Answering the Bracelet--July 12, 2022

Answering the Bracelet--July 12, 2022

"I appeal to you, then, be imitators of me." [1 Corinthians 4:16]

The bracelets were a fine start all those years ago, but they weren't enough.  

You might remember those bracelets [as well as bookmarks, bumper stickers, signs, and t-shirts] that were popular in an earlier decade, that bore the letters, "WWJD," short for the question, "What would Jesus do?"  And there was absolutely something right about that question--it's one we too easily forget in a time when a lot of people boasting about being Christians sure don't seem to have even asked whether they are acting or speaking in ways that echo the way of Jesus.  But at the same time, the WWJD fad had at least one major flaw--a bracelet can't answer the question it poses.  It's great to stop and ask what Jesus would do, and sometimes it's obvious [or at least you would hope it would be obvious], but sometimes we need more than just an abstract question to help us shape our lives in the likeness of Christ.

We need the lives of other people who are practicing the way of Jesus, too, who help in turn to shape our way of life as well.  We need people whose actions and words, even though it will always be imperfectly and with quirks of their own, give us glimpses of what the love of Jesus looks like in new situations, new kinds of relationships, and new contexts.  Jesus, after all, showed us the Reign of God in the backdrop of first-century Palestine, with the Roman Empire lurking around every corner, in an almost entirely Jewish culture.  But people who were shaped by the love of Jesus and shared in his way of life took what they had experienced and ran with it in new circumstances, almost from the very beginning.  They reached out to include outsiders and outcasts, they welcomed Gentiles [non-Jewish people], and they reached people hundreds, and even thousands, of miles beyond anywhere Jesus himself ever stepped food, all within the book of Acts.  

From the first generation onward, we have been dependent on seeing the way of Jesus lived out by others, trusting that even though we may get it wrong, we still need the lives of others who show us that way, or at least who sketch out the path as well as they are able.  And we need people who can translate what the love of Jesus looks like in new contexts.  Jesus, for example, had a handful of interactions in the Gospels with non-Jewish people, but there were no examples from his earthly ministry of whether those Gentiles could belong in the Christian community. It took other disciples of Jesus to wrestle with that question and ultimately to decide [see Acts 15] that yes, Gentiles were welcome as Gentiles--that is, without being circumcised, keeping kosher, and observing the rest of the Torah.  And as the church spread and grew, we continued to listen and observe the witness of those other Christians and the way they interpreted the love of Jesus for a new situation to include rather than to exclude.  

So, for example, when Paul tells his readers in Corinth to imitate him, it's not because he's convinced he'll never mess up in his own life, but because he knows we need mentors, teachers, examples, and guides, who can help us to see what it could look like to embody the Good News in our places and times, which will necessarily be different from those who have gone before us. Almost like the way you can be inspired to create your own work of art after walking through a museum, or to write your own story after finishing a fantastic novel, or the way you learn a skill by apprenticing with an expert, we need the lives of others who can help us to find our own ways of living the Jesus way of life.  Paul doesn't mean to put himself as the center of the Christian faith when he says, "be imitators of me," but he knows that he is a live model that can help them to envision their own ways of reflecting the love of Jesus.  And for the people in Corinth, who didn't have copies of the Gospels to read [remember--Paul's letters were written before the Gospels were first put down on papryus or parchment], they learned the habits and actions of the Jesus-way of life by seeing it practiced by others.

Paul knows, too, I suspect, that without those concrete examples of Christ's love in the ordinary human actions of others, we are all too susceptible to just baptizing our own self-interest.  We can ask the bracelet question, "What would Jesus do?" but without the lived witness of others who are seeking to practice the way of Jesus alongside of us, we're all too tempted to convince ourselves that our own worst impulses are in line with the way of Christ.  It's easy to tell myself that "Me and My Group First" thinking is Christ-like thinking because I go to church or have a Bible and I think it's OK.  It's easy to say, "If I think it's a good idea, it must be in line with Jesus, because I'm a Christian--I would know."  That's how we ended up endorsing slavery, conquest, war, and bigotry over and over again in the last twenty centuries.  But when we look at the lives of people who really do embody the love of Jesus, their lives call us back to honesty, and we can see how far off the mark those things are--because they don't look like the way of Jesus.  

It is baffling [and more than a little terrifying] to me how often folks who slap crosses on their vehicles and proudly boast about their church affiliations speak and act in ways that look nothing like Jesus.  And seeing that has a way of making me [when I am honest] look hard at myself for the ways I'm out of sync with the love of Christ, too.  But what helps us to embody the Reign of God is to see the lives of others who are struggling to get it right, too, and to see how others are figuring out what Jesus' love looks like in their situations. We're going to mess up--and here's some good news: our belonging in the people of God does not depend on how often we "get it right."  But when we need some responses to the question, "What would Jesus do?" and our bracelets aren't giving us any answers, the lives of other Christ-followers may just give us the spark of inspiration we need, whether it's an ancient older brother in Christ like Paul or a sister like Mary Magdalene, Joanna, or Junia, the witness of a mentor from your congregation in the pew ahead of you, or the daring love of a child who is growing up in faith before your eyes.

We need more than fad jewelry to help us live the Christian life--we need each other.  And good news, we have been given each other, to watch, to shape one another, and, as Mr. Rogers would say, to love us into being.

Lord Jesus, we thank you for the people you've put into our lives who walk with us on the way.  Open our eyes to see them and to learn from them.