My title for this devotion is Blind Eye vs Loving Heart.

At first glance the two topics in that title seem to be disconnected. But hang in there with me please.

In John 8 there is the story of a woman caught in adultery being brought by the Pharisees to Jesus. Verse 4 has them saying, “Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. Now in the Law, Moses commanded us to stone such a woman. So what do you say?” If you are familiar with the story several things stand out from here on.

• They were trying to trick Jesus. If He says, “Stone her” then He goes against his teachings of love. If he tells them to let her go he violates the Law.
• Jesus knelt down and started writing in the sand. No one knows what He wrote but we do know the Pharisees peeled off one by one until none were left. I can speculate what He wrote but not here.
• He refused to condemn the woman but told her to “go and sin no more.” Leave that life.

But here is where the Blind Eye comes in. Not Jesus. His is the Loving Heart. His heart is seen in His refusal to condemn, but in a roundabout way to defend and restore.

“If a man is found lying with the wife of another man, both of them shall die, the man who lay with the woman, and the woman.” Deut.22:22

I have often asked when preaching or teaching John 8 , “Where was the man?” I now renew that question and raise it a notch. If the Pharisees-the ones who were so law bound they hounded Jesus for minor technicalities-were experts in the Law, how could they miss this? I think the answer is seen in two words: Blind Eye. They saw what they wanted to see and if they saw something they didn’t like they turned a blind eye to it. They were so hell-bent on trapping Jesus they were willing to dismiss the Law’s teaching OR they simply did not want to see what God’s law said.

Like me, like many, they turned a blind eye to the truth. It could even be said they turned a blind eye to this woman for the purpose of their own agenda. I can be guilty of this as well. Paul told Timothy: “For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itchy ears will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions.” (2 Tim.4:3) A disregard for truth. Turning a blind eye to what is in order to approve what is not. A Pharisee?  Yeah…at times I am.

“Father, help me not to be blind to the truth. Help me not to disregard Scripture for my own agenda. Help me to be true to you with a loving heart for others…just as Jesus was.”