they got this
woman and brought her. Oh, where's the man? According
to the law, they both must be stoned to death. They both must
be stoned to death. And why? Oh, my soul, why? Why are they so anxious to get
the Lord to condemn her? and weren't concerned for her
companion's sin. Why didn't they bring him too?
They just brought the woman. They just wanted her stoned to
death. They just wanted her to be condemned. And I'll tell you
something about us. In case somebody hadn't told
you in a day or two, let me tell you this. You know why they weren't
concerned for her companion in sin? Because man is guilty himself. and he's prejudiced, he's willful,
he's ignorant, and he is unfit at any given time, not only are
keeping God's law for himself, but he don't have the sense enough
and the right enough or he's so blinded by himself and so
ignorant of himself, he's not able to condemn another man.
And he certainly couldn't possibly have the right motive. Oh my,
that people, these folks didn't have the right motive. Oh, we're
all, listen, God asked this question, David asked this question, Lord,
if thou shouldest mark iniquities, who would be able to stand? If
God lined us up and started down from the day we was born and
just went marking everything we done, everything we done,
mark it down, mark it down, mark it down, mark it down. then who'd
be able to stand? But you know what he said? He
said, oh, but Lord, there is forgiveness with thee that thou
mayest be feared. Thank God for that. And I tell
you, man is guilty. I've seen people do this. I've
seen people do this. They're willfully ignorant. They're
unfit to administer true justice to anybody. to a fellow man with
the right motives. You reckon you've had the right
motive at anything you've ever done when you said something
about somebody else or mistreated somebody else? Do you reckon we ever had the
love of God that caused us to do something? Or was it just us? But oh, what
a terrible, terrible lot the accusers of the law are. Oh,
the world, he'll come along and tell you, you ain't nothing.
And they're right, I ain't nothing. Flesh will come along and say,
boy, you're just rotten. Yes, true too. Then the devil
comes along. And then you have that self-righteous
Pharisee. He wants to look at you and say,
if you was like I was, you wouldn't be the way you are. If you was
like I was, you'd be able to look up to God and tell him what
a fine, fine fellow you are. You'd look up to God and tell
him all the wonderful things you've done. Look up and tell
him how faithful you've been and how kind you've been and
how loving you've been and how gracious you've been and how
forgiving you've been. But oh my, I won't be like that
publican. Smote his breast. Couldn't even
lift up his eyes. He said, Lord, Be merciful to
me. And you know what he said? The
sinner, the sinner. Oh, so here's this sinner under
the law. She's condemned. She's under
the law. And there's people standing there. They want blood. They want blood. But now let me show you sinner
under grace. Cause sinner under grace, you
know, John 117 says this, the law was given by Moses, but grace
and truth came by the Lord Jesus Christ. They said to her, now
Moses in the law commanded us to stone her. What do you say
about it? If you let her go, you're gonna
disobey God's law. And if you show her mercy and
grace, then that makes you a friend of publicans and sinners, which
they've already accused him of that. What do you say? What a contrast. They're standing
there with the law and there's grace is standing here in the
person of our Lord Jesus Christ. The law in you, what do you say? The law's just and holy and good. Everybody knows that. Everybody
says that. It's holy, just, and good. And
it says condemn, but what do you say? What do you say? Can you say live when the law
says die? And how our master handles this
question, is a vital interest to us, it is to me, for four
reasons. In some measure, it reveals our
Lord's own character and what a blessed character He is. Secondly,
it reveals His attitude toward God's holy law. And thirdly, it reveals His attitude
to these accusers that came up here. And fourthly, the way he
deals with this miserable, guilty, embarrassed, justly condemned
sinner. How's he gonna deal with it?
