Hope Springs

I love it when God decides to show up in a service. 

I know that He is there where two or three are gathered together and focused on Him. I get that. However, there is something special, a unique anointing, when He decides to make His presence felt. 

Like today. 

The man who spoke at our church service today was brought up in our church, and there was nothing special or particularly awesome about his delivery or his speaking style.... except for one thing.  He was passionate about his message. He works with Teen Challenge in Ontario and spoke with fervor about the need in our society for church folks to stop judging and start reaching out, like Jesus did at the Samaritan well to a woman who had had five husbands, and the one she was with wasn't her husband. 

He showed a video that opened my eyes and challenged me, gave me hope where there literally had been despair, and renewed my faith to keep praying for the loved ones I have who are not currently serving Him. Its link is here:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfHCMpOcJt4 

After church, I had the opportunity to connect with a lady I have come to really appreciate the last several years, more and more of late.  I was able to share some of my own story with her, and as I did, it was though the years melted away and it had only happened a short time ago. I felt keenly the slimy hole I was in so many years ago, those feelings of worthlessness and helplessness, the hurt that I tried to drown in attention-getting behaviors which only scratched the surface of that deep-down itch nobody could touch. And I remembered what it felt like as I described how Jesus had found me, like that woman at the well, and showed me exactly where I was - and was gracious to rescue me. Literally rescue me. I felt tears springing to my eyes as I spoke. 

It gave me hope to see that video I put the link to, above. And it gave me hope to share my story and remember that God doesn't care (as the song goes) where you've been sleeping:

I don't care where you've been sleeping; I don't care who made your bed;
I already gave My life to set you free. 
There's no sin you can imagine that is stronger than My love.... 
And its all yours if you'll come home again to Me. (Don Fransisco)

When it comes right down to it, everyone is broken. We're just broken in different places, that's all. Judging someone else because their broken place is not in an area that is a problem for you ... is kind of like a fellow who's lost a leg judging someone else who's lost the other one. 

It's good to know that God doesn't make distinctions or rate on a sliding scale when it comes to brokenness. Everyone is in the same situation. And Jesus is more about rescuing people who know they need help than He is about posturing and politicking. His sacrifice is sufficient for all, and once He has touched your life, or the life of someone you care about, He will NEVER let go. NEVER.

I needed to hear that... so much. Maybe you do, too.

Knowing His Voice

"My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me... My Father, Who gave them to Me, is greater than all, and no one shall be able to pluck them out of My Father's Hand." - Jesus, in John 10:28-30

This morning, I was reminded of how Jesus ministered when He was on Earth. Many people have told me - all of my life - how Jesus went somewhere and "healed them all" and how that's God's will for everyone. That it's within His will for us to pray for someone to be healed, or for a circumstance to be alleviated, or for whatever "negative" thing that person is experiencing to be resolved. 

I'm not so sure.

Oh, I'm not saying that God doesn't hurt when His people hurt. I'm not saying that He doesn't still heal or protect. I know from experience that He does!! 

However, I've been looking at how Jesus operated when He walked the earth, and it's actually a little less like what I've been taught to take for granted in the church. 

Only in a few places did Jesus go into a village and "heal them all" ... and usually only if He wasn't going to stay there for long. If He was going to a major center, like Jerusalem, for example, He would only teach or hang out at the local bar, or go to the temple. Once in a while He'd heal someone. Maybe a few at a time. But not everyone. 

It's like this. Jesus gave up His divine attributes when He came here, and so the miracles that He did, He did by the power of the Holy Spirit. He actually LIVED in the Spirit - and in doing so, He LISTENED to the Spirit. "Turn this corner. Go this way, not that way. Sit at this table, not that one. Heal that person in the corner, not the one begging at the Temple gate." 

Ah. Yes, the beggar at the gate Beautiful, the one who was there every. single. day. Hmm. I wonder how many times Jesus passed that guy and not once did God say to heal him? 

And so ... Jesus didn't. "I do only what the Father tells Me," He said once.

Remember Lazarus? Jesus listened to the Father about him too, so much so that He delayed charging off to the rescue when a message came that Lazarus was sick. Why? Because God told Jesus that it wasn't time to go yet. And when He did say it was time to go, He gave Jesus a word of knowledge that Lazarus was dead. And they were going anyway. 

