sin no more

They went each to his own house, but Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. early in the morning he came again to the temple. All the people came to him, and he sat down and taught them. The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and placing her in the midst they said to him, "Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. Now in the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say?" This they said to test him, that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. And as they continued to ask him, he stood up and said to them, "Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her." And once more he bent down and wrote on the ground. But when they heard it, they went away one by one, beginning with the older ones, and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus stood up and said to her, "woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?" She said, "No one, Lord." And Jesus said, "Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more."

John 7:53-8:11

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The story may not belong to John's Gospel. In fact, the story may never have happened. But this point of the story is unshakably true. This is the pervasive message of the New Testament. Jesus exalted himself above the Law. He wrote it! Jesus altered some of its sanctions. He pointed to its main goal of Christ-exalting love. And he reestablished righteousness on the basis of an experience of grace. The story points us to the message of the whole New Testament: We are called to be holy as God is holy. God hates sin. But pursuing holiness without a profound experience of grace in our own lives produces hypocrisy and doctrinaire cruelty. Jesus came into the world to provide that grace through his cross, and to establish holiness, righteousness, and justice on the foundation of our experience of his grace. So come to him for grace, and set your face to sin no more.

John Piper 

White knuckling through sin will not last long. You may be successful for a time, but eventually, you will place God in your debt for being "good", and the moment something goes bad for you, you will feel abandoned and wronged by God for not coming through on His end. This is a wicked way to think and live. God owes us nothing. Our action of turning from sin will not be God-exalting obedience, but self-exalting sacrifice.

Rather, by experiencing the grace of God applied to us through the cross, we will see that our striving for holiness comes from the fact that God is holy and He has cleansed us of our sinfulness. We were hopeless fallen, yet loved and shown grace to the degree that God would kill His Son for us.

See your sin, feel the weight of it, experience and apply this grace and love through Jesus and then sin no more!