Two commercials about Jesus are scheduled to air during this Sunday’s Super Bowl game. The commercials are sponsored by the “He Gets Us” campaign, and are designed to stimulate reflection and conversation about our Lord. As Jordan Carson, the director of communications for the campaign, has said, “We are trying to introduce people, including some who might be skeptical of Christianity, to Jesus’ relevance in modern-day life and call upon Christians to reflect his teachings in the way they treat other people.”
A laudable desire, to be sure. Hopefully the commercials will lead at least some viewers to reflect on their relationship with God (or lack thereof), and on their love of neighbor (or lack thereof). This hope is intensified by the fact that there are many people in our country right now who watch the Super Bowl faithfully every year, but who actually pay more attention to the commercials than they do to the game. Some of them have little or no interest in professional football, while others are often fans of teams that failed to make it to the proverbial “Big Dance” — like the hometown Patriots and (much to our Bishop’s chagrin) the Pittsburgh Steelers.
