He Gets Us: Bringing Jesus Into the Conversation

There is a certain kind of conversation that feels inevitable in most settings. Someone says the words, and everybody measures the reaction. Politics first. Philosophy second. Identity in the foreground. Even when the topic is supposed to be light, people end up taking positions instead of listening.

Then along comes a campaign called He Gets Us with a simple premise: reintroduce people to Jesus by sharing his life and teachings in unexpected places, with the hope that it sparks curiosity and gives people a reason to talk rather than retreat. The campaign says it began in 2021 as a response to loneliness, division, and anxiety, and it is built around stories about Jesus that invite conversation in major cultural spaces.

That matters, because the obstacle is often not the message itself. The obstacle is the posture we walk into the message with.

What makes He Gets Us interesting is that it does not ask the listener to start by agreeing. It frames the invitation as exploration: “everyone is welcome to explore Jesus’ story,” and it also states that Jesus loves LGBTQ+ people. It also insists it is not affiliated with any single individual, political position, church, denomination, or faith viewpoint, even while it is clearly, unapologetically, about Jesus and thus connected to Christianity.

If you have ever tried to talk about faith with someone who has been burned by a church conflict, a family rupture, or a bad online argument, you already understand why this approach is both promising and complicated. Promising, because curiosity lowers the defenses. Complicated, because public messaging still lands in real people’s lived history, and not everyone will interpret every detail the same way.

Why “unexpected places” can change the temperature

He Gets Us says the idea is to share stories about Jesus in unexpected places to spark curiosity and conversation. The phrase “unexpected places” is doing real work. It signals a willingness to step out of the usual bubble where religious language is already pre-approved or pre-rejected.

In my experience, most conversations about Jesus go one of two directions. Either the person is ready to receive, because they are already practicing or already sympathetic. Or the person has already decided the topic is a trap, a sales pitch, or a threat to their boundaries.

Unexpected placement helps because it interrupts the script. When someone sees a message about Jesus while they are thinking about something else, they are less likely to brace for a debate. They might still dislike it. They might still roll their eyes. But the moment shifts from “prove yourself” to “what did I just see?”

That shift is not trivial. In many communities, the word “Jesus” carries multiple meanings at once, including comfort for some people and pressure for others. He Gets Us leans into that ambiguity rather than pretending it does not exist. It is about Jesus, yes, but it tries to keep the conversation open.

The campaign’s stated aim includes highlighting themes like love, forgiveness, understanding, kindness, and service. Those words are not small. They are not generic morality-speak either. They are the exact themes that tend to be most appealing to people who feel tired of conflict.

At the same time, these themes can clash with the way people experience Christianity in public life. That is one reason the campaign has attracted criticism. AP reported that criticism focused partly on perceived tension between its inclusive public message and some financial supporters’ backing of conservative causes, including anti-abortion and anti-LGBTQ+ efforts. Even if you personally understand the nuance, you can see how others might not.

If you are trying to bring Jesus into the conversation, you are also stepping into the messiness of trust.

The trust question: when messages travel faster than motives

A campaign is not a private conversation between two people. It is a public signal, and public signals collect interpretations.

He Gets Us says it is led by Come Near, Inc., a nonprofit, and that He Gets Us, LLC is wholly owned and managed by Come Near, Inc. It also says it is not affiliated with any single individual, political position, church, denomination, or faith viewpoint. That is a specific kind of clarification, the kind organizations make when they have watched people assume the worst.

But trust is not just about what an organization claims. Trust is also about who people see in the ecosystem around the message, what they have heard from institutions in the past, and what they fear the message will be used to justify later.

The tension reported by AP is a good example of that reality. If someone thinks the campaign is saying “everyone is welcome,” but they also believe some of the money behind it has supported causes that contradict the lived experience of LGBTQ+ people, they may feel the invitation is conditional, or at least incomplete.

This is where Christian conversation gets especially hard. Jesus is supposed to be the center. Yet Christianity in public life often includes a blur of political alignment, moral intensity, and cultural conflict. Some people will decide that blur means the message cannot be clean. Others will insist that the center is still Jesus, and that the work can be judged by the themes it chooses and the openness it offers.

Both reactions can come from real pain.

So the question for anyone encountering He Gets Us is not only “Is it true?” It is also “What kind of relationship is being offered to me?”

He Gets Us seems to be aiming for a relationship where curiosity is allowed to precede agreement. The campaign invites people to consider Jesus, his life, and his teachings, and why he matters today. That is an invitation to reflection, not a courtroom demand for immediate belief.

But even invitations can feel like pressure if you do not trust the host.

Loneliness, division, anxiety: naming what people already feel

He Gets Us says it began in 2021 as a response to loneliness, division, and anxiety. That phrasing is strategic because it identifies common emotional weather patterns rather than starting with doctrinal points. It is easier to talk about loneliness than to argue about theology. It is easier to admit anxiety than to defend your worldview.

