The He Gets Us commercials are startlingly gritty, taking us to places many professed followers of Christ don’t want to go. They reveal an absence of kindness, compassion, and long suffering in many of us. They may make us uncomfortable for all the right reasons, both spiritually and practically. The Bible instructs Christians that our mission field is comprised of these folks portrayed, in all their ugliness of sin, holding up mirrors for us all to see exactly what we once were, if our memories be short.
The many and varied scenes are ashen, earthy, destitute, hopeless, post-apocalyptic almost, with brokenness the backdrop, and suffering and disassociation the human experience.
What the commercials do not explain is why this human condition is so, why it exists. God has given us common grace by which to experience and dwell in an amazing universe, so that we might know the beauty of sunsets, the love of family, the fruit of the moon and stars, the glory of mountains, the provision of natural gifts given to us by God by which to make a living. He’s given us ears to hear the whispers of a mother or a lover, music, wisdom. Touch, smell, taste, to experience the wonders of food and drink and silk and skin. These are blessings from God not represented in these commercials, though most experience these in some way every day. The majority of humanity gives no thanks to God for these things. We show little appreciation for them. We are self-centered, so much so that we create a spiritual campaign that feeds that, spending $100,000,000 on it. The best life now is being lived by those in palaces as well as those in ghettos whose hope is only in this world. He Gets Us offers no off-ramp.
The love, compassion, and mercy of Jesus Christ is not adequately, or even accurately, demonstrated in these commercials, because it doesn’t show why the world is such a mess, why it’s dark, dangerous, and deadly. Thus, the depth and breadth of God’s love isn’t seen or understood. They don’t explain why sickness, war, hatred, murder, lying, stealing, and rage exists in our hearts and are born in our desires, which these commercials use to promote no earthly solution . Why is humanity in such a state if it were good? Because we are not good. We are fallen, broken, we are sinners, lawbreakers, despisers of God’s commandments and rule in our lives, so we settle for His temporal graces, as outlined above, while rejecting His command to repent and believe the gospel so as to be saved and ultimately delivered from this sin sick world into a perfect, eternal paradise where love, joy, and peace are as prevalent as the abiding and wonderful presence of God.
He Gets Us doesn’t show us this. It’s like the set up without the punchline, the movie without an ending, a book without a conclusion, a math problem that has no answer.
These commercials are intended to show Jesus, not the Christ, as one who accepts everyone just as they are. It’s an earthbound Jesus, not the transcendent Christ. Myth-buster: Jesus doesn’t accept the sin of everyone right where they are. He never accepts sin. He loves people in spite of their sin, but will not endure with all forever. His mercy has an end date. We just don’t know when that is for each of us. His love will not endure with one who rejects repentance of their sin and gospel forever.
While Jesus healed the 10 lepers, only 1 came back converted and gave Him praise, worship, and thanks. And He gets this. He knows most will reject Him. We tell the gay person, the liar, the abortion provider, the tax cheating middle class man, the adulterer, the racist, the fornicator, and more, how much God loves them by paying the just penalty for their sins by enduring the worst suffering man ever created – the crucifixion, and how He rose by His own power from the grave three days later to prove He is God, is to be believed and obeyed, and that He will grant eternal life to all who repent and believe the Gospel of His glorious Kingdom. But most will be like the 9 lepers. They will gladly accept the earthly, common grace of God yet never know His eternal saving grace. This He gets about us.