Jesus and the Social Outcasts
Stephen Terry
Commentary for the February 15, 2014
Sabbath School Lesson
“All those the Father gives me will
come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away.” John 6:37, NIV
The 2008 Persian-English
film, “The Stoning of Soraya M” by Cyrus Nowrasteh has never been released for
distribution in the United States as it was deemed too brutal and violent for
American audiences. In a parallel to the opening verses of John, chapter eight,
in the gospels, Soraya was arrested for adultery by Muslim enforcers and
condemned to death by stoning. However, in her case, there was no Jesus to
deliver her. Under Sharia Law, her accusers dug a hole and buried her in the
ground up to her neck. A crowd then viciously struck her in the head and face
with stones until she died.
Lest we
arrogantly assert that these are Muslims and those in Christian countries are
above endorsing such behavior, we may want to consider a 1964 Twentieth Century-Fox
movie, “Zorba the Greek.” This Oscar-winning movie is most often remembered for
Anthony Quinn’s dancing and the delightful Greek music. However, there is a
much darker theme to the movie. A beautiful widow, played by Irene Papas, has
her throat slit under the approving witness of the entire town for daring to
become sexually involved with someone other than the young man the townspeople approved
of but she had no interest in.
Sexual
transgressions are not easily forgiven or forgotten, not even by Christians. Even
though when we read the Bible, the scriptures appear schizophrenic about the
subject. In the Old Testament we find a death sentence pronounced for those
guilty of adultery.[i] Yet
we find King David’s adultery with Bathsheba not only an instance where both escaped
death, but God even chooses Bathsheba out of all David’s wives to be the chosen
woman to carry forward the Davidic line that ultimately produced an incarnate
Jesus.
Some might
say that David was forgiven because he repented. However, Leviticus makes no
allowance for repentance. Even if it did, how many others may have repented
over the centuries but still were sentenced to death? King David was the most
powerful man in Israel in the days of the United Monarchy. Then as now,
apparently, justice for the powerful was not the same as justice for those who
were powerless.
Perhaps this
is why the Pericopae Adulterae[ii]
is such a dramatic illustration of the issues surrounding this whole subject.
The victim, obviously powerless, is brought before Jesus by those who had the
power to judge and destroy her. Had they succeeded in securing her death, the
citizens of the town would have looked on approvingly, just as in “Zorba the
Greek.” However, they wanted to “kill” two birds with one stoning, and deeming
Jesus to be as powerless in their trap as the woman, they attempted to get Him
to also condemn her. Turning the tables on them by pointing out their own
sinfulness, He then frees the woman from their devices and refuses to condemn
her.
In spite of
this interlude, the schizophrenia on the subject continues in the New Testament.
This story was included in the gospel attributed to John the Disciple, but in
the Revelation which has also been attributed to the same author, we find those
guilty of sexual sin are excluded from the heavenly city and destroyed.[iii]
How can we reconcile the attitude in Leviticus and Revelation with the account
of David and Bathsheba and also the woman taken in adultery in the Gospel of
John? Is it even necessary to harmonize them?
When Jesus
was approached about the apparent discrepancy between His teaching on adultery
and divorce and the much easier grounds for divorce under Moses, He pointed out
that the current status of divorce had become what it was solely because of the
hardness of their hearts.[iv]
In that regard, little has changed over the centuries. When it comes to sexual
sin, hearts can be extremely hard. Maybe that is the real issue that ties these
different outcomes together.
It is
perhaps a curse of our day that there are many in our populations who are
classified as “sexual offenders.” A visit to the website of most county sheriff’s
offices will reveal hundreds of such offenders categorized by level of offense
and often showing their locations by neighborhood throughout the local
community. While not forced to wear Hester Prynne’s scarlet letter “A,” these
individuals are nonetheless easily identified and at times made targets of
condemnation by those in the community whose sins are not so publicly
displayed. They may never escape the humiliation any more than the criminal
condemned to the stocks in the public square in ages past could escape the
abuse heaped upon them by the “righteous.”
Should
Christians be any different than others in how we deal with such persons? Is sexual
sin the “unpardonable” sin? Perhaps an anecdotal, yet true, tale will help to
illustrate the problems Christians face in this area of dealing with sexual
social outcasts.
Several
years ago, our church was approached by our local conference administrators regarding
Adam.[v]
Adam had been serving a sentence in a Washington State Prison for a sexual
offense. While in prison, he had been a student enrolled in Bible studies
presented to the prison population by our denomination.[vi]
As a result of those studies, he chose to accept Jesus and be baptized. The
denomination will only baptize individuals into church membership, so naturally
Adam was baptized into the fellowship of the church which infers all the rights
and privileges of membership. Eventually, he became eligible for parole and was
given a release date. He would continue to be a registered sex offender for the
remainder of his life, and his whereabouts would continually be monitored, but
other than that, he would be free to resume as much of a normal life as
possible. What would you do if Adam showed up at your church?
Actually,
Adam wanted to be completely open and honest about his past as he felt that
being a Christian meant nothing less, so he contacted the conference office for
help in integrating into church fellowship. The conference then contacted the
various churches in the area to see what could be done to provide fellowship
for this individual. The response of the churches was a resounding “No” to any
possibility of joining in fellowship with any congregation.
“Would any
church be willing to provide space in a non-church setting and provide someone
to nurture and help this person and others in similar circumstances like his to
grow in their walk with Jesus?” the conference then asked.
Again the
answer was, “No.”
During this
time, I brought up the subject of sexual offenders and the unpardonable sin in
our weekly Sabbath Bible study class. One young mother attending became very
irate and felt that any consideration given to sexual offenders would be a
threat to her children. I can understand that concern, but I asked what are we
to do with a repentant sexual offender who has been baptized? She replied that
is not her worry. She never returned to our Bible study after that. However,
her case illustrates the very real feeling of many on this subject.
In an effort
to deal with these concerns, the conference developed a policy for dealing with
sexual offenders in a manner to protect children and keep a close watch on the individuals
at all times. That policy was circulated to the churches to either approve or
disapprove as they chose. I attended one meeting of the church membership to
discuss the policy. When it became clear that they were not going to approve
the protections in the policy, I asked why they did not want these protections
in place? In response they said they felt it would encourage sexual offenders
to attend their church and would increase rather than mitigate the danger.
I pointed
out that failure to adopt the policy would mean there would then be no means to
identify such persons or monitor their activities. In fact, anyone from the
community could attend church without any concern for whether they were sexual
offenders or not, even though, per the County Sheriff’s website, there were
several such individuals living in the neighborhoods adjacent to the church
property. That statement was only met by bellicose posturing that “If I catch
any of them I will quickly boot them out the door!” Following a chorus of
amens, the policy was voted on and rejected.
Having
attended this church for several decades, I knew the membership was no more
saintly than any other church I had belonged to. Yet, here they were ready to cast
the first stone at the unpardonable sinner. Here, two thousand years later, we
still struggle with what to do with the outcast who comes to Jesus. Perhaps we
should not expect too much. After all, those who failed to put the adulterous
woman to death managed to accomplish it anyway in the person of her Protector.
In the end, fellowship with Him is the only fellowship that really matters. He
will drive no one away.
