“Because of the irreverence in attitude, dress, and deportment, and lack of a worshipful frame of mind, God has often turned His face away from those assembled for His worship” (5T 498.3).
As we “press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus” (Phil 3:14) let us do all that we need to do - and that includes to dress with reverence when we assemble to worship.
Dress For Success
I am sure that all of us have as our main goal in life to please God. I am also certain that we are aligned with Paul when he wrote in 1 Corinthians 9:24 “ Do you not know that 2 those who run in a race all run, but one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may obtain it.” Our prize is eternal life with our Heavenly Father. Can you imagine it?
Often in our everyday lives it is easy to forget who God actually is.
Apart from the High Priest, who was only to speak the name of God in the Holy of Holies in the Temple in Jerusalem on Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement), the people in the courtyard simply prostrated themselves as they heard God’s name spoken aloud.
Our God is Holy
The reason I open this article with this is to remind each of us of His holiness. I know we all know that, but in the busyness of today’s world, and with the growing casualness of our churches, it is important to remember our God is holy.
I lead into this second article on dress with this reminder because the focus today is dressing for times of corporate worship - for church as we worship our God, the Lord God Almighty. I was moved when I read about how seriously and earnestly these devout Jews of old took worship. As I pictured them prostrating themselves purely because God’s name was being said aloud, it sobered me thinking about what our divine services can be like now. So I preface my thoughts about dress for church with this reminder of the awesomeness of God. We do ourselves a disservice forgetting this, and we do God an injustice when we forget His majesty, or take our relationship with Him for granted, or lightly.
Once again, as per my first article, none of this is said in condemnation of another. We each must respond to how God is speaking to us about any topic. But, equally, this is not subjective. How God speaks to us is not some sort of movable feast, varying widely from person to person. We need less of “God said to me…” and more of “Thus saith the Lord”.
We are blessed with His Word recorded in our Bibles, and as Seventh-day Adventist Christians, we are further blessed with the writings of Sister White, who as our Spirit of Prophecy acts as the lesser light, providing clarification for the greater light, God, as revealed in His written Word.
Sometimes some topics are not spelled out clearly. Then we have our traditional method of Biblical interpretation to guide us: each verse should be explained and clarified by other verses. There are always clear principles throughout the Word — if we dig for those nuggets of gold, and then once discovered, are humble enough to modify ourselves and our daily practice to align with those gems. The outworking of our faith ought to be Bible-based, rather than it being shaped by the culture we are living in.
Often topics lacking Biblical clarity are thankfully made clear by Sister White in her writings. She has much to say about today’s topic: worship and appearance.Her instructions, alongside Biblical injunctions, enable each of us to gain clarity for ourselves going forward.
Many of us have observed how all practices surrounding church have evolved over the past four decades, since the liberalisation of the 1960s: music, appearance, who is now pastoring and leading the flocks, even the manner and atmosphere of the services. There seems to be two main arguments regarding how church ought to be: reverence on the one hand, and being ‘user-friendly’ and tolerant on the other hand.
I am certainly not sitting in judgement about this. My daughter attends a modern-style church, where they wear jeans, the music is modern, with drinks available throughout the service, and the cushioned chairs symbolic of the whole thing — padded comfort.
When I was her age, I attended a Pentecostal-style church, and that was part of my journey that led me to where I am today: it sat uncomfortably, and led me to questioning this very topic: how should I best worship God? My daughter is starting to query and ponder the same question, and we have many discussions about this topic, and as she earnestly seeks to do right, my prayer is whatever she does, is pleasing to God, and evolves as she matures in Christ.
Two Key Understandings:
Setting aside the other aspects of corporate worship, today we focus on our outward appearance. As I said in the last article, our bottom-line regarding how we look is based on two foundational understandings:
1. Firstly, we are here to please God, so as we journey forwards, day by day, it is about doing what He wants, which may mean less of what we want. And this leads onto the second premise.
2. Secondly, what we look like on the outside ought to be an outward expression of what is going on in the inside.
God refines us, as per Isaiah 48, where He says “Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver; I have tested you in the furnace of affliction.” This analogy of being refined continues through to the end of His written word, to Revelation, where we are instructed through John,
“I advise you to buy from Me gold refined by fire so that you may become rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourself, and that the shame of your nakedness will not be revealed; and eye salve to anoint your eyes so that you may see.”
