Jesus on the Talk Show Circuit? Cleric Writes Script : Whimsy: Minister’s book imagines conversations between the Son of God and a raft of celebrities, including Rush Limbaugh and the Material Girl.

Madonna? Let those without sin cast the first stone. Rush Limbaugh? He who mocks the poor shows contempt for their maker. David Letterman? Sorry, Johnny gets the 11:30 slot in the hereafter.

No, Jesus would not be tongue-tied if he returned to sit down with some of the biggest celebrities of our age. In a gentle, humorous new book, “What Jesus Would Say . . .,” a minister at one of the nation’s largest evangelical churches imagines some of those what-if meetings.

Forget about a wrathful Lord leaving bodies strewn in his path as he tramps through the vineyards of pop culture. The Jesus envisioned by the Rev. Lee Strobel takes a sympathetic look at some of the betes noires of conservative Christians--Madonna, Bart Simpson and President Clinton.

Strobel, a minister at Willow Creek Community Church in suburban Chicago, wants to show readers of the book to be released next month by Zondervan Publishing House that religion is more about love than condemnation.

“The public perception of God tends to be so judgment-oriented,” Strobel said. “I think he does it through grace and love that helps our heart as opposed to slam-dunking people because they have messed up.”

Take Madonna, whose capacity for self-promotion and mixing religious and sexual imagery knows few bounds.

If the Son of God walked into one of her “Girlie Shows,” Strobel admits, “I think a lot of people think the first thing Jesus would do is to slap her face.”

But Strobel believes that Jesus would treat the Material Girl as he did the adulterous women at the well in the Gospel of John, offering her redemption and challenging those who are without sin to cast the first stone.

“Jesus was harshest on the religious leaders of the day because he saw such hypocrisy at throwing stones at other people,” Strobel said.

On the political front, Strobel indicates that Jesus would call Clinton to account for any infidelities and his stand in favor of legalized abortion. But he would also be pained by evangelicals who gloat over the Administration’s problems.

“Biblically, we’re called as Christians to give honor to those in government. We should be praying for them,” Strobel said.

Limbaugh--the mouth that roars and roars--would be told to put a sock in it when it comes to denigrating the poor, “femiNazis” or people with AIDS.

“He who mocks the poor shows contempt for their maker,” Jesus, quoting from Proverbs, might remind Limbaugh.

That this is not your typical evangelical self-help book also is evident in the Top 10 list of things that Jesus would say to David Letterman. No. 10: “Sorry, Johnny gets the 11:30 slot in eternity.” And No. 5: “Behave yourself or I’ll reveal to the world that you were Chip on ‘My Three Sons.’ ”

Strobel, 42, a former atheist who left a newspaper career for the ministry in 1987, said the idea came to him when some ministers at Willow Creek were talking and someone wondered what Jesus would say to the TV character Murphy Brown. Everyone laughed, but he later developed the idea into a series of sermons on the loving ways of Jesus.