Latest / Crosswalk Talk: Celebrity Christian Interviews / Dr. Tyler Johnson on He Gets Us, the “More” Super Bowl Ad & Sharing Jesus in Culture

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Dr. Tyler Johnson on He Gets Us, the “More” Super Bowl Ad & Sharing Jesus in Culture · Crosswalk Talk: Celebrity Christian Interviews

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Life audio, Doctor Johnson, thanks for joining me.
• 0:06
  Speaker 2: It's correct to be with you.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: By call. We're talking to doctor Tyler Johnson of come Near.
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: He is the chief impact officer. Come Near is the
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: one that operates that He gets Us ads and they're
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: having another one this year in the Super Bowl. He
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: gets us dot com as the website. Doctor Johnson that
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: I looked at this ad the last few days and
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: I thought it was just amazing, very powerful. For those
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: who haven't seen the ad, what is it going to
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  Speaker 1: be about? Give us a preview of this year's He
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: gets Us super Bowl ad.
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: But the ad goes under the title more, which is
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: in a campaign called the Loaded Words Campaign, which is
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  Speaker 2: us focus on words and culture that are loaded with
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: meaning but are used in everyday life. So the word
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: in this ad in particular is more, and it comes
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: out of the idea that culture is telling us we
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: constantly have to get more and more and more, and
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: the undergirding reality of Romans twelve one through two of
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: don't be informed of the world, but be transformed by
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  Speaker 2: the knowing of your mind. The JB. Phillips translation actually says,
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: don't be pressed into the mold of the world. That
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: be transformed, and so we're really trying to say there's
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: a mold of more that we don't think is congruent
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: with the best for humanity that God would have to offer. Yeah.
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: Absolutely, I think obviously it's a biblical I think also
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: it's kind of an indictment against materialism. As I watch
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: that ad, it seemed to me to be saying that
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: what the world is trying to sell you isn't going
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: to satisfy you. It's kind of like what I think
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: Pascal said that we're always searching for this God's shaped
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: vacuum that only God can feel. And that's kind of
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: what I got out of that ad. It's kind of
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  Speaker 1: an apologetics type ad, I thought. And of course the
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  Speaker 1: visuals are amazing. It's busy, and at the end it
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: kind of forces you to pause and think about Jesus.
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: Let me ask you a question that critics ask when
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: this subject comes up. Because super Bowl ads are about Jeep.
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: I've never bought one. I guess there's so expensive. Why
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: spend all this money on a Super Bowl ad? This
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: is I think third or fourth year before he gets us.
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: Maybe you can help me figure out the date there,
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  Speaker 1: But why not spend that money somewhere else? Why a
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  Speaker 1: super Bowl at that's the fourth.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, we like to say what is it worth to
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  Speaker 2: raise the public conversation about Jesus? Period? The question back
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: to many of those critics is what would it be
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  Speaker 2: worth to raise the public conversation about Jesus? Period? And
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: then to do it in a way that makes someone
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  Speaker 2: kind of tilt their head, like at the end, we
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  Speaker 2: hear this a lot that people go, I see this
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  Speaker 2: amazing ad, and then at the end it's like, that's
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: a Jesus ad, which then creates this moment where somebody
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: begins to contemplate or create conversations around Jesus. And that's
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  Speaker 2: really what we're trying to do is raise the public
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  Speaker 2: conversation about Jesus as far and broadly as we possibly can.
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: What is come Near? I don't know a lot about
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: Come Near, and I'm assuming most people that watch these
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  Speaker 1: ads don't know anything about come here. What is come here?
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  Speaker 1: That's that's the is it a ministry at organization? What
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: is it?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah? So we'd like to say come near as a
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  Speaker 2: group of people that are deeply passionate about inviting all
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  Speaker 2: people one step closer to the authentic Jesus from wherever
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  Speaker 2: they are. So we're working substantially in the creative and
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  Speaker 2: innovation spaces to really move people in that direction. And
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  Speaker 2: that's where we'll say a lot. We want to raise
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  Speaker 2: the public conversation about Jesus. What it be fair to
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  Speaker 2: call it a non denominational group. Yes, I think it's
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  Speaker 2: a broadly Christian group of people.
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: You're partnering this year, maybe last year as well, but
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: I don't know this year at least with the Bible Project.
