Really, If It Were Jesus, What Would He Do?

By Khen Lim

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According to Wikipedia, the phrase was the subtitle of an 1896 book by Charles Sheldon called ‘In His Steps.’ This was a novel that sprang from Sheldon’s sermons delivered in Topeka, Kansas in his Congregational church. Having that subtitle, the book focused on Sheldon’s approach to Christian life, constantly asking what Jesus would do if He were in our shoes. Jesus is placed at the centre of our consciousness and morality. These ideas had run alongside what was called Social Gospel, espoused by Walter Rauschenbusch. In fact both authors acknowledged one another’s contribution – Rauschenbusch was inspired by Sheldon and in return, Sheldon identified his theology with Rauschenbusch.

The novel became very popular. All in all, over 21 languages were used to translate it by 1935. In the story, Rev Henry Maxwell comes across a homeless man who issued him a challenge in a serious imitation of Christ because he was having difficulties understanding what so many Christians often choose to ignore the poor.

In the novel, the homeless man said this:

“I heard some people singing at a church prayer meeting the other night, ‘All for Jesus, all for Jesus, All my being’s ransomed powers, All my thoughts and all my doings, All my days and all my hours,’ and I kept wondering as I sat on the steps outside just what they meant by it. It seems to me there’s an awful lot of trouble in the world that somehow wouldn’t exist if all the people who sing such songs went and lived them out.

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“I suppose I don’t understand. But what would Jesus do? Is that what you mean by following His steps? It seems to me sometimes as if the people in the big churches had good clothes and nice houses to live in and money to spend for luxuries and could go away on summer vacations and all that, while the people outside the churches, thousands of them, I mean, die in tenements and walk the streets for jobs and never have a piano or a picture in the house, and grow up in misery and drunkenness and sin.”

The homeless man’s questioning inevitably leads many of the story’s characters to ask the question “What would Jesus do?” And by and large, the many situations in the story were tackled mainly by virtue of what the question means to these characters leading to a change of heart in many if not all the cases. And with this change of heart comes a decision to take their faith in Christ more seriously. This seriousness is reflected in how these characters focus on understanding the life of Christ and how it applies to them in the real world.

Almost a hundred years after the novel was written, there came a movement simply identified by the abbreviation “WWJD,” which is self-explanatory, focusing on inspiring teenagers and all young Christians to change the way they live their lives. A 1990s grassroots movement was begun by Janie Tinklenberg, a youth leader in Michigan mainly for her own youth group but surprisingly its influence spread throughout America with many seen wearing the famous bracelet with the same abbreviation in initials.

The effects of WWJD lasted right through to 2010 even with a movie with the same name out in 2010. Two years later, a sequel was also released. The first movie was essentially a complete take of the Sheldon’s story line.

For all intents and purposes, a movement revolving around WWJD appears a great and encouraging idea and the fact that it had gone widespread seems to confirm that it was a good idea. But if we start to look at it a little more closely, perhaps we might see some cracks in the approach. These cracks are worthwhile understanding.

The Case Against

Firstly not everyone – if at all there is anyone – is in the capacity to be able to perceive what Jesus would do in any given situation. Everyone will have his own idea of what Jesus would do but that doesn’t mean they are all correct. And even when someone says he does know, who are we to contest the issue with him? Who are we to challenge the veracity of his claims? And who are we to say we’re right and he’s wrong?

Anyone who tells us that he knows what Jesus would do is so convicted in his belief that we will end up having as many people as there are opinions of what Jesus would do. But are they all correct? The problem is that we are entirely capable of conjuring what Jesus would do only for the idea to be simply a reflection of what we want and not necessarily what He would do. What we think Jesus will do is likely to be a way of using the name of Jesus to endorse our own ideas.

The Bible does remind us of how foolish we can be when we think we know what Jesus would do. In Luke 19:11, the people welcomed Jesus’ arrival in Jerusalem, feting Him as much as a warrior as they wanted to make Him out to be. The people had thought His arrival would indicate “that the Kingdom of God was to appear immediately” simply because that was theirs and not Jesus’ conviction.

What they had no understanding of was that Jesus was indeed the Messiah and that the plan was for Him to suffer all our sins and to die for them so that we may have a clear way to Salvation through Him. Had the people read and understood what was said in Psalm 22 and/or Isaiah 53, they would have known what to and not to expect.

Remember that the disciples themselves – Peter specifically – were in denial of what it was that Jesus would end up doing. This disbelief was based on what the disciples had envisioned Jesus would actually do. It was in their own mind that they misunderstood the plans that God had for His Son to carry out.

The Jews had been looking for someone to destroy the Roman oppression. They had imagined a hero who would come not only to rescue them but to annihilate their enemy in the same way as God had used Joshua, Gideon, Barak and Jephthah and even Samson. But that was not what Jesus came to do. His kingdom wasn’t going to be established on the destruction of Rome. His was to bring about salvation from sin and its consequences.

