A little over a year ago, my friends took me to see the Faces of Jesus exhibit by Rembrandt at the DIA in Detroit. An art museum is always a great place to think. It was there that I was confronted with a woman who had done me wrong and I had wanted payment for the injustice. I was deceived and injured. I was angry for the hurt she brought so many in her circle. But during this confrontation, I saw her in a light that was new. I’d like you to meet her.
This is her, the woman caught in adultery by Rembrandt. John 8:1-11
A year has passed. And the story of this woman is not over. Since I now see her in the light of how Christ sees her, I recognize that she is everywhere. She has many names and has experienced much shame. At one time, I had wanted to drag her to the street and call her out for who she really was.
I don’t want to anymore.
I think she is frightened that that is exactly what I want to do to her. So she hides instead. It’s easier to hide the shame. Easier to conceal her guilt. Easier to keep secret her painful story of how she got there. Her privacy and fear of judgment and condemnation sends her into the world. I am so anxious that she will someday say that her loved ones didn’t love her anymore so she had to find love elsewhere. How can I tell her that the love I had for her all those years has been replaced by a greater Love that I didn’t create?
I think this is how I will tell her. My lessons I have learned about how Christ loves us and the woman caught in adultery have given me a passion for those enslaved in human trafficking. But this passion really includes any woman who is struggling with the shame that has been poured out on her by family, friends, herself and her circumstances.
One of my dear friends, Renee, and I had previously participated in a SOAP outreach to help find missing children at risk for human trafficking. We had been so moved by the experience and outpouring of Love over the city of Detroit, that we decided to continue on our own.
Two weeks ago, we took some flyers and went to about 40 motels that surrounded our homes to educate and encourage the employees to help find missing children. It was my first “made up” mission’s trip I’ve ever participated in. It was exciting, perhaps even a bit risky.
We had a great opportunity to begin to build relationships with some very receptive people. We had one gentleman who left to go on break as we arrived. But he came back over as he was listening in to our conversation with Diane (who was struggling herself with good customer service). He wanted to know about the National Human Trafficking hotline and that it truly was confidential. There had been many times he was too afraid to call anyone because he might get in trouble. Another woman told us she had wondered several times if the children she saw were actually with the parent. We were shooed away, stared at, ignored, asked if we wanted a receipt (huh?) and also trapped in a small room with a very stoned manager while we spoke. Somehow he even seemed to know what we were talking about because he mentioned SOAP as he stared at us with his glossy eyes.
We had a lovely walk down Michigan Avenue’s motel alley as we discussed how much we need to help her. She may not have been here before, trapped in slavery, like thousands around the world. She actually might just be your friend, daughter, niece, mother or sister who needs to know you have no rocks in your pocket with her name on it for her sin. Because let’s face it, if she has one with her name on it, there should be a rock with your name on it in another pocket.
Jesus was the only One without sin. And His pockets were empty for us all.
John 8:1-11
1 but Jesus went to the Mount of Olives.
2 At dawn he appeared again in the temple courts, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them. 3 The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group 4 and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. 5 In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” 6 They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him.
But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. 7 When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” 8 Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.
9 At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. 10 Jesus straightened up and asked her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?”
11 “No one, sir,” she said.
“Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin.”
