What does it really mean to Pursue Better?

Last week I presented my first paper at an academic conference– it was partly inspired by this ad from Sam Adams, along with Psalm 119. Let me explain.*

In Psalm 119 we find the psalmist meditating on the law of the Lord as the path to life. The intensity with which he seeks God’s commandments suggests he is battling internal and external pressure from other commands. These other commandments can come from many sources and take many forms but in my paper I argue that marketing is one area of external pressure. Just one generation ago no one would have expected advertising to enter the home, but not only has that now happened, but networks of our friends and family sell us products and we carry phones everywhere that enable selling at any minute. Of this development Tim Wu writes, “Thus, bit by bit, what was once shocking became normal, until the shape of our lives yielded further and further to the logic of commerce—but gradually enough that we should now find nothing strange about it.”

Bonhoeffer wrote a meditation on Psalm 119 and in it one can sense the urgency with which he sought God’s Word for direction in his own life. He writes, “The more sharply the world presses against me and condemns me, the more narrow and difficult my way becomes, the more determined must be my regard for all of God’s commandments.” This is so because Bonhoeffer understands the law of the Lord [this is a great simplification] as the way of God and the form of Christ, and the commandments are what keep us along the path of life. Bonhoeffer doesn’t define the commandments as static principles but as the continuous revelation of God in his word to guide us into the form of Christ–where true humanity is found. 

The following quote from management guru Peter Drucker serves well to provide a brief definition of marketing and introduce how marketing similarly seeks to encounter and direct human beings: “The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well that the product or service fits him and sells itself. Ideally, marketing should result in a customer who is ready to buy. All that should be needed then is to make the product or service available.”

This definition reveals the sweeping aspirations to know consumers so profoundly in order to influence them. This activity takes place in an increasingly personal, targeted way. Communications professor Joseph Turow summarizes the logic of marketers this way: “the future belongs to marketers…that learn how to find and keep the most valuable customers by surrounding them with the most persuasive media materials.” Though advertising is the most visible aspect of marketing, this encounter and direction takes place across a range of activities as it seeks to know and make consumers who are ready to buy.

When we understand the Law of the Lord as life along the way of God and the commandments as signposts along the way, as Bonhoeffer articulates it, I would suggest that we can then imagine advertising as billboards, television commercials, and Facebook ads along the way competing and distracting us from the signposts God has for us, pointing us to various divergent paths. Alternatively, in the framework of Psalm 119 in which the psalmist is intently focused on the word to find life, truth, and joy, we can imagine marketing this way:

Teach me, Lord, the way of your decrees,
that I may follow it to the end.

Hello again. Come see what’s new. We think you’ll like it.

Give me understanding, so that I may keep your law
and obey it with all my heart.

Thousands of possibilities. Get yours.

Direct me in the path of your commands,
for there I find delight.

Radiant. Rejuvenated. Revlon.

Turn my heart toward your statutes
and not toward selfish gain.

Luxury feels better earned.

Turn my eyes away from worthless things;
preserve my life according to your word.

A diamond is forever.**

If we don’t take this contrast seriously it is because we don’t take the Word seriously and our social imagination has been colonized by marketing. An interesting question to ask here–thanks to my adviser for this–is We may perceive these contrasting commandments as banal or unconvincing but for Bonhoeffer, the movement off the path of life can be subtle and happens over time, but is no less dangerous for it. He writes that when the psalmist worries about straying from the commands “he is not thinking here of a deliberate, willful transgressing of the divine commandments. But how easily we stray when our vision is clouded by that which is evil. We wander into by ways, lose our sense of direction, and cannot find our way back to the commandments of God.”

The commandments of God bind us to Christ where true life and freedom are found. The commandments of marketing promise life but bind us to death. For example, an introductory book on brand management introduces the concept of branding by describing the benefits to consumers and the benefits to firms. Though a brand can meet functional needs they are also believed to “have a more positive and affirmative role in today’s markets. The brand is a tool for self-realization, a symbol of aspirations, a sense of achievement” and particularly iconic brands offer even more: a “spiritual uplift.”

So while humans are sold the benefits of security, hope, and transcendence in products, what does the brand do for the firm? It delivers price advantages, creates barriers to entry for other firms, and ultimately, can increase stock market share prices. It is a sign of our captivity that such logic not only goes unnoticed and unchallenged, but has become the very bedrock of our economic system.

So while Sam Adams encourages us to pursue better by identifying their brand with the American Dream and calls us to the “relentless quest of a better future” on our own terms, Psalm 119 reminds us that to pursue better is to pursue God in his word. Paul encourages us in Romans 12:2, “Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” As the logic of commerce invades our lives we must learn and pray for the ability to discern a truly good word for our lives from God so that he can direct us in the way of life.

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*This is an attempt to condense the ideas from a 7,000 word paper into a blog post. If you happen to want to read the entire paper just let me know and I’d be happy to share it and discuss!

**The base for this reflection is Psalm 119:33-37 and in between each verse are brand and campaign slogans. In order of occurrence the slogans are for the following brands: Everlane, Best Buy, Revlon, Chrysler, De Beers.