No Stones: Forgiveness and Belief (John 8, John 20) | 06/29/2025

All right, I'm going to move my chair right over here.

You guys can huddle right up around me here.

Yes. There you go.

All right, guys. All right.

Thank you all for being up here. You get to help me teach what I

taught you guys this week. But the the adults, your

parents, your grandparents, your friends out there, they might

not know some of the things we talked about this week.

So this is going to be a lot of fun.

Now, I must say that every year it is such an honor for me to

get to teach the kids. And every year, you know, this

year we were back in this corner.

And I and I love the challenge of taking these principles and

presenting them in a way that children can get right.

And these principles that are true are true and in such a way

where even when we're young, we can understand them and gather

them. So you guys did super great this

week and I had so much fun teaching.

And what's fun for me is every year I see that you guys are

growing a little bit every year as the years run by.

Every year, you guys, Atticus, you got taller this year, right?

Every year you're getting a little bit taller and taller,

which is a lot of fun. OK, This year, the stories, I'm

going to just highlight two of the stories that we talked about

this week. And remember, the stories were

found in John Chapter 8 and John Chapter 20.

John 8 · chapter mention John 20 · chapter mention

And both stories that we talked about, remember they had

something to do with stones, right, Atticus?

Do you remember that? Do you remember that, Audrey?

Yeah. So the first story is in John

John 8 · chapter mention

Chapter 8, and it's it's a story that you might be familiar with.

In John Chapter 8, there's a woman and she's caught doing

John 8 · chapter mention

something bad. She's making some bad choices

and she's doing something that's that's bad.

And the consequence. Do you guys ever have

consequences at your house if you do something bad?

Yeah. What kind of consequences do you

have? Someone will, you know,

sometimes a spanking, maybe. Sometimes.

Yes. Louise, what kind of

consequences might you have? Oh, hot sauce.

That's an interesting one. That's a good one.

And I think that sometimes maybe screen time might be taken away.

Some things, yeah. Oh, you, you get a ground if

you. So you know, our parents,

because they love us. They have consequences for us

sometimes when we do something bad.

So in John chapter 8, you remember there's a woman and she

John 8 · chapter mention

makes a bad choice. She does something bad.

And the people who there's some people to find out about and

they're going to tattle on her. Do you ever had anybody

tattletale on you when you do something wrong?

Have you ever had that happen, Evan?

Do you hated that? Because that's not any fun,

isn't it? So these religious leaders,

Eloise, what are you? What did you want to say?

When you have you ever had somebody tattle on you?

Eben sometimes tattle on you? Oh, I don't know.

Oh, Eloise, Eben over here, they're siblings.

This is Eloise and they're siblings.

So maybe some, maybe sometimes. Well, what happened in this

occasion is that these people, they caught this woman and they

wanted to give her consequence. And the consequence they wanted

to give her was actually taking rocks, like big rocks, not

little rocks. I had a Little Rock, but I lost

it. It was the rock that broke our

front window last year. Remember, they got caught by a

tire or something that broke the front window.

Well, well, I know I thought it was on my desk, but when I went

to find it this morning, wasn't there.

So I don't know where it went to, but that Little Rock was

maybe someone said he did take it.

I don't know. But the in the story, remember

they said that they wanted to throw rocks at this woman and

they asked Jesus, Jesus, what do you think?

Should we throw rocks at this woman because she did something

bad? And who remembers what Jesus

says? Atticus, can you tell me no?

The the first one, you got it. It's right on the tip of your.

Tongue Remember Evan, do you think you know?

Tell people what Jesus said. He said whoever never sinned

before that gets to throw this first stone.

Very. Good, Evan.

That's so good. Good job, Atticus.

You too. So Jesus says, all right, he who

has never done anything wrong, you get to throw the first stone

at her. And do you remember what

happened? They all dropped their stones,

they all like, and Atticus is right because they all also had

sinned. They all had made some bad

choices. They had done some things that

were wrong. Everybody's sinned, Atticus

says. And that's true because the

Bible says all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of

God. So in this occasion, after

everyone dropped their stone, Jesus looked at the woman and he

said, woman, where are your accusers?

In other words, where are your tattletales, the ones who were

telling on you, where did they go?

And they'd all dropped their stones and they'd all left.

And then Jesus said something to a really interesting he said, go

and sin no more. In other words, go and and don't

do bad things again. That was his hope for her.

But this is a beautiful picture of Jesus giving this woman

forgiveness. And we all need forgiveness.

