Because I’m an idiot, I’m jumping into The Discourse around the “He Gets Us” foot-washing ad that got aired during the Super Bowl.
Let’s get a couple of things out of the way.
First, this is not a presentation of the Gospel. If it was meant to be, it failed at it. At best, it presents only part of the Gospel, and not the most important part at that. That having been said, the claims that it presents a false gospel are somewhat overblown and hysterical.
Second, yeah, the whole AI art thing is kind of cringy, but it’s not the first time a Christian organization has hopped on a fad. (Edit: As it turns out, the art was not AI generated, but was based on actual photographs that were subjected to an editing process that gave the images that AI art aesthetic we all know and love/loathe. Still not the first time a Christian organization has done something aesthetically ridiculous.)
However, a rather more serious critique of the ad is that it is partisan—that is to say, that it takes a side in the culture war, and that said side is the left one. Since I’ve seen people I respect and trust disagree over this, I decided to watch the ad myself.
Here’s a link to a Youtube video, so you can watch it for yourself, but I’m going to go through it picture by picture.
1. Young man washing an older man’s feet, probably his dad.
2. Cop washing the feet of someone from the inner city.
3. Preppy girl washing the feet of a punk/androgynous girl.
4. Cowboy washing the feet of an Indian.
5. Woman washing the feet of a family planning clinic’s customer whom protestors are ignoring.
6. Young woman washing the feet of an older woman.
7. Oil field worker washing the feet of an environmental protestor.
8. Middle-class woman washing the feet of a poorer woman with a child in front of a bus.
9. Non-Muslim woman washing a Muslim woman’s feet.
10. Member of an anti-censorship protest group washing the feet of a member of a pro-censorship protest group.
11. Two old men, one white and one black, each with a foot in a bucket, out in the country.
12. Priest washing the feet of a roller blader.
Finale: Jesus didn’t teach hate. He washed feet. He gets us. All of us.
Now, here’s the thing. I can see where some people would regard this as being problematic. Nearly all of the people getting their feet washed are the sorts of people who the commanding heights of the broader culture either like or are indifferent to, and it is almost exclusively people who the commanding heights of the broader culture dislike who are doing the washing, and it might have been nice, if, say, we’d seen a picture of a news anchor washing the feet of a guy in a MAGA hat, or a peace activist washing the feet of a soldier. It does seem like there’s an asymmetrical demand for humility and acceptance going on in the ad.
But here’s the thing. If you remember the context of Jesus washing the disciples’ feet, this is still fine. Remember, Jesus did it the night before He was taken to be crucified, He knew exactly what was going to happen, and He washed the feet of everyone who was present.
Even Judas Iscariot, who was minutes away from betraying Him. Even Peter, who was to deny Him three times before morning. Even all of the other disciples, who were going to fall asleep in Gethsemane while He sweated blood and then run away and hide when the Pharisees and their goons showed up.
I don’t blame anyone who didn’t get this as the takeaway, because I don’t know if it was meant to be, but “love everyone, even those who really, really, really don’t deserve it, and who hate you for bad reasons” is a very Christian message—because none of us deserve the love of God, but we get it anyway, and He has told us to love as He does.
That having been said, I’m still not a fan of the commercial, because it inadvertently confirmed a lot of peoples’ belief that they are just fine the way they are, thank you, and that is only other people who need to change, and certainly did not at all bring up the most important part of the Gospel: that, as humans, we are sinners in need of a savior from the evil and sin that abides within us, that that savior has come to us already and done what was necessary to save us, and that His name is Jesus, and that we must call upon Him to be saved.
In summary, while the sturm und drang over the commercial was overblown and based on bad premises, it was still not money well spent, and there’s reasons to be extremely ambivalent about it.
‘Til next time.
The Soapbox Guild 