She closed her eyes and willed herself not to start crying. Jason did not carry all the blame here. She went into everything with both eyes wide open. They didn’t do anything she didn’t want to do.
Perhaps that’s why she felt so guilty. Because she willfully did something she knew opposed her moral standards and her faith. Then, instead of it just staying hidden like some dark secret, soon everyone would know, and her hypocrisy would come fully into the light.
Yet, God already knew, and she’d spent the last several weeks avoiding Him as if she could hide. She hadn’t stopped to pray for the baby, its future, its life. Why? Dare she search her heart and find out the truth?
A tear slipped down her cheek, followed by another and another. Soon, she had to dig through her purse and find the package of tissues. Her fingers trembled as she tried to open the little plastic flap. Finally, she just ripped the whole thing, and it fell open into her lap. She picked up two tissues and pressed them to her eyes. So much for her carefully constructed makeup.
Ken rubbed her back between her shoulder blades. He couldn’t possibly know why she suddenly felt so upset, but he didn’t ask or question, just supported. When she thought she could raise her head without wailing, she slowly looked at the pastor. He talked about Christ’s love and wisdom, how the crowd dispersed without stoning the woman to death because of Christ’s challenge of he who is without sin cast the first stone. Left alone with the woman, He asked her, “Has no one condemned you?”
When she admitted no one had, Christ said, “Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more.”
“Beloved,” the pastor said, “let’s take a moment and look at that. What does it mean to condemn? It is the Greek wordkatakrino,which means basically to judge worthy of punishment. Now, her accusers say that the law of Moses required her to be stoned to death. However, that’snotwhat the law says. This kind of wordplay reminds me of the serpent as he addressed the first woman and asked, ‘Did God really say…?’”
He held up his Bible. “What the law of Moses says is that if a man and woman commit adultery, then they should both be put to death. But that’s not what they were doing here. They only brought half of the sinful couple, and in doing so, they were trying to trick Jesus. Because, after all, who was He to go against the law of Moses?”
The congregation murmured in amusement. He continued. “So, stoning her to death was not following the law, and Christ knew that. But, beyond that, what He said to the woman is most encouraging! ‘Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more.’ Which is to say, ‘Neither do I judge you worthy of punishment.’ Now, how is that possible? She was sinning! Whether they brought her partner with her for judgment or not didn’t take her sin out of the equation. Did Jesus really not judge her?”
He slammed his hand down on the pulpit and pointed at the congregation. “I do not for one second believe that Jesus condoned her sin. What I believe is that He knew her heart and could see her desire for repentance. So, what did He do? He forgave her and told her to go and sin no more. He didn’t say, ‘Girl, you’re good. Those are old laws. They don’t apply anymore.’” He paused as everyone chuckled. “He simply said, ‘Go and sin no more.’
“Now, one sidebar worth mentioning here. He didn’t say, ‘Go back to your sinful ways. It’s cool.’ He said she shouldn’t sin anymore. He knew she felt repentant.
“How often do we find ourselves sinning, then asking for forgiveness, then kind of hanging out and waiting, making sure it really happened? We ask ourselves, ‘Am I really forgiven? Like, really truly forgiven? I just can’t believe it!’ And you know what? That’s true. We really don’t believe it. Instead, we focus on our pasts, our mistakes, our sins. They drag us down with the weight of guilt and regret until we can barely walk forward.
“But Christ has given us the out. He is here to share our burdens, lighten the load, and pay the cost for our sins so we can claim that we are redeemed! He didn’t tell her to go and think about what she’d done! No! He said, ‘Go and sin no more.’”
He paced to the front of the platform, his Bible in one hand and his other hand casually in his pocket. “Now, I don’t know about you, but that encourages me. It frees me. It removes the burden of sin off of my shoulders and lays it at the feet of my Savior so I can go out, sinless, guiltless, blameless, and work for Him and His kingdom. It would be impossible to serve Him while struggling under the weight of my past. He doesn’t want that. He wants me out here, working, doing, being the light and the hands and feet! And that’s what He wants for you, too.”
As he spoke, his wife, who led the worship team, stepped onto the stage, followed by the musicians. Daisy felt such a weight lifted from her heart as she listened to the chords of a song softly filling the room.
The weight of her decision to involve herself in a physical relationship with Jason had overwhelmed her, dragged her down, weighted her with guilt and shame. Even though she’d admitted her sin to God and asked His forgiveness, she really had just kind of been hanging out, worried He was mad at her, thinking He could never possibly forgive her for embarrassing Him this way.
But He wasn’t that kind of God. He loved her and wanted her to give Jesus her burdens, let Him take up the yoke so she could continue in the ministry where He’d placed her. He wanted her to go and sin no more. Not sit here and make sure the forgiveness really stuck.
Daisy wanted to stand up and applaud. What perfect timing for a sermon of this caliber! She glanced at Ken. He must have sensed her gaze because he turned his head. She could read the concern in his eyes and smiled at him to help alleviate his worry.
Withher legs crossed, Daisy leaned her head back and looked up at the ceiling of the gazebo. Ken lay across the bench with his head in her lap, and she casually ran her fingers through his hair. They had just finished eating lunch with most of his family. At first, she worried about how his parents would treat her because she had broken down so openly in church. But they never asked any questions, just treated her with welcome kindness.
“I’m glad you came today,” Ken said.
“Me, too. I had no idea that you were taking up an offering for Gálatas Seis. I just thought you were going to talk about it.”
His church had handed her a check for more than a thousand dollars from an offering they had taken after Ken spoke about the charity.
“Nothing special. We do that monthly. The charity on the books for the last year got folded up into a larger company that we don’t typically support. My dad sits on the committee and asked if we could highlight you instead.”
“I really appreciate it. Every little bit helps.”
They sat in comfortable silence for several minutes. The sound of tweeting birds and buzzing insects filled the air. Daisy found her eyes resting on the surface of the pond. The coy breached the surface like an orca out in the ocean. She jumped and then giggled. “I didn’t know they did that.”
Ken apparently knew what she referred to because he didn’t even turn his head to look. “When we first got them, lots of them did that all the time. Apparently, that’s normal when they come to a new place. That one is just crazy, I think. Never did settle in.”
“How do you know which one it was?”
He smiled, and she stared down at his face. “We’ve had the same fish for fifteen years. I know which one it was. It’s not my first day.”
She looked around at the gardens and the edge of the castle she could see. “I can’t imagine growing up here.”
“Yeah, we had it rough.” His chest shook with a silent chuckle. “Actually, it was just my brothers and me and Valerie. This entire property was our playground. We played, too. Can’t imagine a better place to raise triplet boys.”
