DON'T GET CAUGHT
John 8:4-10
they said to Jesus, "Teacher, this woman has been caught in adultery, in the very act. 5 Now in the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women; what then do You say?" 6 They were saying this, testing Him, so that they might have grounds for accusing Him. But Jesus stooped down and with His finger wrote on the ground. 7 But when they persisted in asking Him, He straightened up, and said to them, "He who is without sin among you, let him be the first to throw a stone at her." 8 Again He stooped down and wrote on the ground. 9 When they heard it, they began to go out one by one, beginning with the older ones, and He was left alone, and the woman, where she was, in the center of the court. 10 Straightening up, Jesus said to her, "Woman, where are they? Did no one condemn you?" 11 She said, "No one, Lord." And Jesus said, "I do not condemn you, either. Go. From now on sin no more."
Kodiak Island can be a very dangerous place. Terrible storms blow in there regularly, boating and airplane accidents are not uncommon at all. The seas can go from calm to 20 feet in a matter of minutes. Brown bears literally walked through our village nearly every day. When we lived there we were always on guard. There were always dangers lurking around us.
Even with all that said, there were amazing things to see and do. One of my favorite things to do was to go out on the ocean and go crabbing. I love to eat crab and it is certainly an amazing experience to pull crab from the trap and an hour later be eating fresh crab.
A bonus to be is when the crab trap would contain an octopus. The bad news is when they got in the trap they would any crab caught in there. Both the crabs and the octopus lost their lives when trapped.
Octopus meat is a delicacy to many and I learned to love it when we were there on Kodiak.
When I would clean and butcher the octopus I would find the sack of "ink" that all octopus have inside them. I had known about this "ink" since I was young but I just learned while I was there that the ink was not only there to create a cloud to make it possible for the octopus to escape a predator... but it is also very toxic. If an octopus gets caught in it's own cloud of ink it can get very sick or even die.
In the scripture above we read about those that brought a woman before Jesus to try to trap Him. They knew what the Old Testament law said about stoning her to death for her sin, but they were setting a trap for Jesus. Jesus turned the table on these self righteous hypocrites. The trap they had set had been sprung on them and they were caught in their own sin. We are warned many places in the Bible that we will be caught in our own sin.
Have you ever seen a little fly that's caught in a spider's web? The more that bug struggles to become free, the more entangled in the web it becomes. It's like a person that is trapped by his sin, and even when he comes to his senses and recognizes the need to change, he cannot escape by his own strength. He just gets more tangled. In the end that web brings death unless someone were to come along and free the one caught.
Unlike the fly, there's hope for the person caught in his sin. We can all be free from bondage by admitting our sin to God and giving Him control of our life through Jesus Christ. Only He can untangle us from the tangled web of sin that we've woven.
Roman's 3:23 tells us, "For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God,"
This means that we've all been caught in sin, like the woman in the verses, like the octopus in his ink cloud and the fly in the spider web... we're caught and eventually unless we get out of the sin, we will die.
Roman's 6:23 begins, "for the wages of sin is death..."
This means if we stay in the trap of our sin, we will die, not only a death here on earth, but then bound for eternity separated from God and in hell. But the second half of this verse gives us hope to be freed from the web...
"... But the gift of God is eternal Life through Jesus Christ our Lord."
The only way to escape the certain death brought by a sinful life is through believing in what Jesus did for us and trusting in Him...
Proverbs 5:22
"An evil man is held captive by his own sins; they are ropes that catch and hold him"
We've been given an opportunity to escape from that sure death of the web of sin that we all get caught in... it's written about in Roman's 5:8
"God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us."
If you've never come to the point in your life where you've allowed God to free you from the web that has you headed towards death and separation from God Himself, for all eternity. Do so today. If you have questions, don't just close this page and move on... ask the questions. We never know when the trap closes and we're caught for all eternity. Don't get caught in your own sin. Jesus came, died and rose again to free you from the sin. Allow Him to free you
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