A coalition of Christian media ministries was set to launch the “He Gets Us” campaign on national television, online ads, and billboards about Jesus Christ, created to reach out to millennials and Gen Z through market-tested and extensive research.
The campaign hopes to appeal to the public a unique facet of Jesus Christ highlighting His earthly experiences with messages such as "Jesus was homeless," "Jesus suffered anxiety," and "Jesus was in broken relationships," Julieroys reported. Several video ads were currently running millions of views on YouTube already with black-and-white imagery and stirring piano track that leads interested people to national ministries and local congregations.
"He Gets Us" campaign partnered with well-known evangelical ministries and media firms including the Luis Palau Association, popular Bible app YouVersion, the Billy Graham Center at Wheaton College, Christianity Today, Outreach Media Group, and Relevant Magazine. However, fund donors of the said campaign remained to be undisclosed.
Haven, a faith-based marketing agency created the said campaign ads while Gloo, a technology platform provider generated the website interested users are directed to either join a small group with Alpha or click through a Bible reading plan on the Youversion app, Christianity Daily reported.
Chief strategist for the campaign, Jason Vanderground said the launch this week was made to concur with major sporting events. "We launched the 'He Gets Us' campaign nationally to connect with audiences during a big sports season like the one we're in now with the NBA, NHL, and the March Madness Basketball Tournament," said Vandergound.
The campaign was backed by six-month market research like those multi-million market campaigns of top consumer brands. Based on the research, "Jesus is becoming less known and less relevant to the majority of Americans-especially the under-40s." Researchers from Haven found out that distorted messages about Jesus were the hindrance to reaching out to Christian skeptics. Haven stated, "The biggest obstacle: Jesus' message has been distorted as "hate-filled."
Based on these findings, the campaign ad's objectives were to "communicate that Jesus is for everyone and is a worthy example to live by"-and that his teachings are "positive for society as a whole." Despite the research made by the team, previews of the ads garnered hundreds of negative comments online.
In an ad entitled "Jesus Was Born to a Teen Mom" with a description saying "She would have brought shame on her family because she wasn't married yet. Even worse - her boyfriend wasn't even the father. This sort of thing wasn't just taboo in their culture, it was against the law."
One user named Kurt Haas commented, "What are you trying to sell? It isn't Jesus. It's bending the Good News to make sin more palatable." However, some people defended the ad like Joe Coupon saying, "The Holy Family lived through very difficult times. They would recognize our suffering too and be empathetic."
In a Christianity Today article, Haven founder and chief creative officer Bill McKendry responded to critiques saying, "The church needs to understand that this campaign isn't for them, it's for Jesus...It's to reach an audience we're not currently reaching."
