"He Gets Us" & The Gospel

Hey there, everybody. I'm here with my friend Austin Keeler.

We're doing the Holy Nope podcast. If you don't know who the

Holy Nope is, well, it's us. Me, the greatest preacher, maybe in the history of preachers, and the second greatest preacher,

Austin Keeler. How you doing there, Austin? I'm well,

Steve. Dr. Steven Lawson. How are you? That's great.

I'm doing okay. Is my camera on? Just joking.

It's not Steve Lawson. It's David Loewe. Even better. It's David Loewe.

I'm such an idiot. Welcome to the Holy Nope podcast, everyone. I am

Austin Keeler, also known as Mr. Holy Nope, and joining me is not

Steve Lawson, but it is David Loewe. David, why don't you introduce yourself?

Also known as the Holy Dope, my name is David Loewe. I'm a pastor of a church west of Chicago, Small Reform Baptist Church.

I'm also a hobby filmmaker. I recently wrote a film and narrated a film called

Cessationist, and before that, made a film where I was a producer on called

Logic on Fire, the Life and Legacy of Martin Lloyd Jones, and I'm working on a third film right now that you're gonna be a part of,

I think, Austin. Hallelujah. Yes, you are. I'm excited for that. It's about the demon slayer, unfortunately.

It's not that I take pleasure in making a film about these wicked false teachers, but I feel compelled to do it because the truth is worth standing for, and the truth is worth fighting for.

And so, yeah, I'm gonna do this and shine the light into the darkness.

Amen. The truth is worth standing for and fighting for, and that's what we intend to do today as we talk about the topic of the

He Gets Us commercial, which aired during the Super Bowl. I am the

Holy Nope, and I noped the commercial, which seemed to cause quite a stink on social media.

It was, in fact, quite stinky, you might say, and I received agreement from people, but much, much pushback from a lot of people saying that I don't believe that we should love people, that I'm a

Pharisee, that, you know, I'm not a real Christian if I disagree that we should wash people's feet and things like that.

So it's a controversial topic, and I think it's controversial because it's not a very obvious error that's contained in the commercial, and we want to bring the errors that are contained in the commercial to light in our talk today because the commercial very cleverly, and you could say very deceptively, blurs the lines on the issue of love and kindness and what

Jesus calls his disciples to do. Yeah, that's right. And so that's what we would actually expect

Satan to do. He is crafty. The serpent is the craftiest animal in Genesis 3.

That's what the Lord says. So he is crafty in the way that he deceives people.

It's not always outright and obvious, but I think that this

Super Bowl commercial is very deceptive. And so it's worth us kind of doing a dive.

I know other people have covered this, but we kind of thought that we would both do this as well, just so we could clear the air about what does washing feet really signify in John's Gospel chapter 13, and where does this he gets us campaign go wrong?

So, Austin, did you want to read for us 1 Corinthians 6, 9 to 11?

The Word of God says this, or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God?

Do not be deceived, neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

Such were some of you, but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the

Lord Jesus Christ and in the spirit of our God. So why do you think that this commercial is causing such a divide among even

Christians? I think that the majority of Christians are interpreting out of the commercial a surface level message that is basically that Christians should love and serve people.

A lot of the feedback I got was basically saying just that. All this commercial is saying is that we as Christians should love people who are still in their sin.

We should serve our enemies. We should be kind to those who are different than us and those who even do not believe what we believe.

We should still, we are still called to love those people. Would you affirm those things that we should love our enemies, that we should help people who are in need, things like that?

Yeah, contrary to perhaps popular opinion in my comment section,

I do actually believe that we should love people, that we should help those who are in need, that we should show kindness to people, to people we don't know, to people who are different than us.

Yeah, I absolutely believe that. And so when we voice our opposition to the commercial, the people in favor of loving people, they get pretty upset.

Without understanding why someone would oppose the message in the commercial and the message that they're receiving is that we should love people and be kind to those in need.

And the reality is that the message is deeper than be kind.

It's deeper than we should love. And I would say that it's even much more sinister than we should love those who are different than us.

So a lot of Christians are getting the message, Jesus calls us to love and serve people and we need to humble ourselves and do just that.

I'm wondering if even before we get into dissecting the kind of post -mortem of this topic that we're covering today, would you be willing to share with those who are watching, why did you start

The Holy Nope? Was it because you just hate all these people?

You're just full of anger and hatred toward everybody and you're a legalistic Pharisee that really just wants to tear people down.

Is that the reason why you started The Holy Nope? I mean, I'm not talking about The Nope podcast.

