John 8:7-9

The Savior's solution: V. 7. So when they continued asking Him, He lifted up Him self, and said unto them, He that is with out sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her. V. 8. And again He stooped down, and wrote on the ground. V. 9. 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.

The fact that the Lord so pointedly ignored their question nettled the scribes and Pharisees. They persisted in their questioning; their importunity bordered on impudence. And so the Lord finally straightened up and put a question to them, in the form of a permission to carry out their aim with respect to the accused woman. The sinless one of them should cast the first stone upon the woman.

Christ did not shield, did not excuse the sinner; He did not utter one word in extenuation of her guilt. But His words were a most emphatic and cutting reproof for the self-sufficient Pharisees that were often guilty, in secret, of all the sins in the Decalog.

Having made this statement, the Lord once more bent down and wrote on the ground. Whether He wrote actual words and connected sentences or merely traced figures in the sand, is an idle speculation. But His manner conveyed the reproof more loudly than if He had shouted it, condemning them and their self-righteous sanctimoniousness.

And the effect was all that could be desired. For once, under the prodding of Christ's words, the consciences of the scribes and Pharisees became active. Undoubtedly the dignity and majesty, the solemn, searching earnestness of the Lord did much to add to the weight of His rebuke. And so, one by one, they began to file out of the hall, the older ones leading, and the others following in due course. They might have brazened the matter out before others, before mere men, but they made a miserable failure of it before the majesty of Jesus.

"This, then, is the difference between the kingdom of Christ and the kingdom of the world, that Christ makes all men sinners. But He does not let that be the end, but it follows that He absolves her" (Luther, 8, 131).