In these times, we need eye salve to anoint our eyes to see things as God sees them. Even within our precious Seventh-day Adventist Church, our sight is often dimmed by the cultural norms of today’s society, so that instead of being light to the world around us, worldliness is penetrating into our sacred domain, and blinding us - just like when we look at the sun, and our eyesight darkens through that overwhelming blast of brightness.
Our Choice: Lowest Common Denominator OR Being our Best?
It may not be a salvational issue if we wear jeans or shorts to church, BUT is it the best we can do? Different story if we are a visitor or someone new, investigating church. But for those of us who are believers, baptised, and maturing from milk to meat Christians, we know that divine service is just that: divine. This is a sacred space and time. Time worshiping the Lord God Almighty. The Creator and Sustainer of ALL things. If ever there was a time to dress our best, it is when we go to corporately worship the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.
Here in my country, people spend extraordinary amounts of money to buy special clothes for the horse races. They are not often all that interested in the actual horse-racing but it is one of the rare occasions left when people get a chance to dress up. I know of young women who spend months planning their outfit, putting onto layby [pay by installments] their beautiful cocktail-style dresses and fascinator hats with elegant high-heels for those events, many months away. They book spray tans, professional make-up, and fake nails. All for some horses running clockwise in an event they don’t even understand. Yet those Christians amongst them then turn up to church in jeans and a T-shirt: go figure that one.
One analogy I can always relate to is that of layers of an onion. To me, this is how I see many of these things regarding our Christian walk. It is like the milk and meat analogy Paul uses in 1 Corinthians 3 to describe our progress as Christians as we mature in our faith. We ought not to be complacent. What we thought was okay may and most likely will evolve over time as we walk closer to God, day by day, year by year. Jeans and T-shirts may have been the garb of our younger or new Christian days, but as we mature, and grow in our understanding and appreciation of how the Almighty God of the entire universe stepped down through His Son to save me, I start to feel like I can do better than jeans when I come into His presence. Affliction, as per our earlier verse, also tends to be a great help in gaining this clarity, and deepening our journey.
There shouldn’t need to be rules for just the pastor and his wife, or the team ‘on duty’. We are all ambassadors for Christ. Imagine if we were really ambassadors as our secular job - we would not dare to turn up in jeans and a T-shirt to present ourselves to our new country’s leader. We would be fired for contempt.
Modesty
Part of Biblical injunction regarding appearance and behaviour is the constant and repeated call for modesty. Modesty is synonymous with simplicity. Being humble. In Vine’s Expository Dictionary we are told it means to be “ orderly, well-arranged, decent, modest”, as it is used in 1Timothy 2:9 regarding the apparel with which Christian women are to adorn themselves, and in 1Timothy 3:2 as one of the qualifications essential for a bishop or overseer (“orderly” or “of good behaviour”). So this applies to both men and women.
[Editorial insertion. An example of immodest dress is on the cover of the November Pacific Union Recorder.]
Immodest Fixed
Obviously this overflows into normal, everyday life, and links in with my previous article, but regarding appearance for church, we all ought to be arriving acting and looking orderly, well-arranged, decent, and modest. We know from my previous article that the Bible and Spirit of Prophecy tell us directly to dress appropriately for the gender we are born into; now we are taking this a step further - regarding the impression we ought to be giving. And that impression ought to reflect what is really going in within, which is what God is most interested in:
“The LORD does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart” ( 1 Samuel 16:7).
So some guidelines to ponder…
1. We are not to condemn: If someone turns up in jeans, a tattoo, and hair matted, we know that Jesus would go over and sit with him or her, and love them. Remember, Christ’s method:
“Christ’s method alone will give true success in reaching the people. The Savior mingled with people as one who desired their good. He showed sympathy for them, ministered to their needs, and won their confidence. Then He invited them, “Follow Me” (MHH 73).
All our journeys began somewhere - as Jesus said:
“Judge not, that you be not judged. For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you. And why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye? (Matt.7:1-3).
2. We are to not spend huge amounts! Simplicity and modesty is the key: Even if we can afford high-end clothing and elegant wear, we need to be mindful of how that makes others feel. Nothing ought to distract from our shared enjoyment of worshipping God together.
