Hey Church… Do the Unpopular Thing

The American church is really good at doing the popular thing.

We love gathering with people who look like us, think like us, and vote like us. We’re quick to post Bible verses that support our tribe. We’re excellent at drawing lines and defending them.

But Jesus didn’t call us to do the popular thing.

He called us to do the unpopular thing.

The Unpopular Command

Jesus gave us one clear, unmistakable command that should shape everything else:

“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” (John 13:34-35)

That word “love” isn’t warm fuzzy feelings. In the original Greek it’s agapē — the deliberate, costly, self-giving love that Jesus showed on the cross.

And here’s the part that makes church people nervous: Jesus didn’t limit that command to the lovable.

He ate with tax collectors and sinners. He touched lepers. He had long conversations with Samaritan women and Roman centurions. He let a prostitute wash His feet with her tears.

He consistently moved toward the people “good religious folks” avoided.

So maybe the most counter-cultural, unpopular thing the church could do right now is actually obey Jesus and love the people we’re tempted to reject.

That includes the gay community.

Not “love the sinner, hate the sin” as a slogan we hide behind while keeping them at arm’s length. Not “we’ll pray for you from a distance.” Not “we’ll accept you if you change first.”

Just love. Real, costly, Jesus-shaped love.

Love that listens before it lectures. Love that shows up when life is hard. Love that treats people as image-bearers of God instead of political opponents or moral projects.

Because here’s the uncomfortable truth: If we can’t love the gay person sitting in our pew (or the one who would never step foot in our building), then we’re not actually doing the hard work of the gospel. We’re just doing comfortable Christianity with better lighting.

What This Actually Looks Like

• It looks like listening to someone’s story without immediately preparing your rebuttal.
• It looks like inviting people into your home and your life before you try to fix their theology.
• It looks like caring for someone when they’re sick, grieving, or struggling — without making your care conditional on their behavior.
• It looks like refusing to use people as culture-war pawns.

This doesn’t mean we abandon biblical truth. It means we stop using truth as a weapon and start letting it be spoken in the context of real relationship and genuine love.

Jesus never compromised truth, but He also never withheld love. He held both perfectly. We rarely hold either well.

The Church’s Reputation Problem

The world doesn’t reject Jesus because they’ve carefully studied the New Testament. They reject the version of Jesus they see in us.

When we’re known more for what we’re against than who we love, we’ve already lost the conversation.

Jesus said the world would know we belong to Him by our love (John 13:35). Not by our voting record. Not by how loudly we denounce sin. Not by how well we defend doctrine.

By our love.

And if we’re honest, that’s exactly where we’re failing the most.

Time to Do the Unpopular Thing

So here’s my challenge to the church — especially to those of us who claim to follow the Wesleyan-Holiness tradition or any tradition that talks a lot about holiness:

Stop making holiness about who we exclude. Start making it about who we love like Jesus did.

Love the person with the rainbow flag. Love the person with the Trump hat. Love the addict, the skeptic, the loudmouth, the quiet doubter.

Love them not as a project to be fixed, but as people made in the image of God who are just as broken and just as loved by Jesus as we are.

That’s unpopular. It will get you criticized from both sides. It might even cost you some “friends” in the church.

But it’s also the most Jesus-like thing we could possibly do.

The world doesn’t need another culture warrior. It needs to see what it looks like when people actually believe Jesus when He said to love one another the way He loved us.

So church… let’s do the unpopular thing.

Let’s love.