New Clothes For The New You!

Scripture: Colossians 3:1-17

Theme: New Life - New Clothes or New Clothes for the New You!

INTRO:

Good morning and I am so glad you are here this morning!

Throughout the years, America has been identified by various iconic images. For example, during the great western expansion days, our nation was dotted with wagon trains heading west and wooden forts being built all across the plains. During the Industrial age, we were a nation littered with bricked factories, manufacturing plants and smoke stacks that lined the skies. As we transitioned into the Information Age, those factories and manufacturing plants were replaced with Dot.com sky scrapers and mini-Silicon Valleys. The old smoke stacks which were replaced with electrical grids, giant wind turbines and solar panels kissing the sun.

Today, at least on the weekends, we could be known as a nation of garage sales. As soon as the weather warms, out come all the garage sale signs. All you have to do is to travel to Erin, Cumberland City, Dickson or to Clarksville, TN and you will find dozens and dozens of yard sales littering the highways and subdivisions. Everywhere, people are encouraging others to take home some precious pre-owned treasures for a fraction of their original price.

I am sure, this morning, that we have dozens of people who love to go garage sale shopping as much as others like to be out on the water in their fishing boats or riding on a jet ski. Our garage sale lovers are keen bargain hunters. They get all charged up in the adventure of finding a valuable treasure or a super deal. Garage sale shopping is in their DNA and they love it.

There are times that I too, like to visit a garage sale. Usually, it is when I want to observe people and how they interact with one another. I like to watch how the seller and the buyer communicate with one another over different sale items. I like to watch how people share life together as they share their individual stories. You can hear a great deal of life at a garage sale if you just listen. A lot of times, life around a modern garage sale is similar to life around an ancient watering hole. Ancient watering holes were these places that people would gather to get their daily supply of water. And as they gathered their water they would talk, share life and even barter and trade goods.

If you have been to a recent garage sale, one of the things that you quickly notice is the over abundance of clothing we have in our country. More often than not, there is this abundance of clothing, especially, baby and children's clothing. No child in America should ever be in need of something to wear with all of our garage sales.

Did you know, that there was a time when having more than two or three changes of clothes was rather unusual in our country? If we could travel back to the time of the Little House on the Prairie (late 1800's) or even to the time of the Walton's (1933 -1946), we would discover that most people owned only one, two or at most three changes of clothing.

I remember when the Erin COTN bought the old Coleman house, one of the things that we noticed was that most of the rooms did not have an original closet. And the rooms that did have a closet had a very tiny closet. Houses built back in the time of the Coleman house (early 1900's) did not build the large walk in closets that are so common today. They did not need them. Why would you need this big ole closet when all you had was one or two outfits and a couple pair of shoes?

Today, houses are built with closets that would rival ancient bedrooms for their size. In fact, one of the selling points of many homes, is the fact that they have these large wardrobe closets. If there one thing we Americans love almost as much as food, it is clothing. We love to wear clothes, we look good in them and we love to constantly update our clothing.

Our passage this morning, deals with the metaphor of clothing. Paul uses the metaphor of clothing as a way to teach about the new life in Christ. It appears, that the Colossian people also loved clothing. Given the fact, that their city was located on one of the major trade route that brought together Greece, Rome, Syria and Mesopotamia this should not surprise us. Every day, the people of Colossae had a front role seat as they watched travelers and caravans transport goods along their roads. Each day they would have been able to witness all kinds of different dress and apparel.