"The Good News Is...Rooted in Justice, Mercy, and Faithfulness" (March 22, 2026 Sermon)

The Good News Is...Rooted in Justice, Mercy, and Faithfulness

Rev. Dr. Stephen M. Fearing
Guilford Park Presbyterian Church
March 22nd, 2026
5th Sunday in Lent (Year A)

Scripture Readings

Matthew 23:23

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint, dill, and cumin and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. It is these you ought to have practiced without neglecting the others.”

John 8:2-11

Early in the morning he came again to the temple. All the people came to him, and he sat down and began to teach them. The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and, making her stand before all of them, they said to him, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery. Now in the law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” They said this to test him, so that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” And once again he bent down and wrote on the ground. When they heard it, they went away, one by one, beginning with the elders, and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus straightened up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” She said, “No one, sir.” And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you. Go your way, and from now on do not sin again.”

Sermon Manuscript

To state the obvious, our world is currently filled with pain and division. As a pastor married to a therapist, Tricia and I often reflect on why this is and what role we should play—as parents, faith and mental health professionals, and followers of Jesus—in helping to repair the breach. I’m especially grateful for a common refrain she shares with me, which both saddens and challenges me to do better: she often laments that, as a society, we seem to have lost interest in and the ability for nuance in nearly every situation. Social media algorithms lure us into rage and then reward us for sharing it with others. Growing partisan hostility discourages any form of compromise for the common good. Preachers are accused of being “too political” just for sharing the basic tenets of Christianity. Our culture favors those who are deliberately combative in their tone, extreme in their beliefs, and callous with their words. Amid all of this, there is enormous human collateral damage. Why? Because nuance has left the building. We’re too busy arguing why we’re right and everyone else is wrong that we fail to see who suffers in the wake.

Sadly, you and I do not know the name of the collateral damage in today’s passage from John’s Gospel. She is an unnamed woman whose identity is of little use to the people who have thrust her before Jesus in contempt and rage. It was early in a morning, perhaps not unlike the one we are gathered on today. He had sat down and was teaching near the temple to those who would listen. But his tutelage is interrupted by scribes and Pharisees who have allegedly caught this woman in the very act of adultery. “Teacher,” they muse, “the law says we should stone her. What say you?”

Jesus could have instantly jumped into the argument, escalated the situation, and turned his response into a viral rage-bait video that I’m sure would have gained him a large following on social media. But instead, he does something quite rare in our culture: he practices the pause. Quite literally, as it turns out. Without saying a word, he bends to the ground and doodles in the sand. I can only imagine how much this must have angered those who came to argue, or at least puzzled them immensely. What on earth was he thinking? The text doesn’t tell us how long he wrote in the sand, but I like to think it was for an obnoxiously awkward amount of time.

Eventually, the scribes and Pharisees continue to press the issue. So, Jesus straightens up and calmly, gently, but firmly says the words we all know well: “Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” Earlier this week, I thought that if I had to recall that verse from memory, I would forget the last two words. Notice, Jesus doesn’t say, “let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone.” No, he says, “let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” It’s as if Jesus, through both his silence and measured response, is refusing to allow the people trying to trap him to look away from the woman, whose life could very well end in bloodshed.

“Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.”

And then he does it again! Slowly, he lowers himself back to the ground and continues his sand art.

Nearly three and a half years ago, I preached on this very passage at the first worship service I ever led among you as your new pastor. In that sermon, I lamented, as so many have before me, that we don’t know what Jesus wrote in the sand that day. I ultimately concluded that it doesn’t matter what he wrote; what was most important was the deliberate act of pausing to gather his thoughts and craft a thoughtful, faithful response. I still believe that. However, I also think it’s a helpful spiritual exercise to make some educated guesses. Jesus might have been simply drawing something of no great consequence. Perhaps he just drew a line in the sand, as a visual reminder of the choices we face in a loud and complex world.

But today I like to think that Jesus drew a few questions in the sand as if to invite nuance back into the conversation. Perhaps he wrote down questions like those Tanya Denise Anderson poses in her artist statement in our Lenten devotional. How was she “caught” in the act? Was she allowed to explain herself? Was this a loving relationship? Was it even consensual? Or, perhaps most damning of all: if she was, in fact, caught in the act, as her accusers say, then where on God’s good green earth is man? As the saying goes, it takes two to tango!

Whether he wrote those questions in the sand or not, Jesus’s intentional choice to pause and invite space into a tense and charged situation adds nuance to the discussion. That’s good news for those caught in the crossfire of whatever current hot-button issue is. Jesus is calling us to hold the law in one hand and justice, mercy, and faithfulness in the other. One of the biblical mandates Jesus knew well was the threefold command of Micah 6:8: do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with God. He also knew all too well that we often unintentionally let our zeal for the first part of that equation to diminish our focus on the other two.