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  Speaker 1: And it's an organ that The Bible Project produces incredible stuff.
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  Speaker 1: I've written about them before. They produce amazing videos that
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: are available on YouTube and other sites as well. Tell
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  Speaker 1: me about the partnership there and how that impacts that
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  Speaker 1: he gets Us campaign.
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so we have a variety of different partnerships. That's it,
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  Speaker 2: kind of when we think about a stream or a
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  Speaker 2: funnel at different points. Many people we absolutely loved the
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  Speaker 2: Bible Project have an incredible relationship with them. Would encourage
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  Speaker 2: anybody possible that's looking to learn more about the Bible
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  Speaker 2: and the way they say it a unified story that
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: leads to Jesus to jump in. But there's a lot
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  Speaker 2: of people even further upstream that just aren't at that
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  Speaker 2: point and are just kind of trying to just take
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  Speaker 2: one step closer. So that's where when we say one
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  Speaker 2: step closer from wherever you are, the Bible Project at
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  Speaker 2: a point on a journey is an incredible place to
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  Speaker 2: invite people to be in partnerships with Alpha. We have
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  Speaker 2: partnerships with other local groups in particular, but it really
• 4:44
  Speaker 2: does span a sense of a journey that there's multiple
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  Speaker 2: entry points for different people at times and places, and
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  Speaker 2: the Bible Product is one of those places who we
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  Speaker 2: like you do, really really appreciate respect and want to
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  Speaker 2: have warm handoffs if it's the right place at the
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: right time for people.
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: I guess one thing I'm getting at here is that
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  Speaker 1: when people visit that he gets Us website, because people
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  Speaker 1: watch the ad at the end of every ad, there's
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: a he gets us dot com website, people visit that
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  Speaker 1: ad and the Bible Project resources are on that website,
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  Speaker 1: and so I know, you guys get criticized sometimes about
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: why doesn't the ad include this or that? And I've
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: always thought of the AD as kind of being a
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  Speaker 1: funnel to other information, and so the Bible Project includes
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  Speaker 1: all the information that there's videos on the website about sin,
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: the death of Jesus, and the resurrection of Jesus as well,
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  Speaker 1: so all of it's on there. Would you agree with
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: what I'm saying here in that for those who want
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: to know more about Jesus it's on the website.
• 5:43
  Speaker 2: Yes, I do. And we focus very specifically on what
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: we call is spiritually seeking skeptic, and so we really are.
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  Speaker 2: If it's a language of funnels real we're really upstream
• 5:55
  Speaker 2: and along that it creates a journey where we make
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: handofs to different people. But everything you said about the
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: totality of the Bible project, in the sense of what
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: we would believe, kind of the framework we're coming from,
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  Speaker 2: they do an incredible job articulating huge parts of who
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  Speaker 2: we are and what we would believe in the journey
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  Speaker 2: we want to see people go on to take one
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: step closer to the authentic Jesus from wherever they are.
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: Let me ask you one more question that is often
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: asked by critics, and they'll say, that's a nice ad,
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  Speaker 1: but why not include the full Gospel? Why not include
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: the Romans Road? Why not have it be a sixty
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: second ad saying everything Billy Graham would have said, and
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: that would be wonderful, of course, but why not do that?
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: What do you say about that?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I would just say it's not that we would
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: be against that, but the approach we're taking is just
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: a different approach, and we really are trying to take
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: cues from the authentic Jesus. And it's very rare that
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: Jesus ever had a full moment of what we would
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  Speaker 2: call a you know, you mentioned Roman, a Roman's Road
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: type of approach, so that there's a very human centered
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: how do humans move through a process in particular, And
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: so we really do feel like the moments in the
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: roles that the ads play in particular, which we're trying
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: to do some more stuff other than this, but the
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  Speaker 2: role that they play in particular is to create that
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  Speaker 2: you know, kind of tilt to the head, like what
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: is there more work to incite the curiosity, to make
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: people take one step closer with a real focus on
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: the spiritually seeking skeptic.
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: If you enjoy today's interview, please make sure to subscribe
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: and share the episode with a friend. A big thanks
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: to the team at Life Audio for their partnership with
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: us on the podcast. If you go to lifeaudio dot com.
• 7:38
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• 7:42
  Speaker 1: their network. See you next time,