monday of the fifth week in lent

Date: Monday, March 18
Contributor: Marilyn Baldwin
LectionaryLink:  https://www.lectionarypage.net/WeekdaysOfLent/MondayFifthWeek.html
 
“Let anyone who is without sin be the first to throw a stone …”
 
Both of our readings today are about the threat of stoning as punishment in biblical times. Susanna was threatened by two elders with stoning if she did not comply with their wishes. In the John reading, we know less of the story.
 
We humans are a pretty judgmental bunch. It’s normal, we’re told, because we’re wired somehow to sort things into categories: good/bad, black/white; male/female, and so on. It gives our brains a little work to do at the beginning, prejudging what we just “know” to be true about someone or a given situation. (This is related to the word prejudice.) Mostly, we have prejudged ourselves to be in whatever good category there is, and others are found wanting. And we seem always ready to create the “Other,” one who is beyond redeeming; one we’d rather have out of our presence.
 
In John, Jesus was in the temple, teaching, and a woman was brought in, caught in adultery.  According to Mosaic law, she was to be stoned - a horrifying prospect even then - but the law required it. One of 613 laws, actually. I would venture that just by waking up each day, at least one of those laws would be violated by most of us.
 
First, I’m afraid I’d have to ask, why the woman, and why not the man involved? Why was the law so overwhelmingly on the side of the more powerful, and so biased against the powerless?  Why does this same bias still occur in laws two millennia later, and half a world away?
 
Next, we tend to look at others’ faults with a magnifying glass, and gloss over our own.  The same faults that we see looming large in them may just be a projection of our own faults, and they make us uncomfortable. Subconsciously, we may seek resolution so we’re not continually reminded of our own failings.
 
In Matthew 7:5, Jesus says, “You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.”
 
When I am tempted to judge others, I must first ask myself what it says about me that their behavior bothers me. What is it about me that I’m trying to hide? And how can I connect with them? My guess is that we already have something in common, and by reaching out, I may have found a friend instead of making an enemy.
 
Help me, Lord Jesus, to pause and think before I prejudge another. You welcome us, faults and all. Amen.