How's he gonna deal with it? Oh, this is a mystery. It's a
mystery. I've been accused of a lot of
things. I used to, a couple come and visit us three weeks every
summer. They'd come on vacation. He was an optometrist, and he'd
bring his wife and his daughters, and he'd always come to our services,
morning and night, three nights a week. One day I got to preaching
from Galatians. Stand fast in the liberty wherewith
Christ hath made us free. Be not entangled again with the
yoke of bondage. And I began to show how that
God's people are not under the law, under no circumstances,
no way, no how. He met me immediately and I stepped
from the pulpit and he says, you're an antinomian. I said,
what's that? He says, you don't believe we're
under the law. I said, oh, you did get that, did you? But you
know, he never came back again. Never came back again. Another
fella called me, he wanted to come and visit us one time. He
was a pastor of some Reformed Baptist church somewhere, and
he called me up and says, what time your service start? I told
him, and he says, well, let me ask you this. How do you discipline
your church? I said, what do you mean? How
do you discipline people? I said, I don't. He said, well,
how do you deal with them when they commit adultery and lie
and steal and do all these kind of things? And he said, and cheat
and all that. And I said, I said, I knew I'm
not to do all that stuff when I was unconverted. I said, yeah, I didn't need the
Lord to tell me not to do those things. I knew better anyhow. But first thing he wanna know,
I've been pastor of the same church for 42 years and I've
never, ever, ever has anybody ever been brought before our
church or anybody ever put out of our congregation. You know
why? Because we are gathered as a
bunch of sinners and who wants to run a sinner off? This is
a hospital for sinners. This is a place for sinners to
gather, for sick people to gather. Why would you wanna run somebody
off that needs Christ? You say, well, they did this.
Well, you tell me what I haven't done. You tell me, you come up
with anything you want to think about. And if I haven't done
it, I've least thought it. And that's what they tried to
do to our Lord Jesus Christ. Oh, if he don't condemn this
woman, then he's against Moses. Then we got him. He's a lawbreaker. And if he, Let's this woman go
and don't stand up for Moses' law. Then we've got him because
he is gonna just ignore the whole Bible. And he asked him, said, what
says thou? And look what it says. They said
they, verse six, they said they tempting him that they might
have to accuse him. Now watch what happens. But Jesus stooped
down. with his fingers and wrote on
the ground as though he heard them not. Now listen to this. So when they continued asking
him, while he was stooped down, they just kept asking him. You
got to make a decision. You got to make a decision. You
got to let us know where you stand on this business of the
law. He just stooped down, ignored them. Wasn't listening to a word
they had to say. He stooped down, and the only
other place where you find, two places you find God writing in
the scripture. Over in Exodus 14, 18, 14, 20,
or something like that, 21, or 18, that our Lord, it says there
that God wrote on two tablets of stone with his finger. And
the second time you see him writing with his finger, when he's writing
on the wall, when Pell Shazzer's having a great feast using all
the things from the tabernacle. And God wrote on the wall with
his finger. So this is our Lord Jesus Christ. He's God. And he takes time out
and he just ignores everything they're saying, everything they
do. And he stoops down and he begins to write. And they just kept asking him
and kept asking him. Listen, if I don't answer you, I'm ignoring
you. You say, well, you're ignoring me. I was the reason for ignoring
some people. I don't need to be facetious,
but some people need to be ignored. But anyway, here they come along
and he just took down the right. I'm gonna tell you what I think
he wrote. I'm gonna tell you what I think he wrote. I think
he got down and he wrote, Love the Lord thy God with all thy
heart and all thy soul. I think that's what he wrote
the first time. And they looked down and they said, love God?
Love God? Well, where's the love of God
at in this people? They don't care about love. The
only thing they care about is law. They don't care about the
love of God, that the first thing out, the first commandment is
love God with all your heart. And I tell you, that's what I
think he stooped down and wrote. And oh my, and he's telling them,
he said, you fellas trying to remind me of the law. Don't you
know Moses wrote about me? And he said, you tell me you're
concerned about the law and talking to me, I was the one that wrote
the law. I wrote the law. I was the one
that took my finger and wrote it down on those tablets of stone
on that mountain. And he said, I didn't come to
destroy the law, I came to fulfill it. And oh my, they just continued
asking him. They thought, well, we've got
him cornered. He's doing something just to kill time. Oh, we have
embarrassed him. But he sat down there and wrote
down, I love God. Didn't look what he said when
he got back up. So they, verse seven, so they continued asking
him and he lifted up himself. And that's what we need. That's
what we do. We lift up. If he lifts up himself,
that's what we need to do. Lift up our Lord Jesus Christ
in the gospel. And when they continued asking
him, he lifted up himself and said unto them, he that's without
sin among you, ooh, he that's without sin among you, you be
the first to pick up stone. Go ahead, if you ain't got any
sin, pick up stone. Get you a rock and start throwing
right now. Get you a rock and start throwing.
