What would Jesus do on Sunday morning?
WWJD bracelets were popular a few years ago. They asked a good question: What would Jesus do? Mostly worn by kids, the bracelets were meant to be reminders to make good decisions in the kinds of situations particularly relevant to teens.
Here’s a tough one for us adults. What would Jesus do on a Sunday morning in our town? Which church would he attend? Or would he attend any?
It’s hard to say because Jesus never had to choose a church. In his day (if you count Judaism as a church), and in the decades to follow, there was only one church.
When 3,000 people accepted the message of Jesus on Pentecost, they were baptized and “added to their number” that day (Acts 2:41). “All the believers were together” (2:44). There was only one church.
Even two decades later Paul could simply address his letter to believers in Corinth to “the church” (1 Corinthians 1:2). In a city roughly 20 times the size of ours, there was one body of believers. Compare that to the 60+ separate churches in our small town.
So, what would Jesus do on Sunday morning in our town? Probably some rebuking. That’s what his apostle did with the Corinthian church. Unity was threatened there as believers aligned with their favorite leaders. Paul wrote, “One of you says, ‘I follow Paul”; another, ‘I follow Apollos’; another, ‘I follow Cephas’; still another, ‘I follow Christ’” (1 Corinthians 1:12).
Such fragmenting of Christ’s church was not acceptable. “All of you agree with one another,” Paul demanded, “so that there may be no divisions among you” (1:10).
Have we become comfortable with division that Jesus would reject? Would he be pleased with what he would see if he walked our streets some Sunday morning? What would Jesus do on Sunday in our town?
Probably, we each are secretly thinking, “Surely, he would come to my church.” Or some turned off to “organized religion” might think, “Jesus wouldn’t have anything to do with any of those pompous churches.”
I think that Jesus wouldn’t choose. I think he would refuse to play the divide-up-by-denomination game. He would make us choose!
If he invited everyone to a neutral place to meet with him, we would have to choose between him and “us”. To be with Jesus would require leaving our traditional church alignment to gather with the church of Jesus – without all the distinctions and divisions we have imposed.
If that is what we would do if Jesus was here physically on Sunday morning, shouldn’t it be what we do when he promises to be present spiritually on Sunday morning?
WWJDSM? Seems like a good question for his followers to ponder.
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