How are we to dress for church? I don't know....I'm asking you. Well I guess that I can't literally ask you but I'm am asking you to think about it. Some say that we are to come as we are.....meaning come dressed as who we are.....maybe shorts.....maybe even a tank top....if that's who we are. I've seen that before. Others say that we have to come in our Sunday best.....for it's only right.....and respectful....but one person's Sunday best might be another person's gardening clothes.
I haven't worn a suit to church since....2010....at our son's wedding. That was one nervous yet wonderful day. As my wife and I returned home that night I found that there had been a tennis ball in my pants pocket the whole day....church and all. Now I think that I know how it got there....as my mother was using a walker with tennis balls at the bottom of the legs....and one must have fallen off....but not remembering putting it in my pocket was what I thought to be odd.
I've never worn shorts to church....not even on a hot summer morning on a beach vacation. I do close my eyes often during the worship service today.....it's an age thing....or something like that....but I find that these ears that I have to hear....hear more clearly at those times. I'm one of those who in this pandemic will wait for a while until I go to church....and that also is just me....for it doesn't make sense to me to sing out praises....and have my breath on the neck of a person even two pews in front of me....but then....maybe it also has something to do with not having to ask my wife every week as we walk into church....which I do every single week....if my back is OK....no static clinging sock sticking to my shirt or anything.....(it happened once)....so the distractions are much fewer all around while streaming.
So back to my original question....what do we wear to church? OK....you want an answer....right or wrong or in between....since I brought up the question. The Apostle John may have given us one in his epistles....written to a church roughly in the same time period....probably a little before he wrote down....on the isle Patmos....on the Lord's Day....the seven letters to the churches at the beginning of the book of Revelation....of which I might add that the Alpha and the Omega said that blessed would the one who reads and heeds what John was writing down....so shouldn't we be like....meditating on these or something....to see if we might be in there?
The answer therefore...if it is an answer....forget the shorts or the suit or the socks....for we have to wear love....for there is more than even a normal scriptural emphasis in John's epistles....over and over and over again....telling us to make sure that we love each other.
I'm not trying to be cute here....for those persons in the same pew....or two pews in front....or joined together through the same streaming....listening to the same words....at the same time....different people....all saved for a reason that we will not know until later.....who were redeemed right out of the fire.....for absolutely nothing within ourselves....all in the same boat....all in the same storm.....some with fears....others to strengthen.....some prone to sleep....others to awaken....some with troubles....others with help....some to teach....others to listen....some to see...some to hear....some to feel....some to encourage....others to warn....so where does one's clothes come into this?