And Atticus is right. God gives us forgiveness because

of what Jesus did for us on the cross.

Eloise, what did you want to say?

God? God gives forgiveness to

everyone, yes. He does God gives us forgiveness

away generously. So in this occasion, we

remembered that the stones. So we said this is that we

seeing that they drop their stones.

Well, we also drop our stones. And so that means let's say that

we have a like maybe a brother or sister that hits us.

We can hit him back. But instead, maybe a better

choice would be able to say no stones.

I don't have a stone to throw at them.

Now, some people don't understand this.

And remember I said that some people want to talk about having

no stones, but they yell it like no stones, no stones.

They might yell that way, but is that a nice way to say, I

forgive you? No, Everybody knows that in this

occasion, Jesus has encouraged us to say, hey, yes, Sadie, what

are you going to say? No stones, No stones.

That's what he said, no stones. So Sadie's just exactly right.

We determined that we're going to be the type of people that

when someone does something bad to us or something wrong, it's

not that we won't tell on them because sometimes there's

something that's something bad to us.

Well, that needs to be told. But Jesus has given us an

example here. Even the more they say when,

when people do bad things to us, then we want to take up that

idea of saying no stones. I'm not going to throw stones at

others who do something wrong. Instead, what are we going to

do? We're going to forgive because

Jesus forgives and we want to be like God.

We want to be like Jesus and he forgives.

So that was the first story. It was about stones.

And then there's a second story that also has stones.

And you guys remember what that story was about.

It was about Jesus on the on the morning of the resurrection.

Audrey, what do you remember about that?

In memory that when he died, he went, he got buried into a tomb

because his body. And they rolled this big stone,

which is called a tomb, and rolled in front of this, The

Cave that his body was in and to protect him so no one could

steal his body. And then the angels came and

moved the biggest stone. And when Mary Magdalene.

Yeah. In that amazing Audrey, good

job. There's so many details that you

remembered. Very, very good.

So remember on the Sunday morning after Jesus had died,

Mary Magdalene went to the two men.

When she got there, remember the stone was rolled away.

The stone was rolled away, Yes. What did you want to say?

And he was alive in there. And Jesus was alive.

Jesus came back to life. And so Mary Magdalene, she sees

that the tomb has been rolled, the stone has been rolled away,

but she doesn't go into the tomb, does she?

What does she do? Do you guys remember?

She. She.

She was so surprised. And then John and Peter were

running, and John actually running faster than Peter.

So Audrey remembered this, I pointed out that John and in

John chapter 20, when John is telling the story about Mary

John 20 · chapter mention

Magdalene comes and she says, hey, his body's not there.

The stones been rolled away. John, who's the author of his

book, John, he mentions twice that he ran faster than Peter,

which is really funny because you know, boys will be boys in a

way. So so John mentioned twice that

he ran faster than Peter. But John gets to the tomb first,

but he doesn't, he doesn't go in.

Peter gets there and Peter goes in.

And when Peter goes in, he finds that Jesus is not there because

the stone have been rolled away. Now, I want to tell you, I told

you guys this and I'm now I'm going to tell everyone else so

they can remember. But let me ask you this

question. Did the stone need to be rolled

away for Jesus to get out of the tomb?

Who remembers? Do you remember the answer Evan?

Do you want to tell me? Come close to the microphone.

The question is, did the stone have to be rolled away for Jesus

to get out of the tomb? And the answer, Evan, is.

No. No, Jesus can go through walls.

Jesus can go anywhere at any time.

The stone did not get rolled away, so Jesus could get out.

The stone got a rolled rolled away so that who remembers?

Does anybody remember? OK, what was the answer do?

You remember so they would notice that he wasn't there.

The stone got rolled away, not so that Jesus could get out, but

watch so that we could get in. And this is a really big

principle because here's here's the idea is that Jesus rolled

the stone away in order to help people to believe because that's

what Jesus is like. Jesus goes out of his way to

help people believe. And a lot of times when people

explain God, they don't explain in that way.

They think, oh, God makes it really, really, really hard to

believe, but he doesn't. God gives us all.

You know, sometimes you might call it a God wink or a God

moment where you'll see God and maybe the sunrise or maybe a

friend will speak something to you or your mom and dad might

say something. You're like, wow, that feels

like the Lord moving and doing something through that person.

And so we look for those moments and when we explain Jesus,

that's what we explain. I'm like, well, a lot of times

people explain Jesus wrong, right?