Photo "Sun Ray Behind Dark Cloud"
courtesy of Sura Nuralpradid at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

Here's another thing. At the graveside of Lazarus, who among the people who were there believed Jesus would raise him up that day? Lazarus sure didn't. Mary and Martha believed that if Jesus had only arrived a few days earlier, their brother wouldn't have died. Yet they were deep in grief and didn't believe that Jesus could do anything now. Neither did the mourners around them. There was a total lack of faith at that grave site. And Jesus prayed as God led Him to pray. There was no concert of prayer there. There were no people stretching their hands toward the tomb. There was only Jesus and God - the former obeying what the latter had told Him to do. 

And THEN the miracle happened. 

I think that we get it backwards sometimes. I think we tend to believe that God is all about us doing stuff for Him. Don't get me wrong, I think that doing stuff is great - IF it's God directing us to do it. What I am saying is that we have gotten the cart before the horse, and we don't wait for God to tell us where to go or what to do. We are so busy doing the work of the Lord, one saying goes, that we forget about the Lord of the work!

Jesus spent a LOT of time talking to God. He got His strength, His direction, straight from a moment-by-moment dependence on Him through the Holy Spirit. At every turn, every second, He was listening, attuned to the Father's Voice. 

The most important thing to Jesus personally was the knowledge of the presence of God. It was why He cried out in anguish on the cross, "My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?" Not just to fulfill scripture, that was a heart's cry of grief over broken fellowship. 

And on the Final Day, when those who believe they have done so much for Him stand before Him to give an account, telling Him how much they have done "for Him", He will say to them, "Depart from Me, ... I never knew you." 

What? Doesn't God know everyone? What does that mean, "I never knew you"?  The verb "to know" in that passage is talking about the same "knowing" by which Abraham knew his wife, Sarah. 

Intimacy: there it is again. 

What He is saying in that passage is this: "You never let Me know you. You never let Me - not My work, but ME - have first place in your heart. You never let me ravish your innermost being, or delight your soul. You were too busy working for Me that I couldn't get close. I was your Employer, not your Lover." 

Ouch.

How long has it been since I've heard His voice, responded to His touch, crawled up into His lap and fallen asleep in His arms? How long since I've taken the time to remember when He rescued me from myself and to lift my gratitude to Him? How long since I've just let Him lavish His love on me? It is in that secret place with Him that I find out what He wants me to do ... and when ... and how.... and when to stop.  It truly is a moment-by-moment thing. 

Knowing Him in that way, in that intimacy, precedes knowing His Voice, recognizing His leading, going and doing and saying what He wants. I suspect that we waste a lot of effort pinging around doing what we think is His will, when what it might really be is to wait until the time is right, or to go in a different direction. Or just to be quiet and let someone work things through on his or her own. 

Being quiet actually sounds like a really good place to start.

Piercing the Darkness

A friend posted this morning on Facebook a picture she had taken of a lighthouse. The morning was misty, the paint on the building had peeled and worn almost off with the surf, but there it stood.

The caption contained a quote from D.L. Moody: "We are told to let our light shine, and if it does, we won't need to tell anybody it does. Lighthouses don't fire cannons to call attention to their shining - they just shine." 

That spoke to me. How many times in my life have I wanted to sound the fanfare and make people notice what I stood for, the message that has changed my attitudes and rescued me from myself? I have lost count. How many times have I wanted to grab someone and pull them out of danger? The tendency is still there to want to rescue, to want to fix people's problems. 

But the lighthouse tells me something different. 

Thanks to -Marcus- for his photo,
"Lighthouse at Dusk"
found at www.freedigitalphotos.net

The only purpose a lighthouse has ... is to shine. That's it; that's all. It doesn't head out into the storm itself to rescue ships in danger. It doesn't shoot a cannon to announce its presence (how many times have I shot my mouth off??? too many to count!! - and it's always ended by the person being more wounded than if I'd just kept quiet!) 

The lighthouse in itself is nothing. It doesn't matter how old it is, how good it looks, whether the paint is peeling or even worn completely off. What matters is the LIGHT. What matters is whether the light that is inside still works, because someday a life - or lives - will depend on it. Oh, maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow. However, the real treasure of the lighthouse is the constancy of that light. The lighthouse just stays where it is, come storm or high water, and holds the light high for all to see. It doesn't hide the light because someone in a nearby village complains, but the keeper actually keeps the windows clean and clear so that nothing hinders the message. "Danger. Rocks ahead!"

