:: After the rainbow Noah became a farmer. He worked the land that had slept under his ocean and planted new life back into the soil that surely held so much death, so much decay, so many memories of the past.
He also planted a vineyard. He drank of the wine, the Bible says, and he became drunk and uncovered in his tent.
The rest of the story is that out of three sons, one simply told the others about their father's predicament, told them with a sneer, maybe, and with no thought of dad's dignity. But two brothers chose to do the honorable thing - to turn their faces away and cover their father. They chose to respect the man who was caught without his dignity.
One son was appalled or amused or indignant, and did nothing to cover his father. Two sons, who maybe felt all the same feelings of the first son, chose to cover.
:: She was thrust into the crowd of the pious. They "set her in the midst" of those intent on hearing words from Jesus, right in the middle of their church service. I can see her red face and mine would have flushed for her, would have felt the burning shame and embarrassment and humiliation as if it were my own.
They thought they had Him and they knew they had her, but she was just incendiary and that's all they needed her for. She was only a tool to spark a fire that would point burning fingers at Him.
Were they appalled or amused or indignant at her behavior? Exposing sin can be more about our own ego and preserving it or inflating it by comparison. Our own right-ness can become more important than any one's righteousness.
So what'll it be, Jesus? What do you say about her?
He wrote her covering in the dust. Like Noah's two sons, He looked away from her shame and covered her, because that's really what love does - covers a multitude of sins.
No stones were cast that day. Conviction took the seat of condemnation and everyone was left wanting a covering.
:: May there be no rocks in our reach today - only coverings.
Jesus' shed blood.
A covering community.
A patchwork of saints walking holy and wholly set on Love - the greatest cover for sin; because sin calls for overcoming and overcoming calls for coming along side, to call sin what it is and to remind us of what we are.
What do You say about us?
Holy. Beloved. His own special people.