Represent Jesus Well. 

These three words have gnawed at me, haunted me, and challenged my every decision. These three words are deeply and theologically Christian. They’re also practical. 

In a world as complicated and controversial as the one we all live in, we need a good dose of make-it-obvious-practical to help us get through the day. We also need some guiding principles that are theologically rich enough to not trip us up halfway through our use of them. 

I’ve been a Christian for a long time. I gave my first sermon when I was 12 or something silly like that. I went on every youth group trip I could and led faith-type student groups for as long as I can remember. For whatever reason, it didn’t occur to me until I was in college that I could actually become a pastor. Growing up I attended a more traditional church. The pastors in this church denomination moved around often and I had no intention of being a pastor who moved around every 3-5 years. It wasn’t until college that I realized not every church worked like that! I’ve been a pastor now for over 14 years (at the same church). I’ve wrestled with what it looks like to live a faithful life of following Jesus for as long as I can remember. 

It’s what keeps me up at night: thinking about how we can live the Christian life in a way that’s neither rigid nor loose. To live it in a way that does the inner work of being transformed into the image of Jesus, but not at the expense of the essential work of loving God and others as Jesus so famously commands us to do. I want the small-town church I serve—Ripon Community Church—to be full of people who are filled with God’s grace for others, yet also live in such a way that people can’t help but notice the changed life we exude because we’ve chosen to make Jesus the leader of our life. 

When I took over as lead pastor in January of 2022, I was taking over for the guy who founded the church. When I took the reins, we had just emerged from the throngs of COVID and a few significant challenges as a church. Church attendance had drastically shrunk (less than 200 people showed up on my first Sunday as lead pastor – We’d grown to 700+ before COVID). It was an intimidating moment. I knew our church needed a focus that would guide our people to be the kind of people and do the kinds of things that brightened up our community. I wasn’t going to reinvent the wheel, but there was something I thought might keep us focused. 

Every morning, before our three boys head off to school my wife Meg or I say a few simple things. We say, “Love you, Have a great day!” We say, “Don’t forget your lunch/homework/water bottle/shoes/backpack”… You get the idea. Then we say, “RJ dub.” Dub is short for W. It’s just easier to say, trust me. If you haven’t guessed already, it’s code for Represent Jesus Well. That’s what they leave the car or house with. It’s also what rings in our ears as we face our own days. 

So it was only natural to take what my family had been practicing together for months and offer it to the church. We set a focus for 2022. It was to Represent Jesus Well – RJW. We were simply going to be a church that did our best to do exactly that. As a church, as leaders, as members of our community, as fathers and mothers and sons and daughters and students… This would be the thing we would try and do. 

I’m writing this guide of sorts because I’ve been amazed at how helpful this simple guiding principle is. It’s not revolutionary, it simply appeals to the ancient principles of the Christian faith and helps bring them into focus. Selfishly, I’ve spent so much time thinking about the nuances of this principle that I need this written out as much as anyone. I need these thoughts down on paper instead of in my head. 

What follows is my best effort to give clarity to this mission of Representing Jesus Well. A way of living that honors a Christian worldview that I personally need in order to navigate this chaotic and complicated world we’re living in. And I think you might just need it too.