Adapted from a Jason Cole sermon series https://www.sermoncentra.com/sermons/4-encounter-with-an-adulterous-woman-jason-cole-sermon-on-sin-exposed-66151?ref=SermonSeriesDetails

2. Sometimes we respond to people’s sin and
think we are responding the way that God
would’ve.
The best way to see how to deal with sin is to
see how Jesus dealt with sinners during His
time on earth.

3. A very religious teenage couple were dating.
They were at the Christian church building
whenever the doors were open.
They tried very hard to center their relationship
around Christ with God centered morals.
They kept their relationship pure and made sure
they stayed above reproach.

4. The temptation to not remain so pure was very
strong, and Satan was continuously attacking
them.
One day they gave into temptation and decided
to take advantage of a time that their parents
were not home.
Of course, the girl’s father came in and caught
them doing some improper things.

5. Put yourself in the shoes of that Father.
How would or should you react to a situation
like that?
Most of us would not respond in the nicest of
ways. The first thoughts that run through our
head when we hear a story like that is:
1. How could they sin so blatantly against God?
2. They will receive God’s judgment!
3. I am glad I am not a sinner like them!

6. There was a similar story that took place when
Jesus was here on Earth, but perhaps even to a
greater extent. This story leaves us a beautiful
account of how our Savior treated people who
were around Him, especially those sinful people
of His day. When Jesus was in Jerusalem, He
spent a lot of time around the temple teaching
and preaching. He gained the respect of many
of the people around Him including the Rabbis
and teachers of the Law.

7. One day, as Jesus was in the temple, the
teachers of the Law and the Pharisees brought a
woman to Jesus.
They thought they could trap Jesus.
This woman brought to Jesus was caught in the
very act of Adultery.
I wonder what was going through the minds of
the religious people of that day.

8. I am sure they were thinking of the awful sin of this
woman and they were probably angry about it.
The Pharisees had hoped to trap Jesus by asking
Him what to do with that woman.
If Jesus would have said to stone her, He would
have been legally in trouble because it was against
the law for the Jews to enforce the death penalty,
and if Jesus would have said “let her go,” they
would have accused Jesus of going against the
Law because the scriptures say that an adulteress
is to be stoned on the account of two or three
witnesses.

9. Allow me to chase a rabbit.
I question why the man she committed adultery
with was not brought to be stoned with her?
Perhaps because she wasn’t married?
NIV
The great King David and Bathsheba should
have been put to death!

10. NIV

11. I’ll let that rabbit go so we get back to our study!
I wonder where each of us would have fit into
this story.
It scares me to think what part I may have
played.
Maybe I would have been looking down at this
woman for her sin thinking I was better than her
because I was not such a horrible sinner.
The hard thing to do is to find a balance for how
we are to treat sin.

12. It would be wrong to have wanted this woman
stoned because we need to show grace to the
sinners and show them love as well, but on the
other hand we can not overlook sin and
condone it, in fact sin should be sickening to
the Christian.
How do we balance legalism and grace?
I believe Jesus sets us the perfect example for
how to view and treat people.

13. NIV

16. When people came into the presence of Jesus,
they felt convicted about their sins.
When Jesus went to Samaria and came across
the woman at the well, she was convicted about
her past and wanted to change.

17. When Jesus was passing through Jericho and
went to Zacchaeus the Tax Collector’s house,
Zacchaeus was convicted he had mistreated
people.
When Jesus came to Simon the Pharisee’s house
the sinful woman was convicted of her life of sin.
Simon Peter was convicted hearing Jesus preach
to a multitude from his boat.
Then after a night of not catching any fish, they
caught enough to completely fill two boats so full
they started to sink.

18. NIV
Why is it people were so convicted of sin in
Jesus’ presence?

19. There is no doubt Jesus was a powerful
preacher. Surely there has never been a gospel
preacher that has affected people the way Jesus
did. Jesus spoke boldly and bluntly, He
convicted people of their sins often by His
powerful preaching, but can we attribute
people’s conviction by His preaching.
A sermon can have some effect on people, but
in reality, that effect in only temporal.

20. You may hear the preacher preach and feel
convicted about something said; you may have
your toes stepped on and want to change.
Most of the time though, a sermon and
preaching does not impact us enough to change
us. Some folks first hear the gospel & are
convicted by the preacher’s words, but had they
not seen Christ in other people they never
would have changed and their conviction would
have been nothing more than an emotional stir.

21. I think it is important for us to put into practice
things we are convicted of in a sermon.
An “amen” does not make us right with the Lord,
agreeing is easy, but changing is not.
Jesus was unquestionably the greatest preacher
ever. Myriads of people, crowds large enough to
fill stadiums, came just to hear Him preach.
He preached the best sermon ever, called the
“Sermon on the Mount,” but I do not think His
preaching is what brought conviction and change
to people.

22. There is also no doubt when Jesus came He was
fully God and His mere presence would have
made sinners feel uncomfortable.
There was just something about Jesus’ presence
that could not tolerate sin and people sensed that.
People though were not changed because Jesus
was God. Jesus could have claimed to be the
Messiah until He was blue in the face and lives
would not have been changed, but I think lives
were changed by Jesus for a different reason.

23. I think Jesus’ preaching was effective and His
deity cannot be denied, but people were
changed because of His character.
When people came into the presence of Jesus,
He lived in a way that impacted people.
He lived His life without sinning.
If each of us were asked I bet we would find we
were all impacted by the character of a person.

24. Perhaps you can remember the godly character
of a person that had an impact on you coming
to the Lord.
My story is different than most because I was a
“PK,”
Preacher’s Kid!
My whole life I was influenced by the godly
character of my parents & 3 older siblings.

