You've maybe heard the question, "What would Jesus do?" You can buy bracelets, t-shirts, bumperstickers and baseball caps with this question, in acronym form, on them (WWJD). The idea is that you figure out what Jesus would do and then you do that. Simple, right? That's the key to Christian living: Just copy Jesus. You'll never go wrong, if you do.
If you've lived for very long at all as a Christian - especially as one who is keen to live God's way - you'll have figured out that things in the Christian life aren't quite this simple. And if you've had a chance to really mature spiritually, you'll know that God doesn't want your best copy of what He has called you to as His child at all.
An important underlying assumption of the WWJD question is that the Christian life is, in essence, mimicry. But is this really what the Bible indicates? Is the Christian called by God merely to do his best, manufacturing a human copy of Christlikeness? Is God really satisfied with, or even the slightest bit interested in, how good a version of the life in Christ we can produce? The answer is "NO."
It might help in understanding what I'm getting at to think about what was necessary to making you a born-again child of God. What, exactly, did you do to deal with the curse and stain of sin that was upon you? How did you get rid of the burden of your sin that put you under God's holy judgment and wrath? Yes, you responded to the conviction and illumination of the Holy Spirit as you heard the truth of the Gospel that is the "power of God unto salvation," you humbled yourself under that truth, repenting of your godless living, confessing your sin and rebellion to God, and trusting in Christ as your Saviour and Lord. But, if Jesus had not died on the cross for your sins, if he had not paid the price God's holy justice required in payment for your sin, and if the Spirit had not acted to spiritually regenerate you, what use would your repentance, confession and belief have been? In fact, if Jesus had not done these things, you'd have no Gospel to which to respond and no salvation to receive.
On this head, I wrote the following for a discipleship course I teach at my church:
"It would seem the believer has very little to do in the process of being transformed by God. Mostly, the believer is receiving, remaining in and then reflecting the work of God in his life. He is like a man with a brain tumor who must receive the work of the brain surgeon to remove his tumor. The man cannot remove his own tumor; he can do nothing to aid the surgeon in extracting the tumor. The man just lies upon the operating table and waits on the surgeon to do what only the surgeon can do.
The man has first had to accept the diagnosis of a brain tumor, though, and agree to the surgery to remove it, trusting that the brain surgeon can perform the surgery well. Is the sick man not contributing, then, to his healing? Well, he is certainly making it possible for healing to occur. The actual removal of his tumor, however, is solely the work of the surgeon to accomplish. No degree of awareness of the tumor, or willingness to see it removed, or trust in the surgeon to remove it, does anything to free the man of his tumor. Only the surgeon, entirely apart from any direct, contributing effort of his patient, can extract the deadly mass from the patient’s brain. Again, in order to be free of his tumor, all the sick man can do is receive the healing work of the surgeon.
When the surgery is complete and the man is freed from the tumor and its fatal effects, he does not go about behaving as though he still has a brain tumor. The headaches, the nose bleeds, the vision loss, the cognitive impairment – these are all gone and it shows unavoidably in the living of the healed man. He does not pretend he is healed; he does not force himself to live free of the symptoms of his tumor; in a very natural, inevitable way, he reveals in his living the reality of his healed state.
In the same way, the man who has been freed of the “tumor” of sin by the Great Physician, cannot help but manifest this in his living. He does not need to act as though he is healed; he is healed and it will show unavoidably and inevitably in his life."
This is the very sort of circumstance under which a person is "saved," born-again into the family and kingdom of God. The lost man cannot save himself, he cannot be free of the "tumor" of sin, except the Great Physician removes it from him. Yes, the lost man must come to God for salvation, he must believe the diagnosis of the Gospel and its offered remedy and trust himself to the saving work of Christ, but, in the end, he can only receive the "spiritual surgery" necessary to save him from his sin, unable to add anything whatever to the work of the removal of his "sin-tumor."
In the same way, the saved person moves forward with God into the Christian life. The Christian isn't called by God to pretend he is saved, to merely act like Christ, to produce his best version or copy of a Christlike life anymore than the man healed of a fatal, cancerous tumor must act like he is, or pretend to be a healed man, or to create his best version of a tumor-free person.
Instead, in Scripture, God takes to Himself the responsibility for producing godliness in us:
1 Corinthians 1:7-9
7 so that you are not lacking in any gift, awaiting eagerly the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ,
8 who will also confirm you to the end, blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.
9 God is faithful, through whom you were called into fellowship with His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
Philippians 1:6
6 For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.
Philippians 2:13
13 for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.
Colossians 2:19
19 and not holding fast to the head, from whom the entire body, being supplied and held together by the joints and ligaments, grows with a growth which is from God.
1 Thessalonians 5:23-24
23 Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete, without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
24 Faithful is He who calls you, and He also will bring it to pass.
Romans 8:11-13
11 But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.
12 So then, brethren, we are under obligation, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh—
13 for if you are living according to the flesh, you must die; but if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live.
1 Peter 5:10
10 After you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself confirm, strengthen and establish you.
It is the Christian's "job," if you like, to receive the work of God in himself. Not produce it, not make up his best copy of the work of God, but simply to receive it.
The question, then, that the Christian should ask himself, isn't "What would Jesus do?" but, rather, "Am in a position to receive the work of God in my life?"
