Throwing Rocks

When I was a kid, we used to do some really dumb stuff. I remember living in an apartment complex when I was very young. There was no grass or yard of any kind... only concrete, a laundry room, and these big open stair wells that went to the upper floors of the complex. We used to run around this ‘playground’ and, not knowing any different, we made the best of it. I always had bruised shins and scraped knees... those concrete steps and sidewalks were really hard on a kid. I can remember playing with stuff like dryer lint (yes, dryer lint) that we collected from the laundry room and geckos... those little squishy looking lizards whose tails fall off with the slightest touch (no worries... they grow back).

Being kids, we were always looking for something more exciting to do. We ran around playing cops and robbers and one day we got the bright idea to have a ‘war’. We stationed ourselves under the two stairwells. Our weapons were the never ending supply of rocks on the ground at the base of the stairwells. We’d stick out heads out and wing a rock as hard as we could at our opponents, ducking back in as quickly as possible so we wouldn’t get hit by the flying rocks. This all went on for quite a while until some unlucky soul stuck their head out at the wrong moment and was blasted right above the eye by one of those rocks.

The fun was over. There was blood, swelling, pain and tears. The game no longer held the same fascination after we saw what could happen and we never played it again.

I was reminded of this story this morning at church, of all places. We watched a video ‘Are You Amazed’ and in it were many accounts of the life of Christ in which people were amazed. One of them was a story depicted in John chapter 8 where Jesus was teaching in the temple when the religious leaders brought in a woman who was caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group (what other motive than humiliation?) and said to Jesus, ‘Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery.’ (No mention of the man, of course.) ‘In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?’

This is one of my favorite pictures of the grace of God. I can just see Jesus as he bent down and started to write on the ground (it doesn’t say what he was writing, but some have speculated maybe a list of sins). The religious guys kept questioning him so he stands up and says simply ‘If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.’ and he bent down and continued to write on the ground. Those who heard began to go away one at a time... the oldest first until only Jesus was left with the woman still standing there. Jesus stands up and asks her ‘Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?’ ‘No one, sir’ she answered. ‘Then neither do I condemn you,’ Jesus said. ‘Go now and leave your life of sin.’

How many times in life do we set ourselves up as the judge of others? How often do we look sadly at another’s sin, all the while ignoring our own? Just like that innocent game, our rock throwing can have very painful results... bruising hearts, crushing spirits, draining another's hope of ever being truly loved and accepted. Lord, help us see the damage our ‘rock throwing’ causes so we won’t ever want to play such a dangerous game.