What Not to Wear; Church Edition

Maybe, we should all worship naked.

Now before you get all offended on me, hear my rationale. This past Sunday I had the privilege of preaching. I always love it when I get the opportunity to share what the Lord has been doing in this messy life of mine and I think it occasionally even encourages a few folks to draw closer to Jesus.

At FBC, the first service bears the label "traditional." What that means is we get to hear a dapper-looking choir in matching robes, we sing hymns and listen to organ music mixed with piano. Neckties are important, suit coats are pressed and hairdos are puffy. It's a good-looking crowd.

The second service is labeled "contemporary." Praise bands play guitars, bass and drummers drum while we sing the latest in Christian music. More than a few coffee cups can be spotted sporting their Starbucks or Dunkin Donuts logos and older people wonder if younger people are experiencing a shortage of combs because their hair has purposely been made to look somewhat chaotic. Neckties are few and far between and jeans are more the norm for the men.

The same message is preached to each crowd.

I play dress-up for the first service. I put on a suit and tie even though it makes me feel somewhat like a poser. For the second service I change into my comfortable clothes and feel more at home and able to breath. What puzzles me is the way people react.

I had one woman pretty upset with me when she saw that I had changed out of my suit and tie after the first service. "Don't you want to give God your best?" she asked. For her, my suit was "my best" and my jeans and argyle sweater were dumpy.

I didn't get drawn into debating clothing but I did toss her question around in my head a little. The reality was my suit outfit cost me less than $150 at an S&K Warehouse sale while the jeans, shirt, sweater, belt combo cost more than that. By her standards, I think I gave God my best in the second service ... if clothing has anything at all to do with it.

"Good to see you in a tie," one guy told me before the first service. I asked him why ties were important to him. He linked it to respect. We are good enough friends that I challenged him to do a little tie research in the coming week. Historically ties have been a sign of wealth, power and status. I wonder when they made the leap to being a sign of godliness for so many.

After the second worship service one woman was very upset that one of the guitar players had a tattoo. Her view was that he should have covered it up during the service. I don't even know where to go with that.

Adam and Eve were naked. Then they did what we all do; they went their own way and pushed God's way aside. As soon as they took the bite, the first thing that changed was their attitude about clothing. From fig leaves to togas to suits and ties, it has been a big deal ever since.

No, we can't worship naked. No matter what we wear or do not wear, it will always be an issue to some in this family of ours. I wonder if anyone heard what I said Sunday? I think it was good stuff.

What does God want us to wear? I think it's pretty clear in Colossians 3:12-14

So, chosen by God for this new life of love, dress in the wardrobe God picked out for you: compassion, kindness, humility, quiet strength, discipline. Be even-tempered, content with second place, quick to forgive an offense. Forgive as quickly and completely as the Master forgave you. And regardless of what else you put on, wear love. It's your basic, all-purpose garment. Never be without it.(The Message)

I can't seem to find God

"Where do you find God?"

Simple question but I had no simple answer. Actually I had no answer. That bugged me. What kind of Christ follower can't even tell you where he finds God?

I've never had God speak to me. He doesn't talk to me. Honestly, I'm glad He doesn't. I'm pretty sure I'll have a heart attack if I wake up to the voice of God. Will He sound like the booming echo in the Ten Commandments or will He have the English accent fresh from Monty Python? Either way I am pretty sure I'd drop dead from fear. I read of a televangelist saying Jesus appears to him while he shaves and they chat it up. If that happens to me I will be unconscious from the moment my forehead bounces off the rim of the toilet on my way to instantly being on my face before God.

Where do I find God since He's not handing me a towel in the morning? My friend's question nagged me for a couple days until the "ah hah!" moment hit.

It's a little bit gross but stick with me. The answer came when I was riding a local trail by the city sewer plant. The stench was as awful as ever from the giant mixers churning the lumpy brown water in huge, outdoor, cement pools. When i was riding past, trying to hold my breath, a bunch of little birds decided to play with me. When I approached them in their spot on the chainlink fence, they darted out in front of me to the berry bushes on the other side of the path. Looking for them I had to also see the view of the Maine coast with a rusty train tressel stretching across the bay.  Not seeing the birds, I started noticing the stench again. Woosh! The birds were back on the fence making a racket. I think they were laughing at me.

A few of them almost hit me when they darted back to the oceanside. The clouds were piled on top of each other like cotton and the water was a vibrant blue. The sewer plant was behind me now.

And that's where it hit me. My friend's question was a mystery to me because I don't have to "find" God at all. Instead I just have to see Him in every setting and every circumstance. He saturates everything.

I think we all tend to focus on the sewage too much. Maybe those birds were laughing at me because I was so busy complaining about how bad things smelled that I was missing God's handiwork. I was missing the mystery of the divine.

Maybe God used those birds to speak to me? Naah, that's crazy talk, right?

"By taking a long and thoughtful look at what God has created, people have always been able to see what their eyes as such can't see: eternal power, for instance, and the mystery of his divine being. So nobody has a good excuse." Romans 1:20, The Message