Loved, Despite
A worthy lesson from 'The Righteous Gemstones' finale
I just finished The Righteous Gemstones on HBO. It’s a show my wife and I have been watching for a while, though we’ve disagreed on it—she really likes it, and, well, I haven’t. The show is too over the top for me. I could only manage one episode at a time and needed long breaks between seasons. But we finally binged the last one and made it to the end.
Spoilers below if you’re watching the show. If you’re not, I believe this will still have some resonance with you.
The show follows the Gemstone family, who run a massive megachurch empire. They’re rich, powerful, and deeply dysfunctional. The father, Eli Gemstone, is the founder and spiritual leader. The story unfolds during a transition of power from Eli to his three children: Jesse, Judy, and Kelvin.
Jesse, the eldest, is entangled in blackmail and crime. Judy is brash and constantly bickering. Kelvin is indulgent and self-absorbed—really, they all are. Throughout the show, they lie, steal, fight, disrespect their father, their church, their faith, their children, and even themselves. They're a mess.
As a Christian, watching the show can be uncomfortable. It feels like it’s mocking the faith, using a family that claims to be religious but embodies everything wrong with power, greed, and self-righteousness.
At times, it felt like they were making fun of me, of everything I believe in. And yeah, if I am being honest, that bothered me a little.
But I also get that people have the right to tell whatever story they want, and I can laugh at myself. What surprised me, though, was what happened at the end.
The show is slapstick and over the top in every aspect, and the finale was no different. In the final episode, there is a much-needed, profound, and genuine moment to cap off all the chaos. Jesse, Judy, and Kelvin are being attacked by their best friend, who turns out to be trying to murder them. All three are shot and are crawling across the floor of this big mansion searching for each other. The attacker goes outside to reload, and when he returns, Jesse gets off a lucky shot and kills the attacker.
And then comes the moment that really hit me. They crawl to their dying friend—the same one who just tried to murder them—and they pray over him. One by one, each sibling speaks with a tone we hadn’t heard before. It wasn’t brash or loud or arrogant. It was humble. And it was forgiving.
"Sometimes we let jealousies corrupt us [...] We all fall off the path, dear Lord." Judy acknowledges the root of her own acting out – pain. "It can do things to you. It can make you feel helpless." Kelvin speaks, of course, of fear. "With all the doubts in our lives, and all the fears, help us let go, Lord."
I actually teared up a little. I thought these people were awful, but even awful people could be forgiven. Even awful people can dispense forgiveness.
For a show that spent so much time mocking Christianity, that final moment embraced what it means to be a Christian. It captured the heart of the faith—Jesus forgave us for our sins, and if we follow Him, we learn to forgive ourselves and others. Christian faith is not for saints; it is for sinners.
As the show ties up, we see that Eli finally feels comfortable passing authority to his children. They have finally reflected on their behavior and started to carry some of the burden, freeing Eli to embark on his sailboat for retirement.
Watching The Righteous Gemstones sometimes made me feel yucky, but it’s another reminder that being uncomfortable has value. If we take the time to visit people in their environment and get to know them, we learn we aren’t that different.
We all sin, and we are all forgiven. We are loved, despite.
 | A guest post by
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