By Tyler Cochran, The Federalist, Feb. 15, 2024
Tyler Cochran is a law student at the University of Iowa and a master’s student at Houston Christian University. He writes on religion, politics, and culture and his work has been featured in National Review, Townhall, and The Christian Post.
By focusing too much on ‘us’ and not enough on Christ, the ad prioritizes outreach and cheap grace at the expense of the Gospel message.
This year, “He Gets Us” spent an estimated $17.5 million on a pair of Super Bowl ads as part of their billion-dollar ad campaign. One commercial showed a series of images of people in various circumstances in answer to the question, “who is my neighbor,” alluding to Jesus’s command to “love thy neighbor” in Matthew 22:39. The second commercial depicts Christians washing the feet of various individuals who many might consider to be the Christians’ ideological opponents. The minute-long ad ends with a line of text that reads, “Jesus didn’t teach hate. He washed feet,” referencing John 13:1-17 in which Jesus washes the feet of his disciples.
Unfortunatley, by focusing too much on “us” and not enough on Christ, the ad prioritizes outreach and cheap grace at the expense of the Gospel message. The end result of this kind of watered-down Christianity is ultimately a dying church. …