And let's say someone tried to explain me and they said, OK,

well, let me tell you about Kurt.

And they said, well, one of the things about Kurt is he has he

has really long black curly hair.

Would that be right? No, that'd be like Atticus.

Atticus is that's like me, right?

So no, that wouldn't be. They would be.

And that's how people are with God.

They're like, they explained them all wrong.

What if someone tried to explain me and they said, oh, Kurt's

about as tall as Audrey. Audrey, can you stand up for me?

What if somebody said, well, he's about this tall?

Would that be right? No.

I'm taller than that. What if somebody said, oh, I'll

tell you one thing about Kurt. He's a terrible, terrible, awful

guitar player. Would that be true?

No. Well, thank you for saying so.

Yeah, they wouldn't. They wouldn't be explaining me

right. Right.

If they said he has long, curly black hair, if he's only as tall

as Audrey and he's a terrible guitar player, that wouldn't be

like what I am, right. So sometimes people explain God

by saying, oh, God makes it hard to believe, but God doesn't make

it hard to believe. In fact, God goes out of his way

to help us believe and that's why the stone gets rolled away.

Yes, Eloise. He he just disappeared in the by

her. Yes.

So then what happened is Peter and John go into the tomb and

they see that Jesus is gone. Yes, Sadie.

God believes us and He gives us second chances because He loves

us all the time. Yes, he does.

That is super good, Sadie. So what I want you to remember

when you see the rock and you think about the the stone being

rolled away on that Easter Sunday morning, I want you to

remember that Jesus has the stone rolled away by the angels.

Because Jesus goes out of his way to help us to believe.

Because there'll be times in our life where it might be hard to

believe. Maybe there'll be times seasons

of your life will go. Does God really love us?

Did Jesus really come to save us?

Did Jesus really die on a cross and was he really resurrected?

There might be times in your life.

Or go, wait a minute, do I really believe that?

Well, yes, you can believe it. And God's going to give you even

more and more things in your life that will help you to

believe if you'll just look for them.

So look for stones that are being rolled away that are

evidence of God's great love for us.

Yes, Eloise, what do you want to say?

He died on the cross for us, yes.

Jesus did. Jesus died on the cross for us

and Audrey say 1 Tell me one more thing.

Some people believe that the world just blew up.

Yeah, like The Big Bang Theory. Yeah, I think that that could

have been how God created the world.

He could have said let there be light and boom, bang, light

appeared. Atticus, last guy, what do you

want to say? He died and.

Uncrossed for our sins? Yes, Jesus did.

OK. Will you guys stand next to me

and wave at everybody? Thank you for helping me teach

this morning. So adults, when you think about

the stone being rolled away, remember that God goes out of

his way to help you to believe. And you might be here this

morning and maybe you've been rustling and struggling to

believe, and maybe your prayer would be this simple.

God help me believe. Give me some stones that are

rolled away in my life that will point me and strengthen my my

love for you. God help me to even the more be

strong in our faith through those moments where God rolls

stones away. Let me pray for us.

Jesus. I'm so grateful for this week.

How fun it was to do Vacation Bible school.

Thank you for our church God and thank you that our children are

growing to love you and growing in your ways.

God help us as a church to point our children well to you and to

teach them well about your grace and forgiveness.

Thank you for the forgiveness that we know.

And you help us, God, to become people who say no stones, no

stones. And God help us to be the also

people who realize and live our lives in light of the fact that

you help us to believe. You make it easy to believe and

to follow you. So we come after you.

Jesus, we thank you for your love and your salvation and your

forgiveness in our lives. And Jesus name and everyone said

Amen and Amen. All right, let's all stand

together with the kids right here next to me.

I want to say a blessing. Can you huddle up kids?

And we'll say a blessing if everyone will stand.

I want to send you out with this blessing before you go, if

you'll prepare your heart to receive this blessing.

And now may the Lord bless you and keep you, and may make his

face to shine upon you. And may the joy of the Lord that

is unspeakable and full of glory, may it abound to you.

And may the peace of God that passes all understanding, may it

surprise you in the midst of all of the challenges that life

brings. And they made the mercies of the

Lord, in other words, the forgiveness of God.

That is new every morning. May it be especially new to you

now and your mornings to come. And now may the Lord Jesus

Christ guard your heart and your mind, your salt and your light.

Go now and be salt and light into the world.

You are blessed. We'll see you again soon.