“On Sunday many popular churches appear more like a theater than like a place for the worship of God. Every fashionable dress is displayed there. Many of the poor have not courage to enter such houses of worship. Their plain dress, though it may be neat, is in marked contrast with that of their more wealthy sisters, and this difference causes them to feel embarrassed” (CTBH 85).
3. The focus is to honour God: There are many cut-price stores and second-hand shops that enable everyone of us to have at least one good set of clothes for divine worship.
“All who meet upon the Sabbath to worship God, should, if possible, have neat, well-fitting, comely garments to wear in the house of worship. It is a dishonor to the Sabbath, to God, and to his house, for those who profess to believe that the Sabbath is the holy of the Lord, and honorable, to wear upon that day the soiled clothing which they have worn through the labors of the week, if they can obtain anything more suitable” (CTBH 86).
4. Priorities - Action expresses priorities: If we can make an effort to dress well for our work, or to go to a wedding, or a work function, or even some other event, how much more we need to make that effort for God. If we say God is the top priority in our life, let’s be consistent, and demonstrate that. Actions speak louder than words. If we say we believe God is holy, and we believe in the Bible, which states God is a jealous God, let’s show that - let’s respect God and respect ourselves, by having integrity around what we say we believe.
“I am often pained as I enter the house where God is worshiped, to see the untidy dress of both men and women. If the heart and character were indicated by the outward apparel, then certainly nothing could be heavenly about them. They have no true idea of the order, the neatness, and the refined deportment that God requires of all who come into His presence to worship Him. What impressions do these things give to unbelievers and to the youth, who are keen to discern and to draw their conclusions?” (5T 498)
5. Remember, we are each Ambassadors for Christ: The final sentence of that last quote from Sister White reminds us of the other aspect of our every waking moment - we also need to be mindful of our impact on others. God could have converted the others around us Himself, or used His holy angels, but He chose us to undertake this most important task. It is stated explicitly in God’s Word “Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ” (2 Cor. 5:20).
If we turned up each week to church in our jeans and T-shirt, it may give the impression that anything goes and it is okay to stay as you are, whereas Jesus never expected people to stay as they were when He found them. Spirit of Prophecy reminds us over and over of the reverence required when worshiping God in church:
“Some will enter the place of worship with their hats on, in soiled, dirty clothes. Such do not realize that they are to meet with God and holy angels. There should be a radical change in this matter all through our churches. Ministers themselves need to elevate their ideas, to have finer susceptibilities in regard to it. It is a feature of the work that has been sadly neglected. Because of the irreverence in attitude, dress, and deportment, and lack of a worshipful frame of mind, God has often turned His face away from those assembled for His worship” (5T 498).
Concluding thoughts...
None of us want God to turn His face away from us when we are assembled for His worship. Sister White continues “Unless correct ideas of true worship and true reverence are impressed upon the people, there will be a growing tendency to place the sacred and eternal on a level with common things, and those professing the truth will be an offense to God and a disgrace to religion”.
Sobering words. Serious work ahead for us all. These times we are in call for greater reflection of each aspect of ourselves, including our appearance - not to navel-gaze but to lift our gaze to God. Sister White finishes that portion regarding church and appearance with pointed words that continue with the connection between our appearance and worship at church, but now extending this connection further - to preparation for our eternal lives:
“They can never, with their uncultivated ideas, appreciate a pure and holy heaven, and be prepared to join with the worshipers in the heavenly courts above, where all is purity and perfection, where every being has perfect reverence for God and His holiness” (5T 500).
Wow — lofty words!
The outward appearance reflects the inward state of our being. And both reflect our eternal destination. This ought to be the purpose of all that we do. “Whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God” (1 Cor 10:31).
Let’s keep our eye on the prize. Let us not allow anything to distract us, or to keep us earth-bound. Instead, let us raise the bar, and live our lives worthy of our true home, the heavenly courts. May we cultivate right ideas about all that we do and all that we are, including seemingly simple things like our clothing and our appearance. If we truly want to attain that prize, as we head for our heavenly home, and prepare to meet our Heavenly Father, awaiting to hear those words “Well done good and faithful servant” , may we each dress for success.
Sharyn Dunn writes from Dunedin, New Zealand. “Kiwi Girl” is a member of one of the world’s most southern Seventh-day Adventist Churches, and enjoys time with her children, reading Spirit of Prophecy, and improving each batch of bread.