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At this point, it is important to remind ourselves of what God said in Isaiah 55:8-9: “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.”

If there is anything more to the point, this verse says it all. God says we do not think like Him. That is another way of saying that we at best second guess Him because there is no way we know what His thoughts really are. His ways and His thoughts are higher, meaning that no matter what, there is no way for us to really understand given our limited intellectual power. And often that is the reason why His miracles border on the impossible for us to perceive. They are, in many of our experiences, unimaginable or unthinkable.

God says, “The secret thing belong to the Lord our God but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law” (Deuteronomy 29:29) and therefore to go “beyond what He reveals can be deceptive” (Psalm 75:5, Matthew 7:21). Clearly then, God has drawn a line between what we are to know and what He knows. This alone would put a contrasting perspective into trying to understand what Jesus would do.

The third point to understand is that what Jesus would do in any given situation might not necessarily be what we are to do. He is the Son of God; we aren’t. He is God in human form. He is the Messiah, the Saviour and His life on earth had a specific mission. His mission here is not one that we can ever shoulder. Jesus came with a calling that was far higher than any man’s. While we are to emulate Him, it does not mean we can do exactly what He has. Even if we did the same things, we are not likely to achieve the same effect or result. For example would any of us dying on the cross save the world the way Jesus could?

The Case For

Life as a Christian has never been easy. No one ever said it would be. Which is why many Christians often ask the question of what Jesus would do in our shoes in any given difficult situation. Our sense of inadequacy wrecked by creaking sin makes us realise that we are constantly needing guidance. Looking to Jesus for a way out is what WWJD is plainly about and if we’re honest about, we would own up to having faced at least one dire situation in our lives where we felt lost and then consider what being Christian hence means.

Let’s look at one such situation:

You’re rushing to get out of your house to a meeting at your office, knowing that if you’re late, you’d definitely be fired. As you’re driving out of your driveway, you notice your neighbour opposite the road clearing her front yard. The storm last night had made a complete ruin of her garden and she’s on her own, struggling to cope with the mess. Parts of her front patio had collapsed. Flower pots are in ruins. Plants uprooted. A huge branch lay half hanging from the big tree. You stop your car and endless thoughts cross your mind.

You can stop what you’re doing and help the struggling lady or you can race to your meeting and save your job. If you do the former, you’ll certainly lose your job. If you rush off, you have a far better chance of clinging on to your job but you’d leave the lady to cope on her own. So what would Jesus do?

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Here’s another situation:

You’re friendly with all the nearby neighbours in your street. Every now and then, you get together with them in a hope that you may be able to introduce them to Christ. You have been making some fair inroads in some cases while in others, you’re taking things a little slower in case you make them feel uncomfortable. Then you hear of two men who have joined your neighbourhood and they’re “living together,” which you later discover are in a ‘domestic relationship’ amounting to a gay partnership. You have a conundrum because you’re stumped as to what you do now.

You can decide on an exclusion policy and not bother to make friends with them, which could make a mockery of your ministry work. Some may notice and think you have double standards. Or you can welcome them like you did with all the others and offer them the same level of friendship and warmth but you may risk impressing others that you have no problems embracing their lifestyle. In other words, some might take this to mean that in your ministry work, gay partnerships are okay. So what would Jesus do?

Let’s try another one:

As promised, you have been setting aside your savings to help the church acquire some much needed musical instruments to bolster its music ministry. This has been a substantial need for many years now because no one was forthcoming but since you have volunteered, everyone is now looking forward to some much-anticipated changes that will improve the quality of music worship in the church. Then you suddenly come across a deal that is too good to be true – a deal to get the guitar that you have always been pining for all these years to add to your collection. The deal is so good that you know if you let it pass, you won’t be coming across another for years to come if at all.

You know that you will fulfil your personal dream to get that elusive once-in-a-lifetime guitar deal but that means you won’t have the money to give to the church but if you use your savings to fund the church’s music ministry project, that guitar you cherish will never be yours. One satiates your personal needs; the other fills the church’s needs. So what would Jesus do?

We’ve only looked at three simple situations but there are certainly a lot more we can bring up but these alone focus on some of the predicaments we face in our daily lives as to what we are and are not to do. These are examples that point to the need to really understand what priorities Jesus would wish us to know in our lives. Even if some may say the priorities are obvious, there are equally as many people who would say they are not that obvious as well.

1 Peter 2:21 quotes Jesus as saying, “For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps” (NASB). The verse talks about Jesus having left us with an example in which to follow Him. To follow Him means to know His steps and to adhere by them. In very much the same vein, we ask the question of what Jesus would then do when we especially face critical decisions in our daily lives.