I'm talking about what you've been known for, making these short clips. What was your purpose in doing that?

Just what you said, just to tear people down and divide the body of Christ. That's what

I thought. That's right.

So maybe, you know, because I think that this is actually a really important thing.

I saw somebody today on social media talking about how all these discernment people, whatever, discernment bloggers, making discernment videos, they're all

Pharisees. They all just want to fight people. I thought, now maybe for some of them that's true.

I don't know. But the people that I know, who

I know personally, people like Stephen Pollett -Kozar or Chris Roseboro and his son

Josh or Daniel Long or Daniel Chapman, there's a bunch of guys out there that are kind of doing some similar things, looking at really bad false teaching and shining the light on it.

I can see from their life and knowing them personally, in many cases, that those guys just want to expose the darkness and preach the truth and show how there really are wolves that try to infiltrate into the sheep pen.

It is our duty as shepherds of the flock to protect the sheep from those who would come in to hurt them and destroy them.

Maybe I'm stealing your thunder here, buddy, because I want you to answer. But just to say, what comforts

David in Psalm 23? He says, your rod and your staff, they comfort me.

He says that about the shepherd, that the Lord is my shepherd, he says.

And his rod and his staff comfort him as a sheep. Well, what's the rod for?

The rod is to beat away the wolves. And the shepherd's crook is to pull the sheep back when they've gone off of the path.

And so that's comforting to the sheep. Would you say that those who are calling you a

Pharisee probably misunderstand your purpose in making the Holy Note? Yeah, I think they would.

I think many of them also don't really understand what a Pharisee is. John Calvin said that the shepherd is to have two voices, the pastor is to have two voices, one for leading the sheep and the other for driving away the wolves.

And I think we forget just how often the New Testament warns us of false teachers.

It's in almost every book. There are explicit instructions, there are reminders, there are allusions, not just in the

Old Testament, or not just in the New Testament, but the New Testament uses many, many examples from the

Old Testament to continue to warn the New Testament church about the devastating effects of false teachers, of apostates, of rebellious men, of the ungodly who infiltrate the church and deceive

Christ's bride for selfish gain. And charismaticism, false teaching, it runs rampant in the

West today. And so the Holy Note exists to reform the church by exposing error and promoting truth.

And one of the best ways to highlight what is right is to contrast it against what is wrong.

And so the method of the Holy Note is to expose what is wrong, and some of it often is very ridiculous and funny, but to take that and then show that this is actually what the

Bible says, this is what the church has believed about this particular issue, and I think the

Lord's blessing it. Yeah, and you know what's really interesting is that like some of those people that I just mentioned, like the

Kozars and the Roseboros, you know, they might have what seems like a large following, maybe 60,

I think the Kozars have like 65 ,000 followers on YouTube, and Roseboro might have more than that.

But compared to like Alexander Pagani or Catherine Crick or, you know,

Isaiah Saldivar, these people have hundreds of thousands of subscribers on their channels, and they are deceiving the masses.

They've tapped into some kind of algorithm. They've even admitted theirs is a quote -unquote algorithm revival, which is no revival at all.

And so I just wanted to bring that up even before we begin, so that the listeners to this will understand that this is coming, we,

Austin and I, are coming from a place of love for the

Church, the Bride of Christ. We love Christ, and we love the Bride of Christ.

We love the Church. And because we love the Church, we feel that it's necessary for us to stand and protect her as an under -shepherd should.

The hired hand, Jesus says, runs away at the first sign of danger.

But those who are shepherds don't do that. The good shepherd, indeed,

Christ himself, he lays down his life for the sheep. And so we want to follow his example and preach the truth, and preach the truth in love, even love for our enemies, but still boldly stand on the

Word of God, especially in cases where like there's such a wide audience like which saw this commercial, which really has, this commercial that we're looking at has absolutely nothing at all to do with biblical

Christianity, but it comes in the shape of or under the guise of Christianity.

And so that's why we're doing this critique today. Would you agree with that, Austin? Yeah, man, I would agree with that.

I think that's very well said. I was just teaching at a conference in Texas recently, and I was teaching through the book of Jude, and I just was struck at first by Jude's care and concern for the saints.

He calls them beloved, the called, and the kept. And so the chief motivation of us and others who devote time and energy to calling out false teachers and false teaching is love for Christ's bride, right?

Love for Christ himself, and concern for the purity of his church, who these false teachers, through their devious schemes, molest with their error.

