The Wellness Fund as a response to our “now”
“Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.”
-Søren Kierkegaard
Christ has no body but yours, no hands, no feet on earth but yours.
Yours are the eyes with which he looks compassionately on this world.
Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good.
Yours are the hands with which he blesses all the world.
-St. Theresa of Avila
The people that Jesus encountered back in first-century Judea, and certainly the problems they were facing then, can sometimes seem distant. After all, we don’t have leper colonies outside of our cities. We don’t encounter demoniacs around every corner. And, if we are short on wine, we can make a trip to the closest liquor store.
While some of the issues Jesus encountered while walking around his local country seem all too familiar (economic hardship, chronic illnesses, religious superiority), it can sometimes be difficult to relate to the culture where Jesus dirtied His feet over two-thousand years ago.
This is, perhaps, one of the greatest challenges for the majority of us Jesus followers who live post-ascension. Because, for all the timeless and universal qualities of the Sermon on the Mount, and for all the ways in which the character of God and humanity stay the same, we are still stuck with nagging questions: what is Jesus doing here and now? How do I follow Him in this modern world?
Enter the popular “WWJD?” bracelets! Suddenly, we had a physical reminder that we were supposed to do what Jesus would do in every situation we encounter. Easy, right?
Well…not really. Determining what Jesus would do in 21st century America isn’t as simple as looking at your bracelet and sending thoughts and prayers to those in need. It’s also a tremendous amount of pressure to put on any individual Christian.
It turns out that discovering what we’re supposed to do “now” requires a good deal of orienting ourselves to the time that we are in, negotiating with those who might have different views than us, becoming students of the ways Christians have historically lived out their lives, and submitting ourselves to the Spirit that Jesus promised would help us after He ascended.
This is a lot.
And it’s hard.
But I think it’s hard on purpose.
I can’t say exactly why God works this way. But somehow we are supposed to wrestle with this question: what would Jesus do here and now? It is our responsibility to answer that as a community of Jesus followers. The WWJD bracelet movement undervalued this question, making it too personal and often too moralistic. This isn’t just a question for you today, it’s a question for all of us on “the way.” To live a faithful Christian life is to give this question the weight it deserves.
So what would Jesus do if he ran a non-profit/coffee shop/campus ministry support organization called The Christ Center?
Well, the short answer is….we’re not sure. But we want to know.
Recently, as we wrestle with the question, we have been compelled to engage with the mental health crisis among young people. In a national survey, three quarters of college students reported moderate or severe psychological distress (National College Health Assessment, American College Health Association, 2021). And 60% of students met the criteria for at least one mental health issue over the 2020-2021 academic year (Lipson, S. K., et al., Journal of Affective Disorders, Vol. 306, 2022).
If Jesus wandered onto our modern college campuses, there’s a good chance He would seek out the last, the lost, and the least. He would probably find the students who are struggling with depression and anxiety. He would bring friendship, hope, and light to those in darkness. And He would invite those who would pick up their crosses to follow Him onto the campus.
And it’s not too hard to see that He is doing that–through campus ministries, churches, faculty and administration, and student wellness centers! We want to be the hands and feet of Christ, supporting those who share our love for college students.
We’re hoping that our Wellness Fund can be a part of that good work. We’ve been serving college students for 20 years now; and we’re praying that the next 20 years is full of work in faithful response to the “now” in which we live.
Presently, that means engaging this mental health crisis with everything we’ve been given.
What would Jesus do?
We can’t say for sure, but we’re listening.
Will you listen with us?
Click here to learn more about our Wellness Fund and see how you can get involved.