Most people carry some mixture of all three. Even when they are not willing to say it out loud, they behave as if they are bracing.

In that context, a campaign that highlights love, forgiveness, understanding, kindness, and service reads like a set of counterweights. It is trying to move the conversation away from winning and toward belonging.

And there is another reason these themes land: they are not only Christian ideas. They are human longings. People may disagree about Jesus, but they still understand what it means to be forgiven, to be understood, to be served.

That is one of the quiet strengths of a Jesus-centered campaign that emphasizes character and conduct. It gives people multiple entry points. You can begin with the person of Jesus. You can begin with the moral appeal. You can begin with the question “Why does this matter now?”

At the same time, loneliness and division are not solved by advertising alone. Even so, a campaign can be a useful doorway. It can create a brief moment where someone is willing to ask a sincere question rather than defend a reflex.

If you have ever had a conversation where a person surprised you by being gentle, you know how that happens. It often starts with a small break in posture. People remember the gentleness. They begin to trust the conversation again.

He Gets Us is trying to create that kind of break on a larger scale.

Bringing Jesus into a mainstream conversation without turning it into a fight

The campaign is widely associated with Super Bowl advertising, with AP reporting it ran Super Bowl ads in 2023 and 2024, and the campaign itself says it has brought Jesus into major cultural spaces. That is a particular kind of boldness. It places Jesus in a setting where many people expect sports entertainment, not spiritual reflection.

It also means people encounter the message without the usual cues. There is no sermon context. There is no church sign. There is not even a direct conversation with a pastor. It is just there, in the open.

That changes what a listener has to do next.

When you encounter a message like that, you can ignore it. You can mock it. You can scroll past. Or you can pause. The pause is where conversation begins.

I think that is the real aim: not to coerce belief, but to create a moment where “Jesus” is not only something you already know about, or something you already argue against. It becomes something you might return to, perhaps in private, perhaps with someone else, perhaps later in the day when you are quieter.

Still, there is a real risk when you put Jesus into high-visibility spaces. The risk is that people will treat it like a brand competition rather than a spiritual invitation. They might turn Jesus into a debate trophy. They might evaluate the message mainly by its cultural signaling.

That is why the campaign’s disclaimers and boundaries matter. He Gets Us says it is not affiliated with any single political position, church, denomination, or faith viewpoint. It also states it is led by a nonprofit, Come Near, Inc., with He Gets Us, LLC wholly owned and managed by Come Near, Inc. The campaign is trying to reduce certain assumptions.

But no public campaign can remove all ambiguity. That is the trade-off of visibility.

If you want a mainstream conversation, you accept mainstream interpretation.

A practical way to approach the campaign as a conversation partner

If you are curious about He Gets Us, or if you are trying to respond to it with integrity, it helps to treat it like a doorway, not a verdict.

A useful starting point is to ask what the campaign is inviting you to consider. He Gets Us invites people to consider Jesus, his life, and his teachings, and why he matters today. It also highlights themes such as love, forgiveness, understanding, kindness, and service. Those are clear enough that you can engage them directly without needing to solve every organizational question first.

From there, you can separate three layers that often get tangled:

First, there is Jesus himself, as the campaign presents him.

Second, there is the campaign’s method: telling stories in unexpected places and creating curiosity.

Third, there is the surrounding credibility: leadership structure, nonprofit ownership, and criticism regarding supporters and political causes.

You do not have to ignore any layer. But you also do not have to let one layer smother the others.

If you are engaging skeptically, you might ask, “What is the message actually doing to my thinking?” rather than, “Who funded it and how should I feel about it?”

If you are engaging sympathetically, you might ask, “What would it look like for Jesus’ love to be practiced by people who disagree about everything else?”

And if you are engaging personally, you might ask, “Why am I resisting this invitation?” Loneliness, anxiety, and division do not just exist outside the heart. They exist inside it too.

To make this concrete, here is a short self-check that I have found helpful when faith messages show up in public spaces and stir mixed feelings.

• What part of Jesus does this message emphasize: love, forgiveness, understanding, kindness, service?
• What emotion does it trigger first: curiosity, irritation, defensiveness, hope?
• Is my resistance mainly about Jesus, the framing, or the public context?
• If I were to explore, what is my next honest step, not my next argument?
• What kind of conversation do I want to have with another person after seeing it?

That last question is the one people often skip. Yet it changes everything. If you want to talk about Jesus, you need to decide what kind of listener you intend to be.

“Everyone is welcome” and what welcome actually requires

He Gets Us says Jesus loves LGBTQ+ people and that everyone is welcome to explore Jesus’ story. That is a meaningful claim. For some readers, it will feel like a genuine opening, a chance to see Christianity without the usual fear. For others, it may raise doubts, especially in light of the reported criticism about perceived tension between inclusive public messaging and some supporters’ conservative causes.

Here is the edge case that gets overlooked: people are not only looking for welcome, they are looking for safety. “Welcome” can be true and still feel unsafe if the culture around it does not match.

