Sin is the most devastating and disrupting thing in the world. It lays waste human lives and homes, robbing them of peace and love and usefulness, leaving brokeness and despair and disillusion in its path. Yet it comes with such seductive charm, putting its chain around a man, woman, or young person so gently and with such promise of pleasure and profit, that thousands are caught before they are aware of its nature, and live to curse the day whenever they placed themselves within its power.

The woman in John 8 (from where the words of Jesus come) had been caught in situations such as these. She had been guilty of adultery, an act which every right thinking person knew was wrong and unclean. The self-righteous religious leaders brought her to Jesus and said, " the law of Moses says that she should be stoned to death. What do you say?" Jesus said, "Let the man among you who is without sin cast the first stone." One by one they all left the presence of Jesus, until the woman was left alone with Him.

This woman had done a bad thing, and Jesus knew just how bad it was. But He knew too all the circumstances of her life, the loneliness, perhaps, and the lack of love; the tremendous strength of temptation to which she had given way. And when those proud, self-righteous men had gone, and she was left in the pure presence of Jesus. He must have known something of the self-loathing in her heart, and the deep repentance, and the great desire to be made clean, and not to sin again.

"Has no man condemned you?" He asked. "No man, Lord." "Neither do I condemn you. Go, and sin no more."

There are people who feel that they can never get beyond the threshold of the Christian life, if as far as that, because of the sins of their past lives, and the sinful habits that grip them now as a result. They feel unclean because of things they have thought, and things they have done; because of memories of the past which are always pulling them towards sins in the present.

They believe that "good" Christians would condemn them if they knew what they are really like. They want to be different. They want to be clean. But they imagine that the Christian life is not for such as them.

If anyone like that is reading this article, I can assure you that Jesus is waiting to speak to you just as He spoke to the woman. He wants to speak to you alone. He is going to get rid of all the others first. Don’t bother just now what others think. They are only sinners like yourself, and their approval and condemnation is not worth a lot. They don’t know the whole story as Jesus knows it. He knows all that led up to your present condition. He knows the sense of uncleanness. He know the longing for deliverance and forgiveness. He doesn’t make light of your sin. He never does that. He alone of all, who have ever lived on this earth knows to the full the dreadful, devastating consequences of sin. He knows what a foul things it is; what a horrible cancer it can be within the human soul.

But He knows too that He holds the answer to it. It was to provide that answer that He came from heaven to earth. It was to provide that answer that He went to the Cross and died for sinners, taking your guilt and mine upon Himself that we might go free. And it is to apply that answer to your life’s special need that He is drawing near to you in response to the cry of your heart for help. He is saying to you, in all of your hopeless uncleanness, and sense of bondage and shame, "Neither do I condemn you. Go, and sin no more."

He is not mocking you when He says that. Thousands have proved His power to give the conscience rest, and break the shackles of sin upon their lives. He is telling you to do the impossible, yes. But He is telling you to do it in the strength of the One with Whom nothing is impossible. The guarantee of its possibility is in the authority of the One who speaks the word of command, "Go, and sin no more."

There is no need for you to stay around any longer mourning about your condition, and held back by a sense of condemnation and shame. Take Jesus at His word - "Neither do I condemn you". Take Jesus at His word that is possible when He says, "Go, and sin no more." Get up now, and go out into life counting upon the forgiveness and the strength which He has promised shall be yours.

Doug Watson