Just as we would want to protect our own blood relatives and family from those who would want to harm them, so our desire is to protect the bride of Christ from those who would want to harm it.

And sometimes that means having that second voice to drive away the wolves, and to warn the church to mark and avoid those who would lead her astray.

And so that's what our purpose is in doing this. That's what our motivation is. That's why we're doing this podcast together.

So you said that the error contained in the commercial that we're looking at comes under the guise of Christianity.

And more specifically, we're going to be talking about foot washing. The images contained in this commercial are people washing other people's feet.

And we won't spend too much time talking about it, but it should be noted that the people washing feet are a particular kind of people.

If you're able to notice who they are, they are typically people who would be classed as hegemonic, persons in privileged positions in this society, washing the feet of those who would be considered oppressed or marginalized through the lens of intersectionality, like perhaps an illegal immigrant or a gay man or a trans man or a woman who is abortion minded.

All of those that you just mentioned are, quote unquote, victims.

They all are victims of their circumstances, or they're victims of society, or they're victims of an oppressive culture that has kept them down.

And like you said, there's a kind of a hegemonic reality in this commercial that the privileged people are washing the feet of the non -privileged people or the victim people.

I don't know if you want to talk about that right now, or if you want to save that until a little bit later, but there's a problem in itself, right?

Because as long as a person sees themself as a victim, instead of as a perpetrator of sin against Almighty God, how can that person possibly be saved?

Jesus came to seek and to save that which was lost. It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.

He did not come for the righteous, but sinners. So unless a person sees themself as a perpetrator, not a victim, but a perpetrator, then how will they ever come to Christ for forgiveness?

If I'm a victim, that means it's not my fault. My sin isn't my fault. I'm just a victim of things that have happened to me.

And there's the oppressor, and I'm the oppressed. But that's not how the Bible shows us.

That's not how it depicts human beings. We're not the oppressed. We are sinners, rebels against Almighty God.

And until a person sees themself as the tax collector does, who goes up to the temple and cannot even lift his eyes to pray, but beats on his breast and says,

Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner, until a person comes to that place, they will not be saved.

The only one who's justified in that parable of the tax collector and the Pharisee, the Pharisee, oh,

Lord, I've done all these wonderful things. The tax collector, he beats his breast.

Only the tax collector goes home justified, because only he sees his absolute, utter and desperate need for grace, for the love and grace of Christ.

So until a person can come to that place, there is no salvation for them.

I think that's one place that this He Gets Us campaign really gets it wrong.

So I agree with everything that you're saying. If a person is convinced that their sin isn't sin, that they're a victim of it, that they're oppressed by unfortunate circumstances, instead of transgressors of God's law, they can't understand the gospel, they can't understand the good news of the gospel.

And one of our fundamental concerns with the commercial is that there really is no gospel message.

But David, if they must understand their sin and their rebellious nature, and their position before God as transgressor, as guilty, does that mean that we should just scream at them that they're sinners?

Does it mean that we should get out our MacArthur's six and a half pound preacher's

Bible and beat them over the head with it? Until they until they recognize their their sin?

I noticed, I know, that's what I preach from. I noticed that. I have one too.

That thing is a monster. That's some effect. It is. That's what

I preach from. I mean, I really like it, but totally off topic.

But you brought it up. I really like the fact that this preacher's Bible, one of the coolest things about is very thick.

But the reason why it's so thick, the MacArthur NASB 95, which

I think is the best translation, by the way, why it's so thick is because every verse is on a different line, which makes it really easy as you're preaching to like, look down and see where you are.

Remember, like, okay, I'm right here in the middle of the page. And that's verse 15, or whatever. Yeah, so, so I use that Bible.

The answer to your question, should we scream at them or beat them?

No. But how shall they believe unless someone preaches to them?

That's what Paul says, that we need to bring the truth to sinners.

We need to let them know what the truth is. We need to show them how they have broken

God's law. And the only hope for them, which is Christ, who obeyed

God's law on our behalf. If we don't actually preach that message to sinners, then it doesn't matter what we do for them.

It doesn't matter. Even if we dig wells in Africa, there's nothing wrong with digging a well in Africa.

There's nothing wrong with helping somebody on the street. There's nothing wrong with necessarily giving money to somebody who needs money.

There's no those things aren't bad things, necessarily. But unless it is accompanied with and I dare

I say even that the priority should be the message of the gospel, that the world is lost, that the individual sinner is lost, and a rebel, and that Christ is the only one who holds out hope for them.

Unless that's the message, man, then it apart from like, what the meaning of foot washing is, it doesn't matter at all if we washed everybody's feet, who cares?

