My hot take is that whenever God is reduced to a commercial, a blip, a sound bite - He is grossly oversimplified. It doesn't matter what the commercial says. It doesn't matter if it has four points (but if it's really four points, why did Matthew have 28 chapters?), doesn't matter if it slaps you in the face and calls you the worst of all sinners. The God of this world will not be commodified nor objectified, and no one has claim on Him or who He is. 

There are many who are passionate about communicating our fallenness and sinfulness as a necessary step to salvation. While I understand the desire for this emphasis, I guess I believe that when you encounter something so purely good, your undeservingness needs no articulation. You just know you're out of your league when the goodness of a wild and loving God descends upon you. Just as when you look at your perfect newborn baby, no words are needed to express how unearned this gift is; those words are drowned out by awe. Anyone hounding you for how little you deserve this baby would be seen as very strange indeed - sure, the words are true, but the emphasis is so misplaced.

The "life change" they demand as evidence feels pithy - those who meet this God are utterly transformed, transfigured, transfixed. Why is this so theoretical to you? Have you even met Him? Do you know what it is like to weep in the goodness of His presence? Do you really claim that the way He worked in your life is the way He should work in mine?

I do not deny sin or our fallenness; in fact I see it so deeply that any glimpse of the Divine is the most lavish of gifts - it is foolishness! It is ridiculous! It cannot even be earned with a formula. It is that good. 

Can God encounter people via a commercial? God has encountered me in the midst of problematic books, cringey worship songs, and yikesy theology. If He couldn't, we'd never meet Him. I guess that's where the rubber meets the road for me in terms of depravity - it's all tainted. None of it holds claim on Him. And yet, sometimes, He still peeks from behind the veil. 

All I know is that if there is a heart that is primed to meet Him, meet Him it will. Anything that smells of money is probably rotten, but there are precious and beautiful souls at stake so He will once again condescend through means not worthy of Him because of the deep love that embodies Him.

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