Humility: What DID Jesus DO?

by: Kristen NeighbargerPublished on: 03/01/2024

I have a confession. I grew up in the 80s and 90s during the heyday of Christian bookstores, and I, sadly, participated in way too many Christian fads, wore way too many Christian clothing items, and used entirely too much Christianese. Looking back on those years as a teenage pharisee, all I can really do is shake my head in embarrassment and thank God for therapy. One of the most popular trends of those days was the wearing of WWJD bracelets. We would don the bracelets in the standard green or black and brag to our friends and youth group mates about the fact that we never took them off, claiming that seeing that small little piece of fabric reminded us to ask ourselves “What would Jesus Do” when we were faced with temptations of any kinds or decisions that we had to make. The irony of the situation, though, is that even though we wore these bracelets to remind us to think about what Jesus would do, we weren’t thinking about what Jesus did do while he was on earth. For us youth group kids during the 80s and 90s, those bracelets served as more of a reminder to not screw up ourselves. They functioned more as a tool to follow rules than they did as a reminder to emulate the ways of Jesus.