But when we ask such a question, it should also mean that we are presumably aware of what Jesus has done during His time on earth. In other words if we don’t know that, we can’t be asking that question. So what did Jesus actually do? What do we know of Jesus’ works that we can draw on to truly answer the question? From the Gospels, we can identify seven areas of importance that guided Jesus and therefore can guide us as well:

Seeking out the Father

Jesus remained very close to the Father at all times, constantly seeking Him out in prayer. The Gospel revealed at least 45 times that Jesus had gone to pray by Himself. In every aspect of His life on earth and in every manner of His ministry, prayer was central.

A day in the life of Jesus is well characterised in the first chapter of Mark. Here we see a very busy Jesus whose days were continually filled with people everywhere. People with needs as well as people who offered Him opportunities to minister to. And for many occasions, Jesus’ ministry would take up most of the day. Even so He found time to be with the Father where His prayers focused on His will. No matter how preoccupied Jesus was, there was always time available to devote to prayer.

Accommodating outcasts

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Jesus defined an expression of love for all that was unheard of. When he was seen with prostitutes, beggars and tax collectors, He established an unprecedented credo in what it means to accept all out of love. By embracing the castaways and the ‘despicables’ of society, Jesus provoked controversy that rocked the foundations of the religious establishment. But His lesson was precious. He exemplified how He was not squeamish in accommodating those who sinned, those who were infirmed and those who are unseemly and, by society’s standards, insignificant and unheard from.

Probably the best part of the Gospel to underline this lesson is from Luke 5:29, which says, “And Levi gave a big reception for Him in his house; and there was a great crowd of tax collectors and other people who were reclining at the table with them” (NASB).

This is an astonishing verse. Here Jesus was given a great dinner hosted by Matthew (known then as Levi) the tax collector in the company of what Jewish society considered to be abhorrent. The Lord was seen sharing a meal with people who were repugnant, detestable and unworthy to be spoken of. The Jews hated tax collectors who did the bidding of Rome. If we relate this to today, that’s like having a meal with every lesbian, bisexual, gay, transvestite (or transsexual) and every queer you can think of in town.

Or alternatively you could consider a banquet hosted by criminals, murderers, usurpers, fraudsters, serial killers and rapists. In either case, there is no difference because these are society’s least acceptable people to be seen around. No decent morally upright person would want to be associated with any of these. But lo and behold, Jesus didn’t only talked to Matthew but rather shockingly He also asked Him to be His disciple.

Healing broken lives

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Through the power of God’s Spirit, Jesus performed a remarkable range of miracles. Matthew 14:14-21 and 17:27 records how He met people’s physical and financial needs. In Luke 4:36, He cast out demons and in 5:17, broken bodies were healed. John 11:1-44 speaks of Jesus raising the dead and in Matthew 9:6, He forgave the sins of the guilty. In all of these and many more, Jesus laid proof for us that in God’s power is sufficiency to meet all our needs no matter what they are. Importantly the Bible tells us that this same power continues to work in us and through us today (Phil 2:3).

I, too, have seen God’s miracles work. Many years ago when I was in the healing ministry, working in tandem with a friend of mine, Alvin, we would pray for those at the local General Hospital where we have come across people we don’t know. There was a patient we prayed for who had a lump on her neck. Within the next few days, it was gone. Before that we went to pray because the father was desperately looking to see his teenaged son healed from dengue fever. Blood test reports showed his condition was worsening and getting deadlier. Within a week, he walked out of the hospital and went home. A woman was in coma following a massive car accident under rainy conditions and was not expected to be awake for a while. After praying, she was back at work in less than a fortnight thereafter.

Miraculous events do happen and they are still taking place under amazing circumstances. Of late my own parents were baptised after more than eighty years of pagan worshipping despite my mother having cancer and my father not exactly in the best of health. Invariably God’s wonderful and awesome power often proves all of us sceptics and doubters confounded and ultimately wrong.

Facing up to hypocrisy

Jesus was not afraid of coming up against religiosity and all that is wrong with it. In Matthew 23:13-39, He came face to face with hypocrisy. In these lengthy verses, Jesus railed against the scribes and Pharisees, calling them fools and blind men as well as hypocrites because of their double standards. All in all, there were eight woes as He laid out every criticism they rightly deserved. But of course by doing so, Jesus exposed Himself to vengeance, hatred and opposition, all leading ultimately to His execution.

Earlier in the Gospel of Matthew (19:3-8), Jesus also rebuked the Pharisees when they tried to corner Him with the issue of divorce but He had the last say that humbled them. In Luke 19:45-46, He drove out those who were using the temple to sell things, saying, “It is written, ‘And My house shall be a house of prayer,’ but you have made it a robbers’ den.”

