Changing Clothes

Read Colossians 3:7-14 (NLT)

Spring had sprung! Sunshine, flowers in bloom, and warmer temperatures … ahhh, living the good life! I was ready to put my winter wardrobe away and put on some lighter clothes, more appropriate for all that sunshine. Then, seemingly out of nowhere, it was cloudy and cold, five inches of snow blanketed the area, and that warmer clothing felt pretty comforting. I was glad I hadn’t put those heavy winter things away yet. I confess, as I’ve gotten older, I am less concerned with being fashionable and more concerned with dressing comfortably. Sometimes, it’s just hard to know what to wear and when to change my wardrobe for the next season.

While clothes began as a covering for our nakedness and a protection against the elements, clothes have become an expression of who we are, where we’re from, or what we represent. What a person wears says a lot about them. For example, a king may wear a crown, a soldier may wear boots and a uniform, and a priest may wear a collar. Someone from China may wear a kimono, someone from Germany lederhosen, or a Scotsman a plaid kilt. They are identified by what they are wearing.

But clothes are not just something in the physical world. Did you know you also have spiritual clothes? Isaiah 61:10 (NLT) says, “I am overwhelmed with joy in the Lord my God! For he has dressed me with the clothing of salvation and draped me in a robe of righteousness. I am like a bridegroom dressed for his wedding or a bride with her jewels.”

Colossians 3:7-12(NLT) says it is time to put off six things, namely, anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy language, and lying to one another since we have stripped off our sinful nature. We are to clothe ourselves with six things, that is, tenderhearted mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience, and love because we’ve put on our new nature and are becoming like Him.

The apostle Paul also speaks of clothes in regard to a change of season. “The night is almost gone; the day of salvation will soon be here. So remove your dark deeds like dirty clothes, and put on the shining armor of right living. Because we belong to the day, we must live decent lives for all to see. Don’t participate in the darkness of wild parties and drunkenness, or in sexual promiscuity and immoral living, or in quarreling and jealousy. Instead, clothe yourself with the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ. And don’t let yourself think about ways to indulge your evil desires” (Romans 13:12-14 NLT).

Just as every season needs a change of wardrobe, so the times in which we live require a clothing change. We will be identified by what we put off and what we put on. Ask the Lord, “What’s in my spiritual wardrobe that needs to be changed for this season?” Ask Him to clothe you with His presence, power, and grace.

~ Laura Strack