That light pierces the darkness. It cuts through the rain and the sleet. "A light that is set on a hill," Jesus said, "cannot be hidden." We don't need to strain and strive and grunt with effort to make it shine; it just shines! We don't need to do the search and rescue worker's job. We just need to let the light shine, to let that Light - the Light of the world - do His job. He does it best and doesn't need any help. 

We may not even know how many lives are rescued that way. We don't need to know. And it is not our responsibility to get out there and force people to make the choice we so long people to make. It is not our choice; it is theirs. And Jesus has been drawing and guiding people to Him far longer than we have been His light-bearers. He knows how best to reach someone. He alone can pierce the darkness. We need to trust that He will find a way.

All we are called to do is LET. LET the light shine. LIVE in relationship with Him on a day-by-day basis, and the effect of that life will automatically show. No matter where we are, no matter the circumstances. 

In fact, it is during the darkest night, the wildest of storms, that the Light within us will shine the brightest and reach people in peril.

The Father's Grief

There is a story told in the New Testament of two sons; the elder stayed home and did everything his father asked, and the younger wanted to leave. 

In those days, upon the death of a father, the elder son got two thirds of the inheritance, while the remainder was divided among the younger sons. There was a provision in the law of the day that a son could ask for his share of the inheritance prior to the father's death - but requesting such a thing was, in essence, saying that the son desired his father's death. It was a very mercenary thing to do. Greedy. 

Many commentaries on this story look at the son leaving as the moment at which the son turned his back on his dad. 

Might I submit that this had happened long before the boy packed his bags - that the younger son had done nothing all of his life, or at least all of his teenage years, except to take whatever the father freely gave to him as his right, and still asked for more. He used his dad's name, his dad's wealth, his standing in the community, and that wasn't enough. He couldn't wait for his dad to die. And it wasn't happening fast enough. 

So he grabbed what he wanted and left the farm. 

From the dad's perspective, this son had turned his back on everything he had taught him. He robbed his dad of the help and care that would be his in his old age, by taking off and spending his money on frivolities and lascivious living. 

Did you know that the word "prodigal" means "wasteful"? It does! 

Did you also know that when a child in the Hebrew culture embraces a lifestyle with which the parent does not agree, the family has a funeral for him? That started many centuries ago and it still happens!

"Male Crying" photo courtesy of
David Castillo Dominici at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

The father in the prodigal son story grieved the loss of his son ... as if he had died. In fact, the boy he remembered, the child who doted on his father's every word, truly no longer existed. He'd been replaced by a petulant, prideful, pathetic individual who only looked after himself and who ignored or rejected all efforts to make him see the error of his ways. 

The father mourned for him. Perhaps for weeks, perhaps for months and maybe even years his heart ached within him. At sunset and often during the day, he found his eyes straying unbidden to the gate, the place where he had watched his son's retreating form walk up the hill, then disappear over the top of it.  

Over and over he thought about those last few months prior to his son's departure. He blamed himself for not being able to teach his son right from wrong. He wondered if there was anything he could have done to keep his son from engaging in such selfish behavior. All the arguments, all the bitter words, echoed through his mind. Shame and anguish engulfed him. Once in a while, he'd hear reports of what his boy was doing out there - and his spirit was distressed, the grief as fresh as the very first day. He wondered if there would ever be an end to the waste, to the selfish actions by which the boy's life was characterized now. 

Yet, he'd had no choice but to let go... as painful as it was.

In the meantime, miles away, it took the natural consequences of those selfish actions to hammer the boy's pride and self-absorption into submission. The process might have taken years; we are not told how long it was. 

But one day - one day when the former heir had thrown it all away and there was absolutely nothing left - he realized that in wasting his father's riches and resources, he had wasted himself. He knew he had given up the right to be treated as a son. He knew his dad had already had a funeral for him. He knew that he didn't exist. 

He was a non-person. A second-class citizen. A servant. 

Yes, he had in reality made himself a servant to his own passions, to the grips of excess and then to the bony grasp of poverty to which his self-centered behavior had brought him. 

