Have you ever come upon beauty products, especially perfumes, with very unusual names such as Seduction, Lust, Passion, Scandal, Savage, Black Night, Vampire, Cobra, and so on? Some of them with the creepy design of skulls, snakes, and such other eerie stuff? I have, and I generally refrain from them, because I judge that they belong to the opposite side of my spirituality. Don’t ask about my experience. That will be an arresting story for another day.
Interestingly, God has beauty products, too – with very wholesome names; names that transmit a unique flavour to the wearer. Isaiah 61:3, for example, lists two of them: “the oil of joy” which leaves a lasting impression of joy upon the wearer, and a matching designer dress called “the garment of praise,” in contrast to the opposite design called the “mourning apparel” (2 Samuel 14:2). There is also a girdle of which the Psalmist speaks, a girdle or belt of gladness (Psalm 30:11). On the opposite side, Solomon lists one reprehensible fashion called “the attire of an harlot” (Proverbs 7:10). It would appear, according to Solomon here, that your garment gives you a name.
Applicably, Paul, in Ephesians 6:14-17, lists and recommends a more specialised set of outfits with their brand names; from headgears down to footwear. Visit that shop if you would.
When people dress lousily, they get curiously hailed by their kind as being ‘sexy,’ ‘killing,’ ‘hot,’ ‘cute.’ Similarly, those whom the Lord attires attract related commendations: “they might be CALLED trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he might be glorified” (Isaiah 61:3); Trees of Righteousness that glorify their Lord – not some lousy