These are all examples of very bold steps that Jesus had taken in His confrontation against hypocrisies but we ourselves need to be extrajudicial condemnation of others. While Jesus is in every right to do what He had done, it does not imply we have that same authority. It is often all too tempting to find justification when we become “virtuously indignant” as we confuse self-righteousness with divine righteousness. We fall prey to this vulnerability when we see chances we can grab to cause someone misery and so we need caution before we follow in Jesus’ steps (in this regard) because more often than not, our rants may be a mere expression of our anger and not God’s righteousness.

As for Jesus, His reaction was to oppose those who hurt others using the Name of God, to confront those who go out of their way to socially stigmatise and condemn others and to rail against those who exploit the oppressed and yet feign humility, piety and holiness. In other words His opposition is against who projects a humble outlook but is mean, crooked, wicked and exploitative.  

Teaching the Word of God

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Throughout His days of ministry, Jesus took every opportunity to teach His people. He would share with them the truth and He would help anyone who is keen to discover who the Father is. He lived the truth. He spoke the truth. And He is the truth (John 1:14).

The problem with this, when applied to us, is that many of us do not believe we fit into these shoes. If we’re not meant for the pulpit, we then think that this part of Jesus’ life is not something relevant to us for most of us not only don’t see us as teachers but the very thought of standing up and saying something would likely freak us out of our skins. But this context is not realistic because it is applied in too narrow a sense.

If we study the Gospels carefully, we see Jesus in ‘teaching mode’ not just because there is a crowd of thousands but also when He is one on one with Nicodemus, for example, or when He is with His disciples. When there is an opportunity to speak the truth, Jesus’ example is to seize it and do something positive with it. Teaching is never as demanding as we make it out to be. It merely requires a sense of sincerity on our part and that we be filled with God’s Word. If we possess these, then what we teach will flow out of our mouths very naturally to those around you who seek to listen.

Serving others in humility

Right from the very beginning, the Son of God came to serve rather than to be served. His humbleness resonated through His life in service through His sacrifice where He placed the needs of others before His. If we need reminding, go to John 13:2-17 and read again how Jesus washed His disciples’ feet at the last supper. The quintessential expression of service is the ultimate sacrifice that none of us can comparably match and that was when Jesus died on the cross to finally pay our spiritual debt and release us from bondage.

Very often we make the mistake of getting so busy doing God’s work that we don’t leave ourselves enough time to serve the people. That’s where we’re wrong. Because doing God’s work is serving people. God has been on a 24/7 watch since time began to help people in need. God goes about His daily business not just listening to prayers but delivering them.

He hears the child praying for her nanny who is ill in bed. He hears the cry of the father who’s been out of a job for some time. He hears the prayer of the couple who’s about to lose their home because of default loan payments. He hears when people get together to study the Bible. He hears of the woman caught in the rain with a car that has stalled. He hears of the young boy who is caught in his parents’ messy divorce and is thinking of suicide.

And for all that He hears these prayers, He answers them in His own way and time. He has never not come to man’s rescue especially if he has a heart for Him. Prayers work because God answers. God answers because He takes delight in servicing our needs. Because He is our God.

Anointing and preparing leaders

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Jesus knows a leader when He sees one. He saw people like fishermen and even tax collectors and knew they would do the job after His departure. In our world, Jesus continues to identify leaders, anointing them with callings. And just like in His days, we are seeing leaders coming from past secular moulds like Mafia gang leaders, ex-convicts and even ex-leaders of pagan temples emerging to do His work in the most spectacular ways. Jesus does not allow today’s ministry pressures to stop Him from finding these leaders and investing in them (Matt 10:1-4).

It is not up to us to find who these people are for Jesus’ calling is for the individual. When the calling comes, we will soon know. Each one who is called to do God’s work will exhibit potential in one way or another. He will embrace Scripture as it is passed to him. He will shape his life around Jesus and focus on His centrality in his life. He will be prepared for whatever mission that God has assigned for him.

Focusing on His priorities

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Here are the seven priorities and all of them point us back to the Gospels. All of them underpin the importance of Scripture before we can even know what Jesus would do in any given situation. All of them urge us to take another fresh new look at how Jesus lived and what He did.

We all know in gist that Jesus sought the Father at every opportunity. He prayed when others said they’re busy. He taught the truth when others back off and feign excuses. He confronted hypocrisy when others shirk and become benign. He served when others fight to gain a position to be served. He finds leaders and prepares them to go serve the way He has been.

Jesus depended on the Father for strength, wisdom and power so that He may do all the things above. So when it all boils down to it, the question – What Would Jesus Do? – remains poignant, important and inspiring. The fad might have long been over by now but it is no less important. So let us just remember one thing – read God’s Word to try to figure out what Jesus would do in His life. But if you’re still murky about it, then you’ll never be sure what He would do with yours.