Who cares? So so they go away with clean feet, but a filthy heart.

That doesn't help a single person. If they walk away with clean feet, and a dirty heart, man, no way.

Yes. I've drilled wells in Africa. Did you know that? I think you mentioned that to me once.

Are you saying that me drilling those wells wasn't preaching the gospel to those people?

What I'm saying is the act of drilling a well, while it may be kindness, and might be the result, the result of the gospel, especially in your own life, it then would be the result of the gospel is you want to then serve people.

But that is not the gospel. Drilling wells is not the gospel. Helping the poor is not the gospel.

The gospel is this, that Jesus Christ came to save sinners.

Washing feet is not the gospel either. It's not. This is our this is the main problem, man.

It's so frustrating. Because, because this campaign, look, even if we give the benefit of the doubt to the he gets us people, whoever these like nebulous people are, if even if we give the benefit of the doubt to them and say like, well, they're intending good, and they want to show like Christians helping people somehow.

I would have had much less of a problem with this commercial. Even even though we're not called actually to wash the feet of just random sinners out in the street.

And I think we're going to get into that when we study john 13. But I would have had much less of a problem with it, if they would have just preached the actual gospel, and told people that they're sinners in need of the

Savior, that they've broken God's law, that Christ came to redeem sinners, that he died on a cross to pay the penalty for sin, and he rose from the dead on the third day, and that you must repent and believe in him in order to be saved, that there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.

If they would have just said that if they would have posted acts 412 on the screen, I would have said,

Okay, even though they I think that they still get the message wrong, that like Christians aren't to go out and just wash the feet of random people who disagree with them, even though they get that totally wrong.

I wouldn't probably be making this video right now. But the reason why we're making this video right now is because that commercial doesn't actually preach the gospel.

That's the problem with it. And instead, what does it what does it portray? It portrays like Jesus gets us.

And so real Christians, they don't preach hate this, whatever hate means, they don't do that.

Instead, real Christians go and wash the feet of gay people, or wash the feet of abortion, having people or we wash the feet of just random strangers that look different from us.

And somehow, that's Christianity, never in the history of the church, would that have ever been considered the

Christian message? Okay, but David, aren't you being a little pharisaical?

Because they did mention Jesus, they put his name right up there on the screen at the end of the commercial, right when the music dropped.

Right. And so aren't they sowing a seed? Isn't a seed being sowed?

Isn't that good? Isn't it? Couldn't it be just like the first step for someone finding

Jesus? Shouldn't we rejoice in that? Boy, you know,

I could say a lot of things. No, just the name

Jesus does not contain the gospel. If I would even say if they even said what the name

Jesus means, I would have less of a problem with it. The Lord saves.

If they would have just said that Jesus, the Lord saves. Wow, that would have been at least something.

But I mean, think of think of how many Hispanic people watch that commercial.

Okay, that's a common name. In Mexico, Jesus is a common name, just because the name is on the screen that is not preaching the gospel.

That is not the good news. The good news is that Jesus came and did something.

Yeah. So just you're saying that just name dropping Jesus isn't planting seeds.

And you're not the sower in the parable of the sower. If you're if you're just name dropping

Jesus, at random times, maybe you do that. Just go around and you say his name say,

Oh, wow, I really preach the gospel today. I mentioned Jesus. Well, because Jesus says that there are many false

Jesuses. There are many who come in his name, saying I am the

Christ. And he says, Do not listen to them. So no, there's so many false

Jesuses. That's why it's imperative that we preach the good news about the true

Jesus, the real Jesus. And that's where this falls short that that's not what they're doing, even in what they're showing is not preaching the real

Jesus because the real Jesus never told his disciples to go and wash the feet of those who don't believe in him.

That is not what he says. And so the message itself, even the message itself, they get completely wrong.

Yeah, yeah. Name dropping Jesus isn't planting a seed.

Jesus says that the seed that is sown is the word of God. It's not simply writing his name on a screen or on a church sign or anywhere else.

It is the message of the gospel that he himself proclaimed. So let's get into what foot washing actually means and hopefully expose how it is ripped out of its context by this commercial and misapplied.

So in John chapter 13, Jesus washes his disciples feet.

Right. That's obviously where they are getting this imagery from. And he tells them to wash one another's feet.

So his demonstration of humility towards them and what is particular for him, his humbling himself, becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on the cross, humbling himself for their salvation.