What he did, he turned the white light of God's law on them. They come there to condemn somebody
and he turned around and he took that white light of God's holiness
and God's law and God's justice and God's mercy and he turned
it right back on them. Are you without sin? They had no right to do this,
they were sinning themselves. You know, the only person in
that group who could have picked up a stone, justly so, and rightly
so, who was without sin, it was the Lord Jesus himself. He could
have done that, but he didn't. And oh my, and listen to what
happens now. Oh my, they saw this ugly moat
of uncleanness in this woman's eye, but they didn't see the
beam of hypocrisy envy, pride, and malice in their own. Oh,
it's easy, easy to see and condemn somebody else's sin, but the
Lord deals with us and our sin. I'm glad that God deals with
my sin, that I don't have to let nobody else do it. They tell
you, you know, say, got to go to a priest and get confessed
and absorbed, but listen, I'm glad that God alone knows my
sin. I don't want you to know it.
Listen, you know, there's no sense in us pretending, no sense
acting like we're something we're not, are we? We're not sham sinners,
we're real sinners. And I tell you, our Lord, our
Lord deals with our sin. And that's why he says to them,
he that without sin, Pick up a stone. Whose sin was greater
here? Theirs or hers? Which one you
thinks the worst? Which one you thinks the worst?
Well, they both sin, there's no doubt about it. But I think
their sin was greater. Their sin was greater. They had
blood in their heart. They had hatred in their heart.
They had meanness and cruelty in their heart. Oh my. And our Lord Jesus came into
this world to deal with sin. Sin of the heart, sin of the
mind, sin of the nature as God sees it. You see, it's not so
much what we do, it's why we do it. And Christ deals with
the why we do it. A man, you know, he says, well,
he's a thief. You know why? A man don't become
a thief when he steals something, he steals something because he's
a thief. A man don't lie, become a liar when he tells a lie, he
lies because he's a liar. And that's what God come to deal
with, that issue of sin in the heart. When God deals with that
sin of the heart, deals with what goes in a man's heart, and
that's where the nature lies, and God's gotta change that nature.
And when God deals with the why, we do what we do. Then the what
changes, which is us. Oh, grace and truth came by the
Lord Jesus Christ. Oh my, now look what it says
there in verse seven again. And it says there in verse seven,
without sin, let him first cast a stone at her. And then while
they're standing there pondering this thing, their mouth had been
stopped. You know, I told you that when
the law comes, the mouth is stopped. Their mouth is stopped. God turned
the law on them and their mouth was shut. Shut it up. And when they heard it, heard
what he said. Now listen to this, being convicted
by their own conscience. Now let me tell you what that
means. There's no Holy Ghost conviction here. If there had
been Holy Ghost conviction here, Holy Spirit conviction here,
these men would have been saved. They were convicted by their
conscience. They were convicted by their conscience, not by God,
not by the Holy Spirit. And that's why it says, and they
went out one by one. And you know which one started?
The oldest one, the bunch. The oldest one had a little more
sense than the rest of them. He said, I believe he is backing
up, you know, trying to sneak around behind them fellas. Well,
I'll see you fellas. And you know, next thing you
know, they just start walking away. One by one, they left. One by one. One by one, they
left. Beginning to the eldest, even to probably the youngest.
And oh my, they went out. Where was the courage now? Instead
of standing as accusers, they find themselves the one accused.
Instead of judging, they find themselves judged now. They went
out one by one. Where was their courage now?
Where's their boldness at now? They could face her sins, but
they couldn't face their own sins. They wanted to deal with
her sins, but they didn't want to deal with their own. They
come to make a fool out of Christ and walked away showing what
fools they were, what they were. Now, when it says there in verse
eight, when he told him without sin cast a stone, he stooped
down again and wrote on the ground. What do you reckon he wrote this
second time? while they were walking away. He didn't even
stand up. He wasn't watching them walk away. He was writing.
He stooped down again. You know, our Lord Jesus Christ,
you're talking about stooping. He stooped as low as anybody
could stoop. Oh, He came all the way down,
all the way to the death of the cross. And I believe that when
our Lord wrote this time, I believe he wrote, love your neighbor
as yourself. He dealt with the issues of the
heart and our Lord Jesus Christ, they went out. And when our Lord
stooped down the first time, that's when he came to face that
broken law. That's when he came. to render
obedience to that glorious law of God that's when He came in
love and grace and mercy to prepare to go under that law and add
a satisfaction and obedience to that law that commanded her
to be stoned and the second stooping is is that He faced God's holy
law in every way and He stooped down and that second stooping,
first stooping is when He came The second stooping is when He
come down to die. That second stooping, He come
down to die, to go to that cross, to be put on that cross for us,
to die and then go all the way to the grave. And so He raised
up again. He's on resurrection ground now.
