What Are You Wearing?

“Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience.” –Colossians 3:12 (NIV)

One can often learn a lot about a person by the clothes he wears. Clothes can send a message about a person’s background, attitude, and personality even before the wearer utters a word himself. We can discern a person’s profession by the uniform he wears and their ethnicity on occasions where they would wear their native dress. Even more important is how a person wears his clothes. If an office worker shows up to his workplace wearing a neatly kept suit, it reveals his discipline, and commitment to represent his company well. Conversely, if a person should come to work wearing a suit, but one that is unkempt, it reflects his blasé and careless attitude towards his job. Whether we like it or not, people are always watching us and how we present ourselves before others is a choice we all have to make.

The love and righteousness of Christ are like clothes which we wear. They are beautifully designed, immaculately clean, and are gifts which Christ is more than willing to offer. Yet in our fallible human wisdom we choose not to wear them. Like little children who are excited about recieving new clothes, yet are unable to let go of a cherished shirt or dress that is worn and torn, we are comfortable wearing our clothes of sin and in fact prefer it. However, we do not realize how worn they are and how we are cheating ourselves out of something that is better than what we have. Once we have realized the filthiness of the clothes of sin which we are wearing, we try to wash the grime and mend the holes they have by ourselves. But we soon realize that we can do nothing to repair these clothes for our sinful nature is something that needs to be done away with entirely. Only Christ can give us new clothes of His love and righteousness and we receive them when we have allowed His Spirit to reside in our hearts. These clothes however come with a choice. Will we choose to return to our old clothes and shame ourselves by allowing sin to be displayed in our lives? Or will we choose today to allow Christ to help us put on His garments of love so that Christ may restore our lives as He draws others to Himself?

Scripture taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved.