Former NBA All-Star guard Allan Houston recently opened up about his Christian faith while supporting a new media campaign seeking to tell millions about Jesus. Houston is a spokesperson for He Gets Us, a media campaign launched last year to “reintroduce people to the Jesus of the Bible and His confounding love and forgiveness,” according to the campaign’s website.

Houston grew up in Louisville, Kentucky. His father, Wade, was a University of Louisville assistant basketball coach. Eventually, Wade accompanied him to the University of Tennessee when he was appointed head coach. Basketball has always been a part of their lives. Houston played nine seasons for the New York Knicks; he was a team member of the Knicks’ 1999 NBA Finals. Houston made the NBA All-Star Team twice and won a gold medal as a U.S. men’s basketball team member at the 2000 Summer Olympics.

Still, at a very young age, faith was central to everything they did. He said, “Faith was the source and foundation of everything we did.” Moreover, Houston said faith has “given me a certain way to think, a certain way to perceive my life. And a certain way to perceive my purpose, a certain way to be driven by impact and not material things.”

However, he only got serious with his Christian journey when he turned 15. “At that time, I started to understand my strengths in sports. And I just felt like there was something bigger that was calling me [and] driving me to think about. But not just about trying to be important to my peers, or to uphold a certain status or name, or to play basketball and get noticed,” Allan told Christian Headlines. He added, “And to me, I understood there was something much bigger, and God’s voice just resonated with me. And I responded.”

Allan told Christian Headlines that “as a Christian,” he was “very compelled by the power of the message” in the He Gets Us ads. And how “it stands out in cultural media.” Houston said, “I was really moved by how they took this person that people kind of portrayed and saw a certain way and made Him to be who He really is and portrayed Him to be who He really is,” he said. “In our culture, and in today’s world, things are so divisive. People are angry; people don’t trust people. And they don’t trust institutions; they don’t trust systems.”

However, the campaign helps viewers understand who Jesus “really is and how He knows us. And [He] wants to push us and move us and love us and give us the best opportunity to be what we are called to be.”

Some people may take issue with a media campaign promoting Jesus, but the world needs Him now more than ever. The He Gets Us campaign has recently received backlash because some feel Jesus wouldn’t spend millions of dollars to promote Himself. However, these ads have started a conversation, which was the goal. Hopefully, more people will look into the campaign and discover what it stands for.