He's on resurrection ground. Oh, He went down to the cross,
went down to the grave with our sins upon Him. That first table of the law was
broken. When Moses went down and saw
that crowd already dancing naked around the golden calf, he throwed
the law down and it shattered. Come straight from the presence
of God and he shattered it. God gave him another one. And
he said, I tell you where I want this next one to go. I want you
to lift up the lid of that mercy seat I want you to lift up that
ark. I want you to lift up that mercy
seat. And I want you to take them 10 commandments. I want
you to take that law and put it down under that mercy seat.
Put it in that ark and close that lid. It's already been broken. I want
it under the mercy seat. I want it where blood can be
applied. I want it where God himself can meet a man on the
mercy seat where the blood's been shed. That's where I want it. I want
it under that blessed mercy seat. Every time the priest goes in
there, he'll put blood on top of it. And I tell you what, God
says in their sins, they will be gone for a year at a time.
But when our Lord Jesus Christ comes, it says he put away sin
once in the end of the world by the sacrifice of himself.
He put away sin once and for all. And you know what God said
about it? He said, there's sins and iniquities
I will remember no more. Now, I don't know about you,
I have a hard time sometimes remembering my sins. I don't
know what causes me to do it, I don't know why. I'll think
about something I've done when I was in 20s and in my teens,
and I'll get thinking about something I've done and I'll say, oh Lord,
forgive me. And I know I've been forgiven, but yet, like David
said, my sins are ever before me. And yet at the same time,
that's why we need the gospel. Oh my, put them on, ain't you
glad that Christ is our mercy seat? That law is under that
blessed mercy seat. And Christ is our mercy seat.
That's why we come to the mercy, but boldly under the throne of
grace to obtain mercy and find help in the time of need. And
oh my, our Lord Jesus Christ, they were convicted by their
own conscience. No Holy Spirit done that. When
the Holy Spirit convicts you, you're coming to Christ, you're
not going away from. These fellows went away from
Christ. When the Holy Spirit convinces you, you're coming
to Christ. That's the difference. And oh
my, now look at the confidence now. And all he stooped down
and wrote on the ground. They heard it, they went out
one by one. And I love this right here, last
part of verse nine. And Jesus was left alone. And the woman, and the woman
standing right in front of her. Oh my, I can just picture this.
Oh, there's this crowd around. Everybody's left, but those people
that Christ was teaching, they're still there. And there's this
woman. Christ is left by himself. And
there's this woman. She's left standing there. She's
left standing there. She has been so shamed. Oh my. Here's something, the law can
show you your sin, but it can't put it away. The only way it
can be put away is by being alone with the Lord Jesus Christ. Be
alone with Christ. Oh my. And that's what the law
does. The purpose of the law is to
bring the knowledge of sin and bring us to Christ. That's the
purpose of the law. And what a wonderful, what a
wonderful place and position to be in. Everybody left and
she stood right there. I believe she was afraid to move.
Oh, she stood right there. Oh, how the love of Christ constrains
us. How it constrains us. Ah, look
at this, look at this wonderful confession now. Look in verse
10. Jesus lifted himself up now and
everybody's gone. And he lifted himself back up
and the woman standing there, he lift himself back up. Oh,
he's on resurrection ground. He's done been to the cross.
He's been to the grave. Standing on resurrection ground
here. And Jesus lifted up himself and saw none, I guess everybody
left, saw none but the woman. Oh my, you know Christ sees nobody
but us. You know that? This is how glorious
and how majestic and how wondrous our Savior is. He knows each
and every one of us individually as we're sitting here right now.
And you know, wherever they're meeting all over the world, God's
people, He knows each and every one of them. And we do things to surprise
ourself, but we don't never do anything to surprise Him. Oh
my. And He said, Woman, He asked
her, He said, Woman, where are those thine accusers? Where are they at? Where's that? Where's your accuser at now? Where's our accuser? Huh? Oh, my. You see? He says to her, said, who's condemned
you? She said, who's condemned you? And you know what she said? No
man, Lord, they're all gone. Nobody to condemn me now. Oh, you see, it's the Lord we
have to deal with. No man, Lord, is to condemn me.
