Have you seen the new version of this bumper sticker? “Honk if you love Jesus; text if you want to meet him”? I like it better than the first one. Actually, we can learn something about our role as Christians in the marketplace by reflecting on that first “Honk if you love Jesus” sticker and how perceptions have changed. A little history might help.

When the “Honk if you love Jesus” sticker first got pasted on a bumper, Christians were a minority (at least we thought we were). Instead of the Silent Majority, we were more like the Vocal Minority. There was a spiritual revolution going on. Many new followers of Jesus were meeting each other and growing spiritually in and outside the church. Stickers and buttons were a means of finding each other in the marketplace and that created a sense of newly formed family. And to those outside the church and Christianity, this growing band of “Jesus Freaks” was no threat. In fact, the idea of Jesus being championed by hippies and street people had many looking on curiously. Many even came to Jesus-oriented events just to find out what it was all about.

Today Jesus represents something entirely different to those outside the church. To most of these people, Jesus is the champion of a certain political agenda or the rallying cry of the other side of a culture war. The Jesus who always stood on the side of the poor and oppressed, who stood against established religious rule and authority, who advocated turning the other cheek and loving your enemies is nowhere in the lexicon of what is perceived as Christian today. For a crash course on how many view Christians today, reflect a bit on this bumper sticker: “I’m for the separation of Church and Hate.”

So “Honk if you love Jesus” today means, “Honk if you are on our side…” “Honk if you are one of us…” and all that honking only confirms the fact that those who are not honking don’t want to have anything to do with those who are. This does not help the gospel at all. We need to be creating bridges to people, not walls and barriers.

So here’s a new take on the “Honk if you love Jesus” sticker. I saw it on my neighbor’s car. “Honk if you love cheeses.” It’s an ad for a local wine and cheese deli.

Now, to be honest, I don’t really care much for bumper stickers at all, but reflecting on this can teach us something important. If you did have this bumper sticker on your car instead of the original one, it would do two things for you. 1) It would put you on “their” side. To those who are familiar with the original Jesus sticker, they will think you are making fun of Christians, and it doesn’t hurt to make fun of what people incorrectly think Christians are all about, because that will give you an opportunity to offer another, truer picture of a follower of Christ; and 2) it might put you in touch with wine and cheese lovers, and that just might lead to a relationship, and that’s really what we want to be doing in the world — making friends with sinners like us who need Jesus.

Anything that makes a relationship is far superior to that which makes an enemy. Besides, I don’t think Jesus wants to have anything to do with a whole lot of honking.