Well, it's the same kind of humility they ought to demonstrate toward one another, which is a significant lesson for these 12 disciples in light of their frequent arguments over who was the greatest that we find in Matthew 18,

Mark 9, and Luke 9. So that's basically what's going on in John chapter 13.

Jesus takes the basin. He puts on the servant clothing.

He washes their feet. He tells them to wash one another's feet. And I would add to that, not only does it show what the disciples of Christ are to, how the disciples of Christ are to act toward one another, what their attitude should be, that the world would know us by our love for one another.

By the church's love for the church is how the world would know us as Christians.

But it also shows how Christ himself infinitely condescended when he says, let me see what, what verse it is here.

It says, and supper being ended, the devil having already put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to betray him,

Jesus, knowing that the father had given all things into his hands, that he had come from God and was going to God, rose from supper and laid aside his garments.

He stripped off his outer garments, which

I think there are some commentators that make mention of this also, that it foreshadows what's going to happen in just a few hours that Christ would be stripped and nailed to a cross.

Another commentator talks about how Christ taking off his garments and girding himself with a towel and getting onto his knees and pouring into the ceremonial hand -washing basin, which is what that was, and then beginning to wash the disciples' feet, shows how

Christ himself came down and condescended and became a man and became a man.

He became a servant. He came not to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.

And that this shows in living color, how

Jesus humbles himself. He is, he is so great.

It's, it's beyond words. Jesus tells the disciples that the greatest in the kingdom of heaven is the servant of all.

And then he shows them in this action that he, of course, is the greatest of the greatest.

He is serving them in the role that the lowest slave in a household would do by washing their dirty feet.

It's so remarkable. This condescension of Christ should cause us to worship

Christ. I mean, really, if there's any message in John 13 that should cause us to be in awe of the

Lord, it's this, that the Lord humbles himself in this way and washes the feet of his disciples.

He who is King of Kings and Lord of Lords, he who deserves to be worshiped, who deserves our utmost obedience, he's the one who's washing their feet.

This passage is about Jesus. Like, why couldn't they have, why couldn't they have shown that in the commercial?

You know, what Christ has done. I'm not saying portray Christ and break the second commandment, by the way.

I'm just saying, why couldn't they have shown that the foot washing of Jesus shows his condescension and becoming a man and redeeming mankind, washing the filthiness of our sin away by his blood.

I mean, that's the beauty of the passage. The commercial inverts the focus, as you've so eloquently stated just now.

It's about Christ. And the focus is inverted onto us.

This foot washing is a marvelous display of the condescension of the

Lord of glory to save humble or to save undeserving, lowly sinners like ourselves.

But there are a couple of things that we want to notice from the passage.

And first, that is, whose feet does Jesus wash? Now, it's very plain in the text that Jesus washes the feet of his disciples, and particularly the twelve, the twelve that were nearest to him.

And that should cause us to think about whose feet Jesus doesn't wash.

Jesus doesn't wash his other disciples' feet. Jesus doesn't wash those ones who believed in him and followed him for a time and then walked away from him when he said hard things.

Jesus doesn't wash the feet of the Pharisees. Jesus doesn't wash the feet of the

Sadducees. Jesus washes the feet of his twelve disciples.

And what is the spiritual significance of this act?

Well, I think it's found in Acts chapter 8. He comes to wash Peter's feet, and of course, Peter protests, and he says,

Lord, do you wash my feet? Jesus answered him and said, what I do now, what

I do you do not realize now, but you will understand hereafter. Peter said to him, never shall you wash my feet.

Jesus answered him, and this is it. If I do not wash you, you have no part with me.

There is an intimate connection between the

Jesus washing the feet of those who have part with him, those who belong to him.

And in fact, it is those who call him Lord. We read in verse 13, you call me, you call me teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am.

Jesus washes the feet of those who call him Lord. Now, so this foot washing is then, it's symbolic of spiritual cleansing, the cleansing power of Jesus Christ to cleanse us from our sin, being cleansed from sin, and therefore is limited in its application to those who are in Christ, to those who are his disciples, and to those who truly belong to him.

Matthew Henry says this, note, all those and those only who are spiritually washed by Christ have part in Christ.

So if you've been washed, it's not just about inclusion.

It's not just being included in the Christian community. And something very disturbing that is found on the

He Gets Us website, I think in their frequently asked questions, is that there is blame being laid at the church's feet for people of the

LGBTQ plus community feeling judged and excluded by the church.

And instead, I mean, they should be welcomed and included into the

Christian community. They should be made to feel loved. But the problem is that foot washing has been ripped out of its context to become synonymous with love.