His mind dwelt on servanthood; he knew a lot about it. His father had many hired hands - they had enough to eat and more besides, and a warm and clean place to live. True, their lives were at the beck and call of their master. Yet their master - the father - was good to them. They were protected, cared for, fed, clothed and housed.

He, on the other hand, was feeding pigs. Swine - the most disgusting animal a Jew could possibly be asked to tend. He smelled of pig feces; the odor is one of the worst in the world of domesticated animals. His clothes, his hair, his skin reeked of it. Yet he was so hungry that he gladly would have fought them off at close range to get the pig slop that they received. Yet, he wasn't even allowed to share the pigs' food. Nobody gave him anything. Not one thing.

He wasn't aware how deeply his dad had grieved; in fact, he'd convinced himself that his dad didn't care about him the way a dad cares about a son. He'd done too much, wasted too much. Especially himself. 

Yet ... he was desperate.

He'd go back to the homestead, he thought, and ask to be hired on as a servant. Living in the servants' quarters wouldn't be so bad. It would certainly be a lot better than what he was forced to do now. And it was a lot better, he reasoned, than he deserved. 

When he left home, he felt entitled to the life he thought he'd been denied. When he started back, he felt beaten. Used up. Worthless. 

He was desperate. He was willing to go to any lengths to have a better life than the one he'd chosen, the lifestyle that had turned on him and devoured him. 

Before he rounded the crest of the hill toward home, before he was amazed to find that his father welcomed him with open arms and reinstated him as a full member of the household, little did he know how many long nights his dad had held close to himself all that was good about his growing-up years, how profoundly and constantly his father had missed him. His company, his voice, his smile, his laughter. 

His heart. 

The relationship he'd abandoned, wasted in the dust on his father's front doorstep, was waiting for him when he returned. The father made that perfectly clear. He knew it - though the enormity of the dad's forgiveness and acceptance overwhelmed him - as surely as he knew his own name. The sounds of music and dancing had returned to the house. He was so very grateful.

He stole a glance at the older man amid the festivities.

His dad's face was wet with tears. But he was smiling from ear to ear.

Entering Into Rest

I had a strange spiritual experience last night. It wasn't in the realm of the bizarre - because I've been present when others have had similar ones - but this was the first time it had happened to me.

Let me back up a bit. For the past few weeks, my almost-21 daughter has been in a relationship with a young man which she INSISTS isn't sexual but which is, by all observations, obsessional in nature. Six months ago she didn't even know him; now, she declares that he is her best friend. 

This young man has a past that includes a conviction in a court of law for dealing drugs. He maintains relationships with the people he knew while he was in that life, and in the past few weeks, our property has been vandalized, money has been stolen from our house, and narcotics - prescribed for our other child after a major surgery - were stolen as well. He left our house that day and hasn't been back, but she continued to spend time with him. We set down more and more limits - and slowly it became painfully clear that she was choosing her new friends over her family. 

This hasn't been the first time that she has obsessed about a member of the opposite gender. Ever since before she turned 14, this has been happening. As soon as her hormones turned on, there's been a growing fascination with the world that we tried so hard to protect her from - first nicotine and then alcohol, then the lifestyle of the drug addict and the pusher. Of course that lifestyle doesn't just include the acts themselves, but a whole host of destructive behaviors - violence, theft, verbal and physical abuse, pathological lying, riding the edge of the law, cop-baiting, and (needless to say) disrespect of anything or anyone that insists on the truth. 

It was when this young man used her phone and texted me all sorts of obscene insults, accusing me of the most unthinkable things - and then she defended HIM - that I realized that the child I knew, the beautiful, loyal, caring person I had helped to raise, was dead. She had died seven years ago and had been replaced by someone who now had no moral compass. Her toxic behavior and attitudes poisoned relationships with all who cared about her; her friends (the ones who really DID care - one even told me, "She's changed. I don't even know who she is anymore") didn't want to spend time with her anymore.

It was at that point that I allowed myself to grieve.

The pain was beyond anything I had ever felt. And it's not over; it comes in waves.

Anyway, this past Thursday night, after being used as a human ATM for what seemed like the millionth time, we had a conversation with her in which we calmly but firmly told her that she was not allowed back into our house any more. She had made her choice and she couldn't eat her cake and still have it. 