Jesus is calling us to hold the law in one hand and justice, mercy, and faithfulness in the other.

Now, neighbors, hear me on this important note. While Jesus is condemning the harsh legalism of the scribes and Pharisees, we must never cast all Jewish law as inherently legalistic or rigid. As my friend Rev. Lisle Gwynn Garrity reminded me this week, Judaism has a rich history of holding Written and Oral Torah together to interpret and reevaluate the law. In this passage, Jesus isn’t telling the scribes and the Pharisees to abandon their Jewish beliefs. In fact, one could argue that Jesus is actually calling them to return to their Jewish beliefs. Because Judaism is built on a deep appreciation for the law of God, the Torah, and the intentional and faithful interpretations of that law that protect the most vulnerable among us. And that’s not just good news; that’s great news.

It’s great news because, as the Church of Jesus Christ, we have the opportunity to model a different way of living where we invite nuance to guide us toward discipleship. This leads us to a place where we are more aware of the stones we cast: stones like shame, certainty, social media contempt, political caricatures, church gossip, the need to win, or always be right. Because following Jesus means letting go of the stones we have come to hold dear. When we lay down those stones, we might discover that in a world that turns people into issues, Jesus restores personhood. In a world eager to condemn, Jesus creates space for repentance without humiliation. And in a world that loves spectacle, Jesus chooses mercy, and so should we.

Concluding Invitation

Perhaps a good way to start this work is to put down stones and pick up hymnals! What Jesus reveals in this story is what we are about to sing: there is a wideness in God’s mercy, and there is a kindness in God’s justice. I invite you to turn to hymn number 435 as together we conclude this sermon by rising in song:

[sing “There’s a Wideness in God’s Mercy"]

In the name of God the Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer, may all of us, God’s children, say: Amen.

www.stephenmichaelfearing.com   |   www.guilfordpark.org

"The Good News Is...Together, the Impossible Is Possible" (March 8, 2026 Sermon)

Guilford Park Presbyterian Church

The Good News Is… Together, the Impossible Is Possible

Rev. Stephen M. Fearing

March 8, 2026 · Third Sunday in Lent (Year A)

Ephesians 3:20–21
“Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.”

Mark 6:32–44
The feeding of the five thousand

The Worship Committee is currently considering using memorial funds to replace our aging audio equipment here. Our soundboard and speakers, for example, have dutifully served this space for decades, but it’s time to dismiss them with thanks. So I’ve been thinking a lot about amplification, you could say.

As I reflected on these scriptures with several of you this past week, a simple truth came to mind—one that is, honestly, quite obvious but no less profound: Jesus didn’t have a microphone. At least not like the one that carries my voice now. He didn’t have electricity, soundboards, or amplifiers. Instead, his amplifiers were his followers, in a very real sense.

“Before there was amplification, there was community.”

In The Word This Week, we gathered in the library and watched part of an episode of The Chosen that depicts today’s story from Mark’s gospel. There’s a small detail I really appreciated: as you hear Jesus teaching the crowd, you can hear others in the background repeating his words, carrying his message to those in the back.

A space can be designed to help one voice carry a long way, but a crowd of more than 5,000—especially outdoors—would still make hearing Jesus a shared act, not just an individual one. We aren’t told exactly how Jesus’ teaching reached the edges of such a large crowd. But I can’t help imagining it this way: a word spoken here, repeated there; a phrase caught by one set of ears and carried to another; a murmur of mercy rippling outward through human voices.

Participants, Not Spectators

Now, it stands to reason that if Jesus could miraculously feed thousands with just two fish and five loaves, he also could have easily amplified his voice through divine means. But he chose not to. The good news is that in Christ, God’s abundance becomes real not only through divine power from above but also through shared human participation below: voices carrying the word, hands passing the bread, communities discovering together that the impossible is possible.

Jesus could have snapped his fingers and had a four-course meal literally fall from the heavens into the people’s laps, but he chose not to. Jesus is fully capable of acting alone, but he doesn’t, because the kingdom he proclaims always makes people participants, not spectators.

“The kingdom Jesus proclaims always makes people participants, not spectators.”

In Mark’s gospel, Jesus does not treat the crowd as passive consumers of a religious experience. He draws disciples and, in a sense, the entire gathered community into the work. The word is shared collectively. The food is enjoyed together. The abundance is found together. The good news is that with Christ, and with one another, the impossible becomes possible.

