Wednesday, December 10, 2014
Advent Reflections
Diocese of Newark


Thank you for continuing to journey with us through this season of Advent. You are now journeying together with people from in multiple dioceses - almost 700 people in all. As we come together in reflection and prayer, we join our voices in praise as we await the joyful coming.

Scripture

 

Then each of them went home, while Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. Early in the morning he came again to the temple. All the people came to him and he sat down and began to teach them. The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery; and making her stand before all of them, they said to him, 'Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery.

 

Now in the law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?' They said this to test him, so that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, 'Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.' And once again he bent down and wrote on the ground. When they heard it, they went away, one by one, beginning with the elders; and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus straightened up and said to her, 'Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?' She said, 'No one, sir.' And Jesus said, 'Neither do I condemn you. Go your way, and from now on do not sin again.'

 John 7:53-8:11 
Reflection
 

Have you ever wondered just what it was that Jesus was writing on the ground with his finger?  Twice in this gospel passage the authors note that Jesus "bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground."  Did you ever do this in the sand when visiting the beach, or in the dirt in your backyard as a kid?  In many ways, the movement of our fingers over the dirt or sand is more about the feeling than about whatever it is we are writing or drawing, isn't it?  And yet, like Jesus, even though we can get lost in that feeling, we are still able to understand what is going on around us.  Still, what was he writing or drawing?  We will never know, but we do know his response to the situation at hand. 

 

We are a finger pointing society.  We seem to easily find fault in the other, yet for most, we don't seem to apply that same scrutiny to our own lives.  Perhaps our fingers would serve us better drawing in the dirt, that we might model the humility of Jesus in this gospel, who also did not condemn the woman.  Maybe the word he was writing in the ground was 'forgive.'  Maybe the symbol he drew was the sign of the dove.  Maybe.


 

Prayer

 

Oh God, whose presence we await in our lives, forgive us our conceit, and enter our hearts that we might walk the path of Jesus,

in humility and service. Amen.
 

 

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