What Would Jesus Do? Probably Not What You Think
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“What does Jesus have to do
with anything?” they may ask. “He lived 2,000 years ago. What could his ideas
and opinions have to do with my problems, or those of contemporary society?”
Understandable questions. But
asking what Jesus would do is perfectly rational for somebody who has committed
to being a Christian. That, after all, means being a follower of Christ, so how
could you not ask the question about how he would approach a situation or
problem?
One problem is that the
question may not be easy to answer. Some of what is attributed to Jesus in the
Bible is ambiguous or open to interpretation, so we have to work at
determining, with the help of scholars, what the passages mean in context and
then apply them to the situation. But even if we do find an answer, we may not
like it and be willing to apply it.
I’m reading a book called,
“Night of the Confessor: The Christian Faith in an Age of Uncertainty,” by Tomas
Halik. A Czech priest and scholar, under the Communists Halik was a member of
the Czech “underground church.” A leading international advocate for dialogue among
different faiths and non-believers,
Halik last month won the 2014 Templeton
Prize. The international prize “honors a living person who has made an exceptional contribution
to affirming life’s spiritual dimension, whether through insight, discovery, or
practical works.” Previous winners include Desmond Tutu and the Dalai Lama.
Halik describes Jesus’ teaching as a compendium of paradoxes.
“…If you want to be bigger, then be the least, be the servant of all.
Whoever loses his life will gain it. Those who have will receive, while from
those who have not, even what they have will be taken away. The laborer hired
for the last hour will receive the same wage as the one that has ‘borne the
day’s burden and the heat.’ The master from whom the ‘dishonest steward’ has
stolen, praises him for acting prudently. The father shows more feeling toward
the prodigal son than toward the son who has been faithful and obedient. The son
of the Most High is born in a stable and executed on a cross among felons. The
dead come to life; the blind see; and those who say ‘we see’ have become
blind.”
Doesn’t sound like the platform of any political party I know, nor does it
seem to be the formula for attracting many contemporaries to God or religion. Many
people, including many Christians, are so familiar with these ideas and so accustomed
to writing them off, they have little meaning in their lives. We pass them by
like a speeder passes a radar trap. In fact, unless you take the time to see it
for what it is, it’s easy to view the New Testament as a series of old,
repeated maxims, broken by a series of unintelligible ramblings.
Once I was in a gas station near Kansas City and overheard a conversation between
two men, who, I would guess, were in their early sixties. The first said,
“Miriam wants me to go to church with her tonight.” The second responded, “Oh,
yeh? Well, religion’s OK as long as you don’t take it seriously.”
I believe “what Jesus would do” would bother us, shake us, make us question
whether we’re up to following him. What he would do is probably not what we would
expect.
It brings me back to what I’ve written about before in these blogs. We
search for God knowing that he/she is unknowable and unreachable, and that
he/she is almost always a surprise. If it were not for all Jesus said and
taught about God – that he/she is a loving father/mother – the search wouldn’t
be worth it. But if we internalize what Jesus taught, we must recall that it’s “a
treasure in earthen vessels,” as the author of the second letter to the
Corinthians says. Like the disciples, who failed their master at almost every
turn, we strive to understand and practice the faith, but we seldom measure up.
That goes for us as individuals as well as for the body of Christ, the church.
Fortunately, it seems, for God it's the striving that counts.
One of my favorite passages in the Hebrew Bible is the story in the first
book of Samuel about how God chose David, the least likely choice, as king.
According to the story, God rejects all the proposed candidates, sons of Jesse,
saying to Samuel about the last one proposed, “Do not look on his appearance or
on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him.” And then by way of
explanation, Samuel adds, “…for the Lord sees not as a man sees; man looks on
the outward appearance, but the Lord looks into the heart.”
Ironically, a few passages later the author praises God’s choice by
describing David’s “ruddy” and “handsome” appearance.
It’s not necessary to annoy our friends, Christian or not, by verbalizing
the question, “What would Jesus do?” But that question should always be in the hearts
and minds of Christians, based on what they know of him in the New Testament.
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