25. The author of this sermon remembers the first
time he came to church he was impacted by a
few people in the youth group.
One reason he came back to church was
because people invited him out to eat after
church.
That may seem insignificant, but when he was
shown unconditional love, he was impacted and
drawn to Jesus. He was drawn to Jesus
because these people were different. He was
impacted by the character of Christians.

26. When Jesus came across people in His life,
people were impacted and changed because of
His impact on them and His love that He showed
them.
Think of the love He showed Zacchaeus, the
unpopular, short, tax collector when He came to
his house and ate with him.
Think of the unconditional love He showed to the
sinful woman, her life was changed.
People’s lives were changed because of our
Savior’s character.

27. With the woman caught in the act of adultery
Jesus showed love that no one had ever seen.
He could have condemned this woman of her
sin, but He said He did not condemn her, and
showed her extreme love.
We all want to see people change their lives.
We can sit around all day and complain about
the wickedness of the world and immorality, but
if we as Christians do not show people a Christ-
like character, people will not be impacted to the
point of change.

28. When Jesus came to the Earth He came with
power and authority. God had placed His
authority of judgment into the hands of Jesus.
If anybody that ever lived had the right to
condemn sinners for the way they lived, Jesus
did.
He lived His life perfectly and would not have
been a hypocrite, but Jesus showed us the
perfect example of how to love the sinner.

29. As we read about the woman caught in adultery
we see the love and compassion of Jesus.
The Pharisees and Teachers of the Law wanted
to have this woman stoned so they brought her
to Jesus, who was respected as a great teacher.
Jesus then said one of His most famous
statements.
“
.”

30. At that point in time He was writing with His
finger in the dirt. I do not know what Jesus was
writing. I wonder, could He have been writing
different sins that the Pharisees and teachers
may have committed, hence publicly exposing
their sin.
I believe Jesus’ main point was we all have
sinned and have no right to condemn sinners.
He made this point in the Sermon on The Mount.

31. NIV

32. He was trying to say, although this woman’s sin
may seem disgusting; all sin separates us from
God from the least to the greatest.
Slowly all her accusers went away, and only
Jesus was left, and He said He did not condemn
her either.

33. Although Jesus did not condemn the sinner
when He was here on Earth 2,000 years ago
there is a reason for that.
It is not because He did not have the authority
to condemn, it is because the judgment was not
appointed to be when Jesus was here on Earth,

34. NIV
There will come a time when all who are not in
Christ will be condemned by Jesus.

35. How then should we treat sinners? How should
we treat people who live really immoral lives?
It is really easy to look at people who we know
are immoral and to pass judgment on them.
Jesus left us an example of how to treat people,
and I think the best thing to do is to treat people
with love regardless of their status as a sinner.
We can love the sinner;
we can treat immoral people lovingly and still
not be guilty of their sin.

36. I believe this is the best way for us to reach
people.
When people see a church that is not
condemning of sinners they will be drawn in.
We do not have to condemn sinners because
God’s Word does the job for us.
This does not mean that we do not confront
people with their sins, because obviously Jesus
did, but it means that we love them
unconditionally.

37. I think problems start to come when we see
people as horrible sinners, because in reality we
are no better, they just sin differently than we
do.
They commit those BIG SINS, murder, adultery
& such, I just tell little white lies.
Let’s see how our little sin compares to their
BIG SINS.

38. NIV

39. Did you catch that?
will suffer the same fate as those BIG
SINNERS being cast into the in !
That should jerk the slack out of you!
The only difference is we have Jesus to remove our
punishment for our sin. He has already endured the
punishment for us!
Jesus never pulled any punches with people.
He never held back the truth, but He was also very
loving towards the immoral people of His day.
Jesus had the perfect balance between grace and
truth, and between law and grace.

40. Although Jesus never condemned the sinners
of His day, He never condoned people’s sin.
Jesus got angry with the moneychangers in the
temple and drove them out with a whip because
they had made His father’s house into a market.
In fact, when Jesus preached, He preached the
same message that John the Baptist did,
“ .”

41. NIV
NIV
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42. Jesus always demanded repentance for those
that came to Him. He never overlooked sin.
I love how Jesus spoke to the woman caught in
adultery. After Jesus did not condemn her, He
said, “ .”
I see a problem in the world today, sin is
sometimes condoned in the name of the love of
Christ. Although we should show people love
and treat them as Christ would have, that does
not mean that we condone sin.

43. Sin needs to be dealt with and sin should be
sickening to God’s people.
Just because we believe we should not
condemn the sinner does not mean that we
should condone the sin.
As you look across churches of this country
you see people are more and more condoning
sin.
Churches are now accepting homosexuality and
other sins in the name of love.

44. My question for you is how do we show people
love? Is it by tolerating what they do and letting
it slide. If your kids misbehave you discipline
them because you love them and you parents
know that a lack of discipline is a lack of love.
I remember hearing the words from my parents
when I was punished,
“We are doing this because we love you.”

45. They asked me if I thought I should be free to go
when, where and do what I want?
Even college students have dorm curfews!
Should I, a High School teenager, not have
stricter limits than older college students away
from home?
It was impressed upon me what I already knew,
they loved me so much discipline was
necessary and beneficial.

46. NIV

47. God does not condone our sin because He
loves us, and we as God’s children should not
condone the sin of others because we love
people.
Sometimes the best thing you can do for a
person is not condone their sin.
Condoning sin does not bring people to
repentance.

48. Our hopes and desires with a person in sin
should be for them to be restored to God and
we must do what we can to bring that about.
We must continually ask ourselves how we
should deal with sin.
I believe Jesus sets the best example for how
we should treat sinners.

49. 1. Sinners should feel convicted in our
presence.
2. Sinners should not feel condemned in our
presence.
3. Sin should not be condoned in our presence.