I talked with our pastor about the situation and how I was - we were - reacting to it emotionally. He affirmed our decision - which he said was really the only decision we could have made - and it helped to know that we had his support. Yet there was an ache in my heart and a big heavy ball in my belly that made it difficult to take a deep breath. I would reach down and it would be rock-hard. It never left... it was always there, even in the night.

"Sleeping Baby" photo courtesy of Dynamite Imagery at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

Which brings me to last evening at church. In intense prayer for my daughter, and in prayer as well for relief / respite from the pain, Pastor came up behind me and a couple of ladies from the church were there, each holding a hand. I won't go into the details, but my heart felt like it was in labor, the emotional pain was so severe. For well over ten minutes, it was as if I was giving birth to her all over again. I was wet to my shoulders with tears, my breath coming in gasps. All the anguish I had been holding in so as to "be strong" came out ... and I ended up limp, weak and sobbing as prayer continued on behalf of our entire family.

It was exhausting. I had a sense, however, of laying my head on Jesus' shoulder, hearing His heartbeat, and feeling His arm around me as if I were an injured lamb and He the shepherd ... and He was carrying me until I was strong enough to walk on my own.

A fresh wave of tears came welling up, later, as Pastor came over again after my husband was able to come off the stage (he'd been on worship team) and sit beside me. Pastor began to intercede for my husband - our pastor is a true shepherd; he has the ability to sense the emotions people are hiding or even unable to feel - and he began to groan in empathy as he prayed. And suddenly a dear friend was sitting there beside me on the other side, with her arm around me, weeping with us. 

It was a blessed and precious (if strange) time of true openness and fellowship - unlike anything I'd ever experienced in that place before. 

When we got home, I came to my computer and spent some time on Facebook, even crocheted a bit, and tried playing a computer puzzle-game. I think I remember watching some of the national news program on TV.

My husband had to wake me up an hour later to get me to go to bed and sleep. I stumbled through my nightly routine and went to bed. 

When I awoke, something felt different. I was laying on my belly, something I have not been able to do for months but especially for the last few days, because of that heavy, hard ball in my belly. 

It was gone.

I reached down to my belly and pushed. It felt spongy - pliable - just like the lower abdomen feels after one has delivered a baby. 

And I could take a deep breath without any pain at all. 

The scriptures talk about "laboring to enter into rest" - and although I know that has a deeper spiritual meaning, I believe that is exactly what happened. 

I had labored, given birth, and now I could rest. 

Just rest - trust - and let Him hold me.

Boxes

A lot of the blog posts I come up with are derived from conversations I've had with my husband. Like this one. This morning at breakfast we were talking about a few things, and the topic of preconceived notions came up, the tendency that so many people have to pre-judge what belongs where and who would or would not do [fill in the blank]. 

Although it's not an exclusive activity by any means, Christians do this a lot. I've been around believers who fall prey to the fallacy that as believers, we are better than the rest of the world. Oh, they would never admit it, but they seem to act as though they believe that we're ... well, we're God's favorites. 

Let me explain. I've actually heard, from one Christian or another over the years, that one can't be a committed Christian and also :

• have a chronic or terminal illness
• go bankrupt
• have been separated or divorced
• have rebellious kids who are into sex, drugs, and alcohol
• be addicted to drugs or alcohol
• be tempted by pornography
• have struggles with honesty
• question one's faith - or even God Himself
• be depressed or "blah"
• be a liberal / conservative / social democrat (or other political - or a-political - stripe)
• admit vulnerability or weakness
• watch certain kinds of movies or TV shows
• not want to be around other Christians, or at the very least, not "toe the party line"

... and the list goes on. And on.

"Interior With White Boxes" courtesy of sumetho at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

The tendency to put people into categories and slot them into uniformly sized boxes that all look the same (usually the same size and shape as the one who's talking) has done more to keep many believers living in silent misery for months, years, decades. 

The truth is, some - if not most - believers DO struggle with those things. Maybe not all at once, but the fact remains that we Christians are just as broken as the rest of the world around us. The ONLY difference is that we have someone to talk to about it and to whom we can give control of it. That's it, that's all. 

And whether we do or don't pray about it and / or give control of it over to God - only impacts on our own private relationships, including the one with God. It is not my business to pronounce judgement on a fellow-believer for anything, nor is it his (or her) job to fix what ails me. We can encourage each other, true, (and if we do, let's be sure we're not secretly putting the other person down) but putting each other in a box is tantamount to putting God in a box. 

