Someone sent this question, “How to surrender adulterers to God?”
The biblical account of the woman caught in adultery shows how in the Old Testament time, the penalty was stoning to death. That people were to witness stone after stone slowly and prolongedly tearing the offenders’ flesh until their last breath probably reflected how God hates the sin of adultery. Malachi says that unfaithfulness is committing violence to one’s wife. God would respond by withholding favor from the violator.
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“Another thing you do: You flood the Lord’s altar with tears. You weep and wail because He no longer looks with favor on your offerings or accepts them with pleasure from your hands. You ask, “Why?” It is because the Lord is the witness between you and the wife of your youth. You have been unfaithful to her, though she is your partner, the wife of your marriage covenant. Has not the one God made you? You belong to him in body and spirit. And what does the one God seek? Godly offspring. So be on your guard, and do not be unfaithful to the wife of your youth. The man who hates and divorces his wife,” says the Lord, the God of Israel, “does violence to the one he should protect,” says the Lord Almighty. So be on your guard, and do not be unfaithful.” Mal 2:13-16 NIV
And to the offended party, He wants trust in His justice:
“You have wearied the Lord with your words. “How have we wearied him?” you ask. By saying, “All who do evil are good in the eyes of the Lord, and he is pleased with them” or “Where is the God of justice?””
Malachi 2:17 NIV
God hates all sin including the injustice of wanting justice for others when they sin while wanting mercy for oneself after sinning, the wrong speck-log thinking that Holy God singles out adultery as the only unacceptable sin. God as well hates husband-nagging, neglect of role as the husband’s help-meet, controlling, selfishness, conceit, judgmentalism, disrespect, among others.
For Michal’s despise of her husband (David), God judged her with infertility, seriously looked down upon in old times. (2Sam 6:16-23).
At the scene of the Woman Caught in Adultery, when Jesus asked the person without sin to cast the first stone, everyone ended up leaving because upon reflection, everyone had their own accounting to do.
Jesus was the first to say he doesn’t condemn the woman but He commanded her, “Go now and leave your life of sin.””John 8:11 b NIV
In this day when there is no stoning to death, and the alive person in adultery is being led not by God but by the devil… therefore might not comply with Jesus’s command, you can continue to pray “…that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will.”
2 Timothy 2:26 NIV
Use your Divine Weapons of Warfare that have the power to demolish strongholds and every argument that sets itself up against the knowledge of God. 2 Cor 10:4-5
While man’s justice is feeble, temporary with many loopholes,
God’s justice is perfect—- the kind that sustains a person’s direct accountability. The latter produces godly sorrow that brings repentance that leads to salvation.”(2 Cor 7:10 NIV).
So fight the battle on your knees, wait upon God and take Him at His own promise to avenge and repay; leave room for His wrath. Be on guard to obey and continue to be faithful to God so as not to allow your own disobedience to hinder His work.
The gruesome sight of the blood, flesh, muscles, nerves torn apart, multilated, dirtied, spread on the ground serve as a warning to others on the consequences of adultery.
This is a physical representation of the monumental mess and brokenness it causes. Sin defiles many.
But so crafty is the devil that he can deceive people into being sucked into the fleeting pleasure of sin.
Know your one and only real enemy: Satan. Ephesians 6:12-18 says, the battle is not against human beings but against evil principalities, spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore, stop losing air fighting the wrong war. When you get the mind of Christ, you can instead focus your energies rightly in seeking first his kingdom and righteousness, your relationship with your heavenly Husband (Isa 54:5) because even if you have a faithful husband, he can still die and you would still be lost unless your anchor is Christ himself.
The promise in Heb 12:24 points to the fact that everyone and everything (created things) will one day be gone and only the Creator will remain.
You have a choice as to what you will pursue from here on. One of the choices will lead you to life and enable you to better handle losses and disappointments. The other will keep you in a swinging pendulum of uncertainty.
“At that time his voice shook the earth, but now he has promised, “Once more I will shake not only the earth but also the heavens.” The words “once more” indicate the removing of what can be shaken—that is, created things—so that what cannot be shaken may remain. Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe,” Hebrews 12:26-28 NIV
Adultery is despicable but it doesn’t have to have the last say. Let Jesus have the last word.
His personal ministry for you, the first part of which He read in the synagogue (Luke 4):
“The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, and provide for those who grieve in Zion— to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of his splendor. They will rebuild the ancient ruins and restore the places long devastated; they will renew the ruined cities that have been devastated for generations.”
Isaiah 61:1-4 NIV
Christ is making all things new (Rev 21:5).
Out of the ashes of mourning, He will birth something beautiful in you.
“And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters.”
Romans 8:28-29 NIV