And that's what they say in the commercial. Jesus didn't teach hate. He washed feet.

So now the opposite of hate is foot washing. That makes foot washing the definition of love.

But in no context and with no qualifications, and their qualification might come down to simple inclusion and welcome.

But it's not just inclusion. This spiritual cleansing is not even only justification.

It is going to have the effect of sanctification. It is impossible to be washed, to have your feet washed by Jesus and remain at peace with your sin.

Matthew Henry also says this. He says, All those whom Christ owns and saves,

He justifies and sanctifies, and both are included in this washing.

So He washes those who call Him Lord. And by faith alone, they are justified. And He cleanses them from sin.

He clothes them in His robe of perfect righteousness. But then

He works out sanctification in their lives so that they no longer want to identify with their sin.

They no longer love the sin that they have. And they start to love the things that God loves.

They start to hate sin as God hates sin. And this is the work that the Lord is faithful to do in the lives of those whom

He washes. So the commercial, what is communicated, is that we should wash the feet of those who are at peace with their sin, whether they're identifying with their

LGBTQ plus self, whether they're abortion minded or actively abort or indulging sin in some other way.

We should wash the feet of those who are at peace with their sin, and we should be at peace with their sin as we wash their feet.

Because it's not about beating people over the head with truth and convincing them that they're sinners.

Everyone knows they're already bad, right? It's just about not just choosing to love and serve.

Yeah, I mean, the problem, unfortunately, with that is that they don't know that they're bad.

If you go outside and you ask the average person on the street, I mean, this is what

Ray Comfort is famous for. Going out on the street and asking random people walking by, do you think that you're a good person?

And 95 % of the people that he talks to say, yes, yes,

I am. And that's why he brings in the Ten Commandments and shows how they're not, they're not, we're not.

But yet we convince ourselves that we are. I wanted to say something else that's really interesting that I just thought about, which is, have you seen these videos?

Maybe you could put one in in the editing process. These videos of like, like white people kneeling before some oppressed group and saying, we're so sorry.

And we're like, they're like kneeling before a group of another, you know, different skin color and saying that is the like woke -ism at its greatest degree.

It seems like there's a lot of that in the He Gets Us campaign, in this commercial.

Like, what is the posture of the foot washers in the commercial?

They're all on their knees. They're all kind of looking up plaintively to the, to the oppressed person who's like, you know, in some cases, in the one, there's a one still of like a woman holding a baby in front of a bus that we're to, we're to think that she's like, an immigrant,

I suppose, there's immigrants getting on the bus, and she has like, standing there holding the baby, and her feet are being washed almost defiantly.

And, and the feet are being washed ostensibly by the Christian, like the Christian should be the one saying to such a person,

I'm so sorry that you snuck into the country illegally. That's the posture of it.

This is woke -ism. It's not Christianity. Again, why? Why isn't that Christianity?

Because it portrays groups of people as being oppressed and victimized.

And that the Christians then are the oppressors who are who are now saying like, we're really sorry that we've done this to you.

Why do I say that? Because on their website, like you just mentioned, maybe you could read the whole statement.

On their website, they're saying like, LGBTQ people, for instance, have been oppressed or victimized by the church, not made to feel welcome or made to feel judged.

Except here's the thing, okay? Real talk, man. Jesus says that those who hate the light do not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed, that this is the judgment.

Light has come into the world, and men loved darkness instead of light.

So when people who are living in rebellion are made to feel judged, there's a sense in which, if that's conveyed by a

Christian as like, I'm better than you, of course, that's wrong, right? But there's another sense in which we should make the world feel like it is under judgment.

Why? Because it is. Because it is. And we need to let people know that they are under the judgment and the wrath of Almighty God.

His righteous wrath is upon them. And the message of the Christian then is flee from the wrath, which is to come.

Flee from it. Run away. Run to Christ. Flee to Christ. Hide yourself in the cleft of the rock, which is

Christ. Because if you don't do that, the judgment of God is going to rain down on you.

It would have rained down on me too. This is the offense of the gospel to the world.

Okay? This is why the gospel is offensive. The gospel is offensive. I'm sorry,

I don't mean to preach. I just want to say this, though, because it's so important. And this is where it misses the mark, this thing.

The gospel is offensive because the gospel says, you're such a wicked sinner.

And I'm such a wicked sinner that I have a mountain of bricks upon my shoulders.

And that mountain is made out of my sin. As high as Everest is.