How can this be? Truly, truly, the Lord Jesus
is the friend of sinners. Truly, truly, he came to save
the worst kind of sinners. And look at the salvation that
he provided for this woman. Jesus said to her, no man, Lord,
ain't nobody condemning me. And I love this. The Lord Jesus
says, neither do I. I don't condemn you either. I
don't condemn you either. There is therefore now no condemnation
to them that are in Christ Jesus. Look over in Romans 8, just a
minute. You all know these verses, but look here what it says. Look over here at Romans 8. Oh my. Look in verse 33. Who shall lay
anything to the charge of God's elect? Who? She's one of God's elect. Who's
going to lay anything to her charge? There's a lot of fellows
came, thought they was going to. They're all gone. The law's gone, it can't condemn
me. Angels can't condemn me. The flesh can't even condemn
me. Satan can't condemn me. And look what he says, who shall
lay any charge, anything to the charge of God's elect. I love
it, it's God that justifies. Now here's that question, who
is he that's gonna condemn us? That word condemn means to judge
us, who's gonna judge us? He said, it's Christ that died. He ain't rather that's risen again.
Well, where's he at then if he's risen again? Well, he's sitting
at the right hand of God. What's he doing? He's taking
up our case, taking up our case. Oh my, and our Lord says, neither
do I condemn thee. And look what he said to her,
go and sin no more. And a lot of people have trouble
with that. I don't have a bit of trouble
with it. After he lifted himself up, he's standing on resurrection
ground, atonement's been made, the law's been honored, satisfaction's
been made. What he's saying here is don't
go back to your life. Don't go back to your life. Don't
go back to where you come from. He can't, you know, We understand what we are. We
have no doubt about it. She understood what she was.
And what he's saying, when you sin no more, don't go back to
your old life. Don't go back to where you was.
Don't go back to what you was doing. You live to my glory now. You live to what I've done for
you. You live for my glory. You live
and remember what I've done for you. And what he's telling her
is, sin won't be your master anymore. The Scriptures tells
us there's two sovereigns in the Scripture, God and sin. Sin reigns, the Scripture tells
us sin reigns. Well, Romans 6.21 says this,
he says that we're no longer under the law. But sin has no
more dominion over us because we're not under the law, but
under grace. You wanna know how sin get dominion
over you? Go under the law. You wives go
home, lay down the law to your husband, or you husbands go home,
lay down the law to your wife, see what happens. Furrow fly. You know why? You'll go right
under the dominion of sin. And that's all law can do, is
bring you under the dominion of sin. But we're not under the
dominion of sin. We're under grace. And grace
now reigns. Where sin once abounded, like
in this woman, grace now reigns. Grace reigns. Oh my. You know, I'll tell you, sin
won't be your master anymore. That's what she's saying. It was not go and sin more and
no more and then I'll not condemn you. What he's telling her is,
you live to my glory. You're a new creature now. You
go on and you live to my glory. I know this. I know this. This is one of the things that
they accuse people of that believe in the grace of God. That don't
believe we're under the law in no way, shape, form or fashion.
That Christ is our master. Love is our law. But they accused
us of, said, well, and they accused Paul of this. Well, since grace
abounds, why don't you just continue in sin? He said, God forbid. How can I, who am dead to sin,
live any longer therein? Where'd you die to sin at? In
Christ. Now, They told old Walter Groover,
and the Lord just called him home a few weeks ago. They said,
Walter, he said, if I believe what you did, I believe I could
send all I wanted to and never had to worry about it. Walter
said, I'll send more than I want to, and I'm under the grace of
God. Well, we all, you know, but we
don't glory in it. You ain't gonna come in here
and tell what you've done or what you've said. No, no. Law
says, donor. Christ said, If you ain't got
no sin, go ahead and throw in them rocks. Love God, raised
himself up. Love your neighbors yourself.
And you know, in Christ, you know, our love has to, I've got
to stop. Our love has to be perfect. Our
faith has to be perfect. Everything about us has to be
perfect to be accepted of God. Well, I love God perfectly. You
know where I do? In the Lord Jesus Christ. I love
my neighbors myself in the Lord Jesus Christ. People say, how
do you know you're justified and you ain't got no sin? That
up yonder says it's the right hand of God. And I can see, how
do you see? Same way you do by faith. Amen. Amen.