“Jesus Gets Us” and Other Scary Things

The “Jesus Gets Us” campaign is one of those things that walks like a duck, quacks like a duck and looks like a duck, but is really a porcupine. The hundred million dollar campaign made a huge splash at the Super Bowl with ads that cost twenty million dollars. Similar ads have appeared on other sports broadcasts and even during the Grammy Awards. On the surface, it looks sort of okay, but scratch a little deeper and there are some issues.

First, Jesus does not have a PR problem. The campaign presents a Jesus who is watered down and palatable to skeptics: Jesus washing people’s feet, Jesus hanging out with average folks, etc These ads take huge liberties with scripture in an effort to make Jesus look like an average Joe. Jesus, in truth, was a radical teacher who spoke of inclusion and love and justice. How this teacher who ushered in a new way of being in the world was co-opted into the central symbol of maintaining the social status quo is mind boggling. This watered-down Jesus does nothing for the gospel message.

The church, on the other hand, has a tremendous PR problem. Churches are closing and declining throughout the United States. More and more, church is seen as an anachronism. Think of the financial and sexual scandals, the tendency of churches to use most of their resources to power their organization and care for their building, the petty bickering and the ridiculous conflicts. People don’t have a problem with Jesus; they have a problem with his “followers.” I used to have a bumper sticker that read, “Jesus, protect me from your followers.”

The solution, however, is not a watered-down socially acceptable Jesus. There is a remedy for the church’s ills. It is called the Gospel. Jesus was likely to be found with those with whom no one else would bother: the socially unacceptable, the lepers and prostitutes. Jesus threw the money changers out of the temple, called the religious and political leaders of the Roman occupation “whited sepulchers.” He wasn’t crucified for bouncing children on his knee and blessing people at the bottom of the social heap. He was crucified for calling out the collusion and corruption of the religious and political leaders of his time. Trying to make Jesus into a politically nice guy is not a biblical view of what Jesus was all about.

And here’s where the total hypocrisy of this campaign enters the picture. Trying to make Jesus a-political is a joke when the sponsors of this campaign have a huge political agenda that is anti-women, anti-choice, anti-LGBTQI, anti-trans protection, anti-equality and anti-everything that speaks of radical love, inclusion and welcome. A main sponsor of the campaign is Hobby Lobby. This is the company that will not pay for birth control for its employees. Other donors have chosen to remain anonymous, but the agencies organizing and sponsoring the campaign have deep roots with right wing religious and political groups. At some point there is going to be a huge bait and switch. The underlying agenda of religious and political exclusion, hatred and bigotry will be exposed at some point.

The marketing group behind the campaign is Haven. Based in Grand Haven, Michigan, Haven’s president says his hope is that the campaign can bridge the gap people see between the story of Jesus and their perception and experience of his followers. They want to “rebrand” Jesus. Jesus doesn’t need rebranding, but the church surely does.   

As conservative, evangelical Christianity identifies more and more with nationalism, these ads that present a “nice” Jesus can’t be reconciled with the hateful and hurtful stances of churches that spew bigotry and exclusion.  Trying to co-opt the radically loving, totally inclusive, welcoming Jesus of the gospel into a nice guy who demands nothing is not a biblical Jesus. Trying to portray Jesus as a-political when the sponsors of this campaign have a very anti-gospel political agenda is nauseating.

Beware of “Jesus Gets Us.” It’s a pretty scary thing.

This campaign is gaining traction with people who are on the fence and wondering about Christianity. Exposing it for the duplicitous agenda it propounds is a task for all of us. Please share this blog and correct your friends when they talk about how wonderful “Jesus Gets Us” is.