I just read Mark Osler's Jesus on Death Row:  The Trial of Jesus and American Capital Punishment.  It's worth your time for two reasons.  One, anything that reminds us of what our Savior did for our salvation will only serve to draw us nearer to our most merciful God.  Two, seeing Jesus as a death row inmate forces us to ask whether or not we are loving the least of these in our midst.  It is on this latter point that this book provides much fodder for debate.  As Osler writes, "The more we focus on that story of Jesus, the more the idea of capital punishment becomes troubling." (p4)

In John 8, Jesus was asked to opine on a lawful execution that was about to occur.  There was no suggestion that the defendant was innocent, or that the crime was minor by the standards of the day.  Jesus did not shrug his shoulders, summarily conclude that the death penalty was necessary or approved in the Old Testament, and walk away.

Rather, he challenged the gathered crowd:  A person without sin should cast the first stone of the stoning.  Famously no one did.  They did not have the moral authority to execute another person even when human law called for it.  Could his teaching be anymore clearer?  Jesus came upon the death penalty, about to be conducted and stopped it.  Imagine if he had come upon an abortion about to be committed and condemned it–I don't doubt that many would take that as an unambiguous moral statement.  (pp4-5)