From Scarcity to Abundance

The disciples’ instinctual posture is one of scarcity. There are too many people; it’s too late in the day; we have too little money; we have too little food. Jesus doesn’t deny the size of the need; he simply rejects their conclusion. The disciples see the need and believe it’s impossible. Jesus looks at the same need and sees a community that hasn’t yet realized what is possible when they come together.

Exactly one year ago, this congregation faced the question of whether to convert the youth lounge into a temporary homeless shelter for about a dozen women over the summer. What started as a simple January coffee meeting between the CEO of Greenboro Urban Ministry and me grew into a Mission Committee discussion in February, a Session meeting in March, and then numerous conversations across this church and beyond.

At every stage, the same concerns kept resurfacing: Do we have enough space? Enough volunteers? Enough money? Enough security? Enough emotional energy? Enough flexibility in our building and our life together to host roughly a dozen women for three months? These weren’t foolish questions, and they weren’t necessarily unfaithful ones. But they also reflected scarcity.

Beneath each practical concern was a deeper fear: if we open what we have to others, will there still be enough left for us?

“Bring what you have, offer it together, and trust that in God’s hands, shared gifts will become more than enough.”

And that is exactly the kind of question that lingers during the feeding of the five thousand. The disciples look at the crowd and see the math of insufficiency: not enough food, not enough money, not enough capacity—just not enough. But Jesus invites them to see things differently.

He does not dismiss the reality of the challenge, but he also refuses to let scarcity have the final say. “You give them something to eat,” he says. In other words: bring what you have, offer it together, and trust that in God’s hands, shared gifts will become more than enough.

That is what this church wrestled with a year ago. Not just whether we had enough resources, but whether we were willing to believe that God can do abundant things when a community stops clutching what it has and begins putting it in Christ’s hands. And by God’s grace, we took that leap of faith. We opened our doors, welcomed our neighbors, and discovered that when we placed what we had into Christ’s hands, God provided every space, volunteer, resource, and every bit of courage we needed to share good news with women seeking both shelter and a path toward work and stability.

And this was possible because we trusted in the God who, by the power at work within us, is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine.

Food as Gift

Did you know that there’s a farm in upstate New York where nothing is for sale? In a small town in the Adirondacks called Keeseville, there’s a place called the Sand River Community Farm. On the surface it looks like any other farm: people digging potatoes, peeling garlic, chopping wood, making stew, tending animals. But there is one remarkable difference: the food is grown and shared as a gift.

No wages. No prices. Nothing bought or bartered. Just neighbors showing up, working together, and feeding one another.

It’s run by a farmer named Adam Wilson. One of his neighbors unexpectedly came into some money and wrote him a $500,000 check to take a local abandoned farmhouse off the market. He started growing food and giving it away. Then some of the people he gave food to began showing up to assist him in tending the farm so they could grow more food. A community began to form—neighbor feeding neighbor. A place where everyone was welcome, and the only requirement was to come hungry.

Not only did those who helped form this community find their stomachs filled, but their spirits filled as well.

“This food is our gift… a responsibility to consider: What are my gifts? And how might I join hands with others to sustain the whole?”

Adam Wilson noticed a shift when giving food as a gift. The Sand River Community doesn’t call it “free” food; they call it “food as a gift.” Because, in his words, the word “free” implies that something doesn’t have value. Instead, they use the phrase “gifted” food to emphasize the value of food grown and harvested by a community of volunteers who do that sacred work simply because everyone deserves food, with no exceptions.

If you enter Sand River Community Farm, you’ll find a sign that invites people to trade transaction for relationship, commerce for community, and to consider how their own gifts might help sustain the whole.

What if we stopped believing the lie of scarcity? What if we saw food less as a commodity purchased by consumers and more as a gift shared among neighbors?

Passing the Good News Along

But Jesus said to them, “You give them something to eat.” Not just you watch. Not just you admire. You give. You carry. You pass it along.

Friends, the good news of this story isn’t just that Jesus once fed a hungry crowd long ago. It’s that Christ still confronts our fear of not-enough by teaching communities to speak and share a different word. A word of gift. A word of mercy. A word of enough.

And that word doesn’t travel by magic. It travels through people. Through voices. Through bodies. Through neighbors.

So I want to invite us, for just a moment, to become what this story says the church is: a people through whom good news is passed along.

There is enough for all:

enough food…
enough housing…
enough healthcare…
enough mercy…

Together, the impossible is possible.

In the name of God the Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer, may all of us, God’s beloved children, say: Amen.

Rev. Stephen M. Fearing

www.stephenmfearing.com  |  www.guilfordpark.org