What would Jesus do?

How do we learn to live an ethical life? Many of us would answer with the quip “WWJD” or “What would Jesus do?” However, the question of “what Jesus would do” misses the mark of ethics in more than one way. The phrase “What would Jesus do” assumes that we move throughout our lives actively and consciously making decisions about what we should and should not do (or what is right and wrong); it is also too vague and relative to guide us when decision-making is needed, and assumes that Jesus is not actively working in our world.

If we assume that ethics can be decided by simply asking ourselves “what Jesus would do,” we are not speaking of ethics at all. How many of us have to decide whether we will tell the truth or lie in everyday conversation? Do we really have to decide whether or not we are going to kill our neighbor every day? Generally, what we do naturally flows from who we are. In other words, the core of Christian ethics is not decision-making but character-forming. The true goal of ethics is to form us into a people of character who see the world rightly. Ethics is a matter of aligning our will with God’s will and being “a particular kind of people, a people of God.”* Ethics is, more than a laundry list of what we do, who we are in Christ Jesus. It is a matter of who we are as baptized members of God’s family. But how do we learn these habits of holiness and become “a people of God?” 

We learn to be a people of God in the same way a person learns to become a carpenter. While much of the technical knowledge can be learned by reading a textbook, it takes a mentor and a lot of practice to become a truly skilled carpenter. In the same way, in order to become a people of character, we must learn from the masters, or the saints, and practice the discipline by remembering and imitating them (Hebrews 11). In mirroring the saints and learning to be a people of character, we begin to see the world as God sees the world. Paul shows us how to learn from him when he writes that Timothy has observed and learned from him (2 Timothy 3:10-12). As communities, we can foster this kind of growth and character-forming in various ways, but they all involve meeting together as one body and “provok[ing] one another to love and good deeds” (Hebrews 10:24). Building a people of character is not simply about reading the bible and determining what we should or should not do, but following Christ and imitating Christ in his bringing of the Kingdom of God. 

Out of this imitation comes new life in community with one another. In our baptism and our catechesis we are freed from decision-making and strict memorization of the laws. We are enabled by the community to internalize the rules and commands that we have learned through study as well as our imitation of the saints and become a people of character. It is the Christian community that promises to bring us up and nurture us in faith and prayer.**  We live in a distinctive community with distinctive symbols and traditions such as baptism and eucharist which form us and transform us into a distinctive kind of people. Eventually through this type of catechesis, we become “a people who think, see, feel, and act differently.”* Once we inhabit these ways of being, when our will is aligned with God’s will, we no longer have to think about what to do, we no longer have to make decisions. Our actions became second-nature and a manifestation of who we are through Christ. As we can see, the Christian life is less about decision-making and more about character-forming within our congregations.

This does not, however, mean that we will never need to make moral decisions. Decisions are still made on the margins of the moral life. There are certain times when we are faced with a new or challenging moral question and our habits and character cannot provide an answer. This is when we are called to make a decision based on our experiences, Jesus’ life, and the lives of the saints. Herein lies the confusion about WWJD. Most of us would imagine that these decisions can be made by asking the seemingly simple question, “what would Jesus do?” We cannot merely rely on each person’s individual interpretation of “what Jesus would do” in any given situation.*** When faced with the classic moral conundrum such as whether or not you should tell a murdered where his potential victims are hiding, people can come up with different answer to “what Jesus would do.” Would Jesus lie to the murderer to protect the people? Or would Jesus tell the truth and be the cause of the people’s untimely demise? We simply do not know the answer. Therefore, we cannot apply this moral platitude to the moral decisions we make. Our moral decisions on the edges of our lives are too complicated to use a maxim to gauge our moral practices. 

Finally, we can see that the question “What would Jesus do” implies that Jesus is only hypothetically working in our world, when in reality we know and are called to proclaim the Messiah who is living and presently active in our world. Jesus is alive and sent the Holy Spirit to abide in us and with us (John 14:15-15:11) If the previous comments on forming habits of holiness seem like a tall order, that's because it is. It is, in fact, an impossible order without the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives. We are given new life in the Spirit in our baptism and renewed in Christ each time we are gathered together in worship and partake of his body in Holy Communion.****  Therefore, a better question would be “what is Jesus doing?” and to that we can answer: renewing us in the Spirit and forming us into a holy people of character. 

While on the surface, WWJD seems like a fine rubric for our moral code, the Christian life requires something much deeper. We are enabled by the living and active Christ to become a people who demonstrate habitual holiness. Because our morality and behavior stems from who and whose we are, the Christian life is less about decisions and more about our formation as God’s children. However, when decision must be made on the edges of the moral life, such a vague and relative quip will only lead us into chaos. Therefore, we look to the examples of the saints to be our guides and mentors in all that we do.  

* Daniel M. Bell, A People of Character lecture, Fall 2016. 

** Evangelical Lutheran Worship hymnal, 228. 

*** Daniel M. Bell, Proclaiming the Truth lecture, Fall 2016. 

**** Evangelical Lutheran Worship hymnal, 92.

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