Dress Up

My Most Embarrassing Moment happened in first grade. I was deliriously crazy about a brand new winter coat that was hanging in my closet. At the beginning of the school year, that coat teased me for the first couple of months of warm California weather. Finally, when I woke up on the very first crisp morning, I literally jumped from my bed, gulped my cereal, and then donned the beautiful blue coat I had been dying to wear.

I remember the walk to school that day. I couldn’t bump into enough people. I wanted everyone to notice my coat.

When I arrived at my classroom door, I paused. My teacher was standing outside the door. I wanted to make sure all my classmates turned to look at my brand new coat before I had to unbutton it and place it on a coat hook, so I made a huge production of sliding my arms out of the sleeves.

As long as I live, I will never forget the laughter that poured out of that classroom. In my haste that morning, I had put on my slip before eating my cereal and then rushed to put on my coat. I had forgotten to put on my dress. I was standing in front of my class half-naked.

When Adam and Eve sinned, they noticed for the very first time that they were nude. Imagine. Outside of babies, I cannot comprehend what it would be like to walk around completely naked and neither flinch in disgust nor die of embarrassment. In fact, some of my worst nightmares have involved scenes of being naked in public. Thanks to our ancestors, guilt and shame are a part of me. They’re a part of you.

Adam and Eve did what I would do if I were caught naked. They grabbed some clothes. Now, I would reach for my bathrobe. But remember, Adam and Eve didn’t own a stitch of clothing. So, they reached for the first thing they could find. Some fig leaves.

Ha Ha. That’s pretty funny. As if a fig leaf were enough to cover them. And keep them covered.

But God wasn’t laughing. He didn’t think it was a bit funny that Adam and Eve had outright disobeyed Him and ruined everything.

I used to have the feeling that God pretty much turned away from His first creations in disgust. I mean, He did kick them out of Paradise…

But now I realize that God didn’t turn away. Quite the opposite. Instead, He hung in there and took care of the sin problem. He killed some animals and made a wardrobe for Adam and Eve that would appropriately cover them and, unlike the fig leaves, would hold up over time.

God still does that.

When it comes to sin in our own hearts, we can get pretty good about grabbing at things to cover up with. Anything will do. We pretend it isn’t sin (we call it a weakness, a failure, a natural reflex, a tendency, a bad habit, a sickness); we make excuses for it (it’s not like I intended to, it’s not like everyone else doesn’t do the same thing or worse, it’s the way I am, I can’t help it); we blame something or someone else (if it weren’t for ___________); we make up for it by doing something good (it’s not like I’m a bad person).

The truth is, we can look as ridiculous as Adam and Eve looked in their fig leaves. What we come up with on our own doesn’t cover our sin. No matter how desperately we may try to hide it, our sin is still exposed to God. Clothed in our handmade excuses, we’re still naked as yard dogs.

We need new garments. And God offers us a wardrobe that is not only sufficient, but will hold up for all eternity. When we acknowledge our need for a Savior, believe in our hearts that God sent Jesus to die for our sins, and then ask for and receive God's forgiveness, our sins are mercifully removed from us. Many theologians believe when God killed an animal to dress Adam and Eve in skins and fur, it served as the first blood offering for sin. If that is true, that sacrificial animal was only a foreshadow of the Lamb of God Who Takes Away the Sins of the World. God offers to clothe us with the righteousness of Christ and exchange our sin for His holiness. He made the One who did not know sin to be sin for us, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. (2 Corinthians 5:21)


It’s pretty clear that God doesn’t wrestle us down and make us behave properly. If He wanted to, He certainly could. Instead, God makes us innocent and blameless before Him. Yes, perfectly innocent. Perfectly blameless. Then, as we go about our everyday lives, His Spirit who came to live in us when we received Christ teaches us to conform every decision, attitude, plan, desire, and dream to His holiness. The Bible makes a big deal out of what to wear and What Not To Wear. We’re told to clothe ourselves with humility, compassion, gentleness and patience, to put on the full armor of God, to dress with decency and good sense…to take off anger and lying and sexual sins and and on and on. But it’s about more than following rules or conducting ourselves so we “look like a Christian.” Instead, it’s about falling so in love with God that we want to line our hearts up with His.
But whoever keeps His word, truly in him the love of God is perfected. This is how we know we are in Him: the one who says he remains in Him should walk just as He walked. (1 John 2:5-6)

Clothed with Christ. We don't have to try to look good. We just have to act like who we are.