I will post what Natasha Crain, author and Bible teacher, posted on her Facebook yesterday, then I'll link to an article she wrote several months ago about "He Gets Us."
The Super Bowl will air He Gets Us ads to millions today, and you are almost undoubtedly going to see and hear a lot of people talking about it. Most of you have seen my in-depth article with concerns about the campaign, and I’ll share that again in the comments, as well as my Unshaken Faith podcast with Alisa on it. Hopefully those will be helpful resources for you to share with others.
That said, here are several things to consider today as you engage on this subject. These are just some additional thoughts especially as they pertain to popular types of comments I’ve been seeing on the campaign.
1. There’s no inherent virtue in simply starting a “conversation” about Jesus. Christians shouldn’t be so desperate for culture to hear what we have to say that we’ll take whatever we can get from whomever is able to provide it on a national scale. I’ve seen a lot of people say the organizers are just trying to start a conversation, as if we should all therefore agree it doesn’t matter how that conversation is started. As marketers know, generating an awareness of something that’s inaccurate or problematic in some way is often worse than generating no awareness at all—because you’ll just have to work extra hard to unwind the problems in audience awareness down the road. (I say this as a former marketing executive.)
2. There’s a difference between presenting a short, incomplete picture of Jesus given the nature of a 30-second ad and presenting a short, misleading picture of Jesus. I’ve seen so many comments to the effect of, “Well, there’s only so much you can do in 30 seconds! Hopefully people will go learn more!” Remember: There are about one million ways to creatively present the fact that Jesus is God and it matters for your life in 30 seconds. And, for those who do want to “go learn more,” the campaign doesn’t do any theological vetting of the churches to which people are sent—so they could well be going to learn more at their local progressive church that denies the historic Christian faith (see my article for more on that). Again, the problem with the campaign isn’t that it’s simply incomplete, but that it’s misleading in its presentation of Jesus as some kind of social justice warrior.
3. Yes, God can work through anything, but that doesn’t mean we should support every attempt to make Him known. I feel like this should go without saying, but I’ve seen so many of the “God can work through this” comments that I had to add it here. The Bible is very prescriptive in how we are to handle truth and divide it from error. God CAN work through anything, but that doesn’t mean as Christians we should give a free pass to anyone making claims about Jesus in some way.
4. Good intentions don’t mean we should avoid holding the campaign up to biblical standards. I don’t know the campaign creators, so I have no idea what their intentions are other than what has been publicly stated (and those stated intentions are problematic for reasons I outlined in my article). But even if they did have the best of biblically sound intentions, we don’t need to shy away from sharing truth about what was produced. No one is saying the creators are bad people…many people are saying that the campaign produced is biblically problematic.
5. It’s important to know that those who developed the campaign are not all Christians. People keep pointing to their About page as some indication that the campaign developers are biblically solid Christians (not that that should change anyone’s evaluation of the campaign itself), but it’s ambiguously worded. Another page on their site, however, makes the truth very clear: “He Gets Us is a diverse group of Jesus followers with a wide variety of faith journeys and lived experiences. Our work represents the input from Christians who believe that Jesus is the son of God as well as many others who, though not Christians, share a deep admiration for the man that Jesus was, and we are deeply inspired and curious to explore his story. We look at the biography of Jesus through a modern lens to find new relevance in often overlooked moments and themes from his life.” This, to me, is perhaps the most telling thing of all. This is how you end up with a “lowest common denominator Jesus” who was palatable to the whole team.
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If I could suggest one question that could lead to some fruitful conversation with people today who find the campaign compelling (believers and nonbelievers alike), it would be this: “From your perspective, why do you think it matters that Jesus ‘gets us’?”
This could open the door to discussing the key point I’ve been trying to make all along: If Jesus was merely a fellow human (as this campaign seems to portray him), it doesn’t matter that he gets us any more than it matters that George Washington gets us. But if Jesus was fully human and fully God—as Christians have believed for 2,000 years—then the fact that he gets us takes on unparalleled relevance: The God of the universe created us and knows us better than we can ever know ourselves.
7 Problems with the He Gets Us Campaign By Natasha Crain / October 27, 2022
In case you haven’t seen it yet, there’s a $100 million advertising campaign that launched this year across the United States and is aimed at helping rescue Jesus’s reputation from the “damage” done by His followers. It features a website, billboards in major cities, and ads that have been viewed 300 million times. “He Gets Us,” as the campaign is known, is funded by anonymous donors. If you haven’t seen the ads yet, you likely will soon.
Many Christians immediately have a problem with the idea that Jesus would in some way be “marketed.” As a former marketing executive and adjunct market research professor, I don’t necessarily think such a marketing campaign is inherently problematic. Marketing is simply the discipline of effectively getting a given message to a given audience. ...
But the message shared better be an accurate message about Jesus, lest you’re actually leading people away from Him in some way.
And therein lies the problem with He Gets Us.
The Jesus of this campaign is nothing more than an inspiring human who relates to our problems and cares a whole lot about a culturally palatable version of social justice.
Since many people will be discussing the campaign in coming months, I want to highlight seven significant problems to watch out for and to share with friends who may be misled by what they see. ...
Please read entire article here
