Do you remember playing dress up? Or maybe you remember your kids playing dress up? What were your favorite things to dress up as?
[Take responses from the congregation.]
Did you every wear your parents’ clothes?
In his letter to the Christians in Galatia, Paul writes, “As many of you as were baptized into Christ, have clothed yourselves in Christ.” This powerful image of being “clothed in Christ,” gives us a some key insights into what life in Christ is meant to be.
First, we are meant to find our primary identity in Christ. Clothes tell us a lot about someone, don’t they? In fact, most of the time we choose our clothes to say certain things about ourselves. If we wear Patriots, Red Sox or Celtics gear, we are identifying with that team. Can you imagine wearing your Red Sox gear in New York City? One of my friends is a NY Yankees fan—I know, there’s no accounting for taste—and he had the courage and fortitude to wear his Yankees gear to a Red Sox game. Boy! Did he catch it from the Red Sox fans! They didn’t care about how kind and gentle he is. The generous people there recognized him as a baseball fan and might respect him for that, but it was a long night for my buddy. Being clothed in Christ means—whatever we are wearing—for us belonging to Christ and living for Christ is the most important part of who we are.
Second, we are reminded of the closeness of our relationship to Christ. I love raiding my Dad’s closet. Many years ago, I “stole” a wonderful, very unique sweater. Initially, it smelled like him, but has always reminded me of my cool Dad. I have depended on it to kept me warm on cold days. Wearing that sweater is like getting a hug from my Dad. In some ways it’s better—I can’t have Dad hugging me everywhere I go, but I can wear the sweater! When we are clothed with Jesus, there’s a rich intimacy to the experience. Just as my sweater is close to me, so is Jesus, embracing me as I travel on my day. I depend on Christ to keep me warm when the world can be so cold. Just as we can feel our clothing if we take a moment to focus, so we can experience the intimate feel of Jesus if we are mindful.
Finally, we are to imitate Christ. When I was a kid, I loved trying on my Dad’s clothes. I really couldn’t imagine that I would ever be big enough to fit in them, but I knew I wanted to be like him when I grew up. When we were playing dress up, we were really trying on an identity, trying to experience a piece of what it was like to be an astronaut, princess, lawyer, mom or dad. In our minds, we believed the phrase, “the clothes maketh a person.”[1]In a sense, being clothed in Christ means we want to grow up to be like Him. Whatever we are wearing, our prayer is that others will see grace and honesty, kindness and justice, sacrifice and spiritual maturity, joy and truth—that they will see Christ in us.
In our society, clothes are often used to set up divisions—Red Sox or Yankees, rich or poor, weak or powerful, male or female, goth, gay, ethnic—they are all divisions we can often see in clothes and manners. Part of what Paul wants the Galatians to do is to look past the clothes, to see Christ on each other. That’s why Paul says, “There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.” “No longer Jew or Greek” means cultural barriers just don’t matter, and we can accept one another without one group feeling superior or inferior. “No longer slave or free” means God looks past finances, manners and immigration status; and we are called to do the same. “No longer male or female” means we see people’s giftedness before we see their gender. Paul is talking about how Christians are to see other Christians—to look for Christ first in each other. But more importantly, to see that we are all heirs of the promise in Jesus Christ. Because Christ has come upon us, clothed us in the richness of His sacrifice, we recognize we have all received an instant promotion—to first-born, full-inheritance status. God takes us from just like anybody else, to being a loved child of God, to being the inheritor of the kingdom. And there will come a day, when we are not just clothed in Christ, but we will see Him face to face. May the prayers of our hearts be “Lord, I want You at the core of my identity, in the deepest places of who I am. Lord, help me be mindful of how close You really are, and help me live like You, longing for grace to be the most obvious part of who I am. Help us to see Christ in each other! Come, Lord, Jesus, and be the intimate focus of our lives!”
[1]“clothes maketh the man” is sometimes attributed to Mark Twain (Samuel Longhorne Clemens), but probably dates back at least to the great Erasmus in the 1500s. https://alex-65670.medium.com/what-is-the-origin-of-clothes-make-the-man-7f75e070bf45. https://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/clothes+make+the+man.