Have you noticed that the Gospel of John emphasizes how the Lord Jesus dealt with the individual? Of course He taught groups, both large and small, from time to time, but He never was too busy to take time for the individual. The Gospel of John is full of individuals who became followers because they had private conversations with Jesus.
Notice that when the Pharisees came in they called Him "Master," but when she came in she called Him "Lord." And in 1 Corinthians 12:3, it says, "No man can say Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit."' This woman is going to be in heaven. The Pharisees are going to be in hell. They may have never committed adultery. She had.
There was a law back in the time of Moses that anyone taken in adultery be stoned to death. This was God's law, but little by little, because of the hardness of men's hearts, it had been allowed to go unnoticed. In fact, it probably had not been enforced for the last 1,000 years before the time of Christ. Even though the law was there, they just didn't practice it. But one of these men had studied law and knew about it.
The first eleven verses in John 8 have been fought by many people. From the time of the Middle Ages people have tried to take them out of the Bible, because they're scared to death about the woman taken in adultery hearing Jesus say: "Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more." People were afraid that this would teach people to treat sin lightly. However, when this is understood, we see it, not as a light treatment of sin, but as a tremendous illustration of salvation and righteousness, which is what the Lord intended it to be.
Just by believing someone's word, you can experience complete relief of heart and mind. During the first week of World War II, in September, 1939, Hitler invaded Poland on a Friday and on the following Sunday morning at eleven Neville Chamberlain declared war. That same week I had left my family in France, to go to Belfast, Ireland, where I was to hold a series of meetings. Naturally, when the war broke out, I was concerned about my family. So the layman in charge of the meetings took me to see the postmaster general of Ulster where we asked about sending a telegram to my family.
