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Wanting What God Wants
“Early in the morning he came again to the temple. All the people came to him, and he sat
down and taught them. The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught
in adultery, and placing her in the midst they said to him, “Teacher, this woman has been
caught in the act of adultery. Now in the Law, Moses commanded us to stone such women. So
what do you say?” This they said to test him, that they might have some charge to bring
against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. And as they continued
to ask him, he stood up and said to them, “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to
throw a stone at her.” And once more he bent down and wrote on the ground. But when they
heard it, they went away one by one, beginning with the older ones, and Jesus was left alone
with the woman standing before him. Jesus stood up and said to her, “Woman, where are
they? Has no one condemned you?” She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said, “Neither do I
condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.” (John 8:2-11)
One of the most difficult things for me to understand as I grew up was that delivering on an
expectation was not the same as wanting to deliver on an expectation. This was evident in my
life every time my parents told me to clean my room. I knew there was an expectation to clean
it, and so I usually did whatever was minimally necessary for them to declare their expectations
of a clean room met. To reach this final declaration of clean there usually was drawn out
negotiating, sloth-esque movement, less-than-ideal cleaning techniques, and threats of
punishment along the way. It was a grueling, time-consuming process that often resulted in a
moderately clean room and plenty of stress, exhaustion and tension to go around. Imagine if I
had actually wanted a clean room? If my desires for my room had matched my parents’ desires
for it, the process would have been a joy. Not that the work of cleaning my room would have
been any easier, but rather that there would have been no arguments nor threats of
punishment. Instead, joy and encouragement. The result would not only have been a room that
was actually clean, but also unity and peace in my home. If only I had wanted what my parents
wanted.
Just like the woman who was guilty of adultery, Jesus does not want to condemn you and me
to death for the sin we are guilty of committing. So what then does He want from us? To
receive His pardon and stop sinning! The challenge for us often lies not in stopping actions that
are sinful in our lives, but actually wanting to stop them.
What good is the adulterous woman’s pardon if she is not willing to “go and sin no more”?
Before too long she would have been before Jesus, yet again guilty of sin. You and I need to
want what Jesus wants for us. If we do not want to stop sinning, when we sin, instead of
confessing and repenting to God about our sin, we try to negotiate with God about it. Instead
of immediately cutting off our hand that causes us to stumble, we take action slowly and
incompletely. Instead of receiving God’s admonition to sin no more as a child, we stumble over
it as an enemy.
Yet, what good is the adulterous woman’s willingness to “go and sin no more” if Jesus is not
willing to pardon her? Likewise, without Jesus’ grace pardoning us, we have no opportunity to
want what God wants for us - to sin no more.
“What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! How
can we who died to sin still live in it? Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized
into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism
into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we
too might walk in newness of life.” (Romans 6:1-4)
Do you want what God wants?