That's how high my sin is. And that Christ had to come into the world and die the bloodiest and most painful death imaginable to take the penalty that you and I deserve.

And even that painful death was secondary to the wrath of God in a spiritual sense that he took upon himself.

He took our wrath upon himself that we deserve. And if you don't turn to Christ and believe in Christ, you will bear that penalty forever.

In hell. Forever. That's the message of the gospel. And the man, the worldly man, is so self -righteous that he says, how dare you say such things about me?

I am not a sinner. I am a victim. If I've done anything wrong, it's because mom and dad raised me the wrong way.

If I've done something wrong, it's because of my circumstances. I'm a victim. Deep down, my heart is a good heart.

And how dare you say that it's not? I mean, that just goes to show, like, this is why that commercial is not a

Christian commercial. Because it proclaims the opposite of that.

That's all. I just wanted to say that, because I think it's so important. We've lost it, man.

When is the last time that you've heard even evangelical preachers say something like, flee from the wrath which is to come?

I mean, it seems like that message has been lost in large measure. Of course, there's some who preach

Christ alone. There's no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved. But the vast majority do not anymore.

Yeah, it's true. And that's a sobering message.

And it is an offensive message. You touched on the political motives of the ad, which

I think that the majority of viewers totally missed. But it is wokeness, you might say, being portrayed.

And I agree with you. I don't think that Christians are called to just debase themselves before Christ's enemies.

They say themselves on their website that they made this ad with the election year coming up in mind.

There is a political motive behind this. And the message is that Christians, what's happening is that Christians through ads like this are being desensitized to the sin of the world.

They're being desensitized. So the message being conveyed essentially is to lay aside your convictions,

Christian, and just love people. Lay aside your convictions and just love. And that is a message that Christians must not accept, because that is called compromise.

We've noticed from John 13 that it is Jesus's disciples who call him

Lord. It is those who have part with him, whose feet he washes.

Now we're going to get to Judas in a second. But the second thing that we should notice is that Jesus tells his disciples whose feet he's just washed to wash other feet.

But we should recognize that the command he gives them is not to leave the upper room and just go start washing random people's feet.

Instead, he says in verse 14, if I then the

Lord and the teacher washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet.

One another's feet means one another. It means other disciples.

It means those who likewise belong with Christ and who have likewise been washed by Christ.

So Jesus washing his disciples' feet, we'll say it again, it's symbolizing the spiritual cleansing of those who call him

Lord. And he says there in verse 14, wash one another's feet. So what this isn't talking about is doing acts of kindness for random people.

That is not what it's talking about. It's not talking about doing acts of kindness for the lost. Should we do acts of kindness for people?

Absolutely. But that is not what foot washing means. This is about the disciples helping one another to grow in sanctification.

Let me read this quote from Matthew Henry. It's very good. He says this. He says it is a quote, a servableness to the sanctification of one another.

You ought to wash one another's feet from the pollutions of sin. We cannot satisfy for one another's sins.

We cannot atone for one another's sins. This is peculiar to Christ, but we may help to purify one another from sin.

We must in the first place wash ourselves. This charity must begin at home. Matthew 7, 5.

Take the log out of your own eye and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye. But it must not end there.

We must sorrow for the failings and fallings of our brethren, much more for the gross pollutions. 1

Corinthians 5, 2. Paul orders an immoral person to be removed from fellowship with the church.

He doesn't order them. We should know this. This isn't Matthew Henry. This is me. He doesn't command them to wash their feet.

They're caught in sin and the direction is to remove the person from among you.

The direction is church discipline for the sake of their soul and not to look over their sin for love's sake or for kindness sake.

And that's in the Christian community. That's not even outside of it. Now, we must...

Matthew Henry goes on. We must wash our brethren's polluted feet in tears.

We must faithfully reprove them and do what we can to bring them to repentance. Galatians 6, 1.

He says, brethren, if anyone is caught in any trespass, you who are spiritual, restore such a one in the spirit of gentleness, each one looking to yourself so that you too will not be tempted.

And he says, we must admonish them to prevent their falling into the mire. This is washing their feet.

Foot washing in its context has nothing to do with acts of kindness towards the lost.

But he gets us explanation of the ad.

They say that foot washing can be... This is actually what they say.

They say, quote, figurative foot washing can be as simple as giving a compliment to a co -worker or paying for a stranger's lunch.

It can also be as difficult as not responding to someone who's criticizing you or reaching out to an estranged family member.

Acts of kindness done out of humility and respect for another person can be considered the equivalent of foot washing.

