A Sharp Dressed Man

I went to our local thrift store and bought an outfit, (Dark brown 1970’s pants, Hot Pink 1980’s shirt, Ugly tie, and 1950’s navy blue sports coat with red stiching) to preach this sermon. It went over real well.

A Sharp Dressed Man

Colossians 3: 5-14

By now the all of your Christmas presents should be open and the trash hauled off to the dump. Some of you have already stood in the long lines to take back the gifts that were the wrong size, style, color, or just plain wrong.

When I was growing up Toys gave way to clothes, and my parents used to have a philosophy about shopping for me around Christmas and my Birthday. They would go to a store and find the ugliest outfit they could and get it for me. They knew that I would love it and wear it, and I usually did. Today you probably think that I went and got some of my clothes from High School to preach to you this morning. They say that the clothes make the man. And to a point I believe that’s true.

If you see someone who is wearing ragged and dirty clothes their hair is unkempt and dirty you generally make some assumptions about them. But if you see someone in a Brooks Brothers Suit the assumption is usually not the same.

There is a story told about an incident that happened at a Cadillac Dealership in Tennessee. A man appeared on the car lot back in 1956 wearing an old hunting cap, a dirty pair of overalls, and muddy boots. He meandered around the lot for almost 30 minutes with no one offering to help him. The manager of the Car lot asked the newest employee to go and see he could get him to leave. It wasn’t good for business to have unsavory characters out there with potential customers. The new sales man obliged and went out to meet the man.

The man in the overalls greeted the sales man with some questions about some of the cars, and the standard equipment on the vehicles. The salesman was rather short with his answers, trying to be polite but also trying to let the man know that he wasn’t really interested in wasting his time. After about five minutes the man in the overalls asked the salesman if they would accept cash for the cars or did they need a check. Trying not to laugh the sales man said either would be fine. So the man in the overalls said I would like to pay cash for this car, in every color.

The man in the hunting cap, dirty pair of overalls, and muddy boots was none other than Elvis Presley.

In our passage today Paul discusses our clothing. Not our physical clothing, but how we dress and present ourselves to the world around us. He tells us that we who belong to Christ need to take off the worldly attitudes or attire of sexual sin, perversion, passion, lust, and greed (which is the same thing as worshiping wealth). anger, hot tempers, hatred, cursing, obscene language, and all similar sins. And don’t lie to each other.

There have been so many times that I have wanted to look at these lists found here and again in Revelation 21 and Galatians 5 and use them as a check list.

Sexual sin – Nope

Perversion – Nope

Lust – Nope

Greed – Nope

And I usually feel pretty good about myself so I stop while I am ahead. But Paul goes even further

Anger – Only justified anger, that’s spiritual right.

Hot tempers – Well it’s not as bad as it once was and any growth is spiritual growth

Cursing – Haven’t said my favorite word in months

Obscene language – Who is to say what is Obscene and what’s not.

And don’t lie to each other – I don’t lie especially to my brethren. Well maybe just little ones like when they ask me how I am and I say fine when really I’m not but they don’t want to hear about my problems so I am really doing it for them.

The Holy Spirit sees fit for Paul to write one more thing found in verses 9 and 10 “You’ve gotten rid of the person you used to be and the life you used to live, and become a new person.

Have we really become a new person? Are we really that different from world, or do we blend in with the wickedness quite well. If we are going to become the person that God desires for us to be most of us have got to change our clothes. We have got to take off the rags that the world offers us and be dressed in the robes of the believers. We must be dressed like those who have been chosen by God.