The Reformation Project: Thesis 3

Thesis 3:  Rather than focusing on the circumstantial question of “what would Jesus do” in a given situation, it is more important to understand what Jesus has done for the eternal salvation of His people.

 For the last couple of decades pastors and youth ministers have advised teens and others to make decisions about what to do, where to go, and who to spend time with by asking themselves a simple question:  what would Jesus do?  The intent was to say to 16 year olds:  if Jesus would not have gone to that party or done that with a girl, then you shouldn’t do that either.  At some point that simple pastoral approach to addressing teen behavior became the subject of a major marketing campaign including the initials WWJD on an array of bracelets, t-shirts, and other products.  While that approach to pastoral care is not totally without merit, it is in many ways overly simplistic and runs the risk of reducing the life of Jesus into a kind of Aesop’s fable.  Additional problems have become clear as the marketing buzz elevated WWJD as a central tenet of how some viewed Christianity and the Christian life, in high school and beyond.

Most fundamentally, one can easily see how easily WWJD becomes a pretext for idolatry and self-worship.  For one thing, thinking about the life of Jesus and of us in this way instead of grounding our Christian lives in Gospel truths reduces Christianity to a mere moralism.  Sadly, surveys have shown clearly that many of the same teens and young adults (and older ones, too) that have proudly worn WWJD memorabilia have also remained woefully uninformed of the facts of the gospel and the doctrine of justification by faith alone. It is interesting, but on some level not surprising, that the same churches that have assured us that they have protected their people from the legalistic excesses of past generations have nonetheless managed to address the nature of Christianity primarily in terms of what we do.  To talk about what Jesus might theoretically do without laying a foundation as to what he has done for our eternal salvation results in churches failing to teach what God has done in Christ for our redemption while also undercutting much of the biblical motivations and empowerment for Christian living.  When one loses the necessity of the regeneration, the power of the Gospel, the presence of the Holy Spirit, and the motivation of gratitude in response to divine grace, all one is left with to motivate Christians to faithfulness is some sort of legalism. That today’s legalism is kinder and gentler than that thrust upon past generations offers neither comfort nor power to believers today.

In addition, frequently the question of what Jesus would have done in a given situation is not even answerable, because Jesus never confronted that particular issue in any of the gospel records.  Without a clear biblical example, many will frame the issue in a manner that lends itself to the desirable answer, and then essentially assume that the choice I want to make is identical to what Jesus would have done.  Self-interest is not in every instance wrong, but shrouding it in a cloak of divine sanction is both wrong and delusional.  One sees this clearly when this is applied to politics.  In published articles in recent years, people on the religious left have asked what Jesus would do and have expressed confidence that he would not drive an environmental menace such as an SUV, while those on the right have taken a similar approach to ascertaining with certainty that he would advocate a preferred approach to tax rates.  Of course, Jesus never addressed either of these issues, and while various principles might be found from his teachings that would provide clues as to his views, to say that the answer is not clear cut would be an understatement.  These attempts to co-opt Jesus as a supporter of political programs are delusional and manipulative, if not idolatrous.  The same results can occur when applying this approach to personal decisions and ethics.