Again, should we be kind to people? Should we do kind acts towards people?

Absolutely, we should. But that is not what foot washing means. The message is be kind.

That's what's being communicated in this ad. And there is no gospel.

Let's talk about the trump card that people have been pulling on this whole situation. And his name is

Judas. What about Judas, David? Jesus washed the feet of Judas and Judas betrayed him and Judas didn't truly belong to him.

Therefore, therefore, we should disregard everything we've talked about so far in this podcast, and we should go wash random people's feet.

Here's what I would say. The same sun that melts the wax hardens the clay.

When in Isaiah, the prophet or the Lord through the prophet says this, this is a really interesting point.

When he says, my word shall go forth and accomplish the purpose for which

I sent it, that sometimes the purpose, which

God sends his word forth, the purpose that he has in doing that is not the melting of the heart, but the hardening of it.

Do you know that? That this is what the Lord, I know this is super hard for people to swallow this.

It's a hard pill, the sovereignty of God over all things, including in Romans nine, when he says, for this purpose,

I raised up Pharaoh, that my power would be shown through him.

This is why he raised Pharaoh up for the purpose of his power to be made known, that Pharaoh's judgment would be heaped upon his own head through every time he hardened his heart, when

God showed him the beauty of who he is and his power in the plagues. All right.

So then would it be at least as one potential answer to this problem?

Could it be that the Lord is washing Judas's feet in order to show

Judas truly how innocent the blood is that he is betraying? That Jesus is even doing this thing, showing

Judas that the son of man came down from heaven and he came to serve.

That Judas then is by the washing of Judas's feet, the judgment is heaped even more on his head because at that time, in that moment, he still had not gone to the

Sanhedrin. He still had not gone yet to the Pharisees. The devil had entered him, but he had not gone yet.

And he went to them right after Jesus did that for him, right afterward.

I think that that just goes to show that he is the son of perdition and he is the one that was prophesied about that would be the betrayer of Christ.

And that does not, far from removing Judas's guilt, it increases his guilt.

The fact that Christ washed Judas's feet increases the guilt of Judas. And I mean, that's my interpretation of it.

But even if you disagree with my interpretation of Christ washing Judas's feet, still that exception does not take away anything that we've been saying about this at all, at all.

And the Lord could have had a number of other reasons that he had for washing Judas's feet.

He still doesn't go and tell us to go into the world. He gives no command to his disciples to go into the world and wash the feet of unbelievers.

Absolutely not. Yeah, that's a that's a fantastic point. Judas fulfilled the scriptures.

Judas served a purpose. And obviously that unique situation can't be extrapolated, once again, out of its context to support the faulty message conveyed in this commercial.

Jesus, like you said, he doesn't tell his disciples to go and wash the feet of those who reject him and persist in their sin.

Instead, he commands them to go and preach repentance for the forgiveness of sins.

Just as he told his disciples, he sends them likewise to proclaim to others that you must deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow

Jesus. The worldly kindness that the church is being conditioned to take up, it makes the sinner comfortable so as not to cause any offense.

But biblical kindness exposes sin in order to call people out of sin that they might find life, life in Christ.

And the fundamental message of of discipleship, according to Jesus, is the exact opposite of the false gospel pushed by the world today, which says that your life is about self -indulgence and self -promotion and self -preservation.

You do you and the chief end of man is to be your most authentic self. And Jesus says instead

Christianity 101 is deny yourself. Deny yourself and take up your cross and follow me.

And if you will not, then you cannot be my disciple. You are indeed excluded from the kingdom.

So David, praise God that Jesus doesn't merely get us and leave us the way we are.

Praise God that the hope of the gospel is Christ in you. The hope of glory that he actually transforms us.

He actually calls us out of sin and makes us new creatures in him.

He sheds his blood as a substitute for us to pay sin's penalty on our behalf.

He rises from the grave. He clothes us in the sparkling white robes of his own merit so that we stand before God in a justified position, fully and freely and finally accepted by God and loved by God with the very same love that he has for Christ because we are found in him by faith alone.

Praise God for the true gospel that doesn't just say you're fine the way you are, but the gospel of Christ who is making all things new so that we who belong to him, we who have been washed by Christ, whose feet he's washed, who've been cleansed by him, we can say we are the ones of whom it is said, such were some of you.

Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived.

Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God.

Such were some of you, but you were washed.

You were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the spirit of our

God. Have you been washed? Have you been washed by Jesus? Truly, truly.

That concludes the first episode of the Holy Note podcast. I have been Austin Keeler, and he has been