Safety is not a slogan. It is what happens when someone can ask questions without being punished for asking them. It is what happens when someone’s identity is treated with dignity rather than used as a test. It is what happens when disagreement does not become contempt.

When a campaign says “everyone is welcome,” it is making a promise about the posture it wants to cultivate. But it cannot fully control the posture of everyone who will respond. That is where individuals and communities do the heavy lifting after the ad.

If you are part of a church, a small group, or even just a friendship circle, the campaign can become a tool for https://hegetsus.com/ practice. Not because the campaign itself guarantees anything, but because it can help you start from a theme that Jesus consistently ties to his character and his care.

If Jesus is, at the center of the conversation, then love has to mean something tangible. Forgiveness has to mean something more than forgetting. Understanding has to mean more than tolerance. Kindness has to show up at the level of speech. Service has to become more than a mood.

That is demanding work, and it cannot be outsourced to messaging.

What “He Gets Us” gets right, and what you may still wrestle with

It would be dishonest to say the campaign satisfies everyone. The fact that it has been widely discussed, that AP reported on Super Bowl advertising, and that criticism has been reported means the conversation is alive. Some people see the campaign as a bridge. Some people see it as inconsistent with other public actions in the surrounding ecosystem.

Still, there are elements that are clearly structured to lower barriers.

It invites people to consider Jesus rather than forcing a confrontation.

It aims to highlight themes like love, forgiveness, understanding, kindness, and service.

It states it is led by a nonprofit and claims no affiliation with a single political position, church, denomination, or faith viewpoint.

It says Jesus loves LGBTQ+ people and everyone is welcome to explore Jesus’ story.

Those choices are not an accident. They shape how a reader might approach the message.

But there is a fair question you can raise without being cynical: if a campaign’s inclusive intent is genuine, what happens when people want to verify that inclusion in real community life?

A public campaign can open a door. It cannot replace a door that swings freely from the inside.

So if you wrestle with the campaign, you are not necessarily missing the point. You may be doing what faithful reflection requires: testing the invitation against what you have seen and what you fear might be demanded later.

A better question than “Is this propaganda?”: “What is the conversation for?”

When faith enters the public square, the argument often hardens into a binary. People ask whether something is propaganda, whether it is political, whether it is sincere, whether it is manipulative. Those questions can come from legitimate caution.

Yet they can also short-circuit the deeper opportunity.

He Gets Us is trying to bring Jesus into conversation by telling stories about him in unexpected places to spark curiosity. The point of curiosity is not that curiosity replaces repentance, discipleship, or moral seriousness. The point is that curiosity can be the first honest step out of the armor.

If you have ever seen someone take a first step toward healing, you know it often looks awkward from the outside. It might even be messy. But it is still a step.

When you evaluate the campaign, consider shifting the energy from suspicion alone to discernment. You can still be skeptical, but you also want to ask: if this works as intended, what changes in a person’s attention?

Here is another short checklist that I use when I want to respond well without being naive.

• Did the message point me toward Jesus’ character themes, like forgiveness and service?
• Did it give me room to ask questions without shame?
• Did it invite respect for people who feel excluded by Christianity?
• Did it clarify what the campaign is and is not affiliated with?
• After I engage, am I more capable of kindness toward others?

That is not a guarantee. It is a way to keep the focus on the stated aim: reintroducing people to Jesus and highlighting themes that lead toward love in action.

Where Jesus belongs in the middle of our arguments

One of the most difficult things about bringing Jesus into conversation is that conversations are already occupied. They are occupied by grudges, by tribal instincts, by the habit of treating every topic as an opportunity to score points.

He Gets Us is one attempt to interrupt that occupation. It insists that the story of Jesus belongs in major cultural spaces. It attempts to start with themes that most people can recognize as humane. It tries to broaden the circle of exploration, including for LGBTQ+ people who may have been treated otherwise.

At the same time, it cannot fully control how people interpret the campaign’s public context, including questions about supporters and the perceived tension between inclusive messaging and conservative causes.

So what should a thoughtful reader do?

They can hold two truths together: the campaign can be sincere in its intent to reintroduce Jesus, and it can still be received with skepticism due to real-world complexities. Those complexities are not imaginary. They are part of how public messages function.

A mature response is not required to be uniform. It is required to be honest.

If you decide to engage, engage with the campaign’s Jesus-centered themes: love, forgiveness, understanding, kindness, and service. If you decide to resist, resist carefully, so your resistance does not become an excuse to stop asking what Jesus might be inviting you to consider.

And if you decide to talk to someone about what you saw, keep one thing clear: the goal is conversation, not dominance.

That is what He Gets Us is reaching for, at least according to its own stated purpose. Bring Jesus into unexpected places, spark curiosity, and make it easier for people to talk instead of harden.

In a world that rewards certainty and punishes softness, that may be the most practical, human thing a campaign can offer.