Not that we are divine by any stretch - but when we categorize and pigeon-hole each other, we're saying to God that He can't possibly use or work through this person with "Thing X" in his or her life. 

That kind of smacks of arrogance, don't you think? "Be more like me. Then God will be able to do something with you." It implies that God is unable to accomplish His will when and how He chooses.

God's a big boy. It's His job to fix people; He alone has the power to do that. He can look after things Himself; if He wants my help, He'll ask for it specifically. He can do that. He's God!

Maybe it's time I let God out of the box and stopped trying to do His job for Him. Maybe it's time I let the people I know out of the boxes I've put them into while all the while I was thinking I was "helping" them. 

And while I'm at it, maybe I'd better stop keeping myself in one too, and start believing that God can and will effect change - positive change - in my life.

Mercy. Not Sacrifice.

Twice in the book of Matthew, I was reminded this morning, Jesus spoke to the religious elite of His day - the scribes and the Pharisees - and told them to find out what the Scriptures meant when they said, "I desire mercy and not sacrifice." He was quoting the prophet Hosea - the prophet who married a prostitute to prove how deep God's love goes.

The religious ruling class were all about sacrifice. They were all about making people aware that they were sacrificing, what they were sacrificing (whether an animal or some sort of food or habit) and how often / how much they were doing it. They were all about upholding the letter of the law, and they were obsessive about the tiniest little thing in the application of that law - even to giving a tenth of the product of their herb and spice gardens to the temple.

They even thought of themselves as self-sacrificing. They put themselves out (and made sure everyone knew it) to obey the Law and the associated rules and regulations. They put written passages of scripture into little boxes and strapped the boxes to their head so that God's word would always "be on their minds."

They consistently considered themselves the guardians of their faith. If someone was out of line, they pounced and pronounced upon that person without mercy. They thought that by doing so, they were protecting the purity of their connection with God. They set themselves up as judge and jury, and marginalized the hurting and the needy, rather than taking pity on them and showing them mercy. Judgment was swift and always seen in black and white. They hid behind their robes, their prayer shawls, their tassels, and their phylacteries (those little boxes I mentioned) and they looked down their noses at those who were 'uneducated' and 'unenlightened.' They trusted in their rituals and their position rather than seeking any kind of relationship with the God they claimed to serve, rather than admitting their own need of Him.

Photo "Bible" provided courtesy of
Arvind Balaraman at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

They were wrong.

Jesus called them "blind guides" and said that they swallowed camels whole ... but only strained out gnats (umm, at the other end. Quite the graphic picture!) 

Their blindness, Jesus told them, would persist because they insisted that they could see perfectly. They would not listen to the idea that they might be in error. Instead, they held fast to the way things had been done for generations, and they continued to dispense unyielding justice against all those who would dare to let their brokenness and their need of love and acceptance show. In a typical show of religious arrogance, one day they thrust a local prostitute down in front of Jesus, a woman that they had "caught in the very act of adultery," saying that the law demanded that she be stoned; what did He think? (What I find interesting was that they only quoted PART of the law; it said that BOTH parties were to be stoned. So where was the guy?? Perhaps he was getting his phylactery back on....) 

Jesus' response was telling. "Whichever one of you is without sin (the Greek says 'without this sin') may cast the first stone." 

Picture it. At least half a dozen men (and probably many more) gathered around this itinerant, dusty rabbi and a nearly naked woman, her eyelids swollen and red, her face streaked with tears and her hair undone and plastered to her cheeks ... and all Jesus would do was crouch down and write in the dust. Perhaps He was writing the names of their mistresses. Perhaps He was writing the words of Hosea, "I desire mercy and not sacrifice..." All I know is that they left, one by one, starting with the older ones. The only sound was the occasional thump as the rock each man held ... hit the ground. That, and the woman lying in the dust sobbing, her face in her hands, wordlessly crying out for someone - anyone - to not throw that first stone.

After the religious elite had "dropped their rocks and split" ... Jesus - the only person who could have cast the first stone - showed her mercy.

He didn't condone her sin.  But ... He didn't condemn her either. He forgave her totally: without reservation. He gave her a second chance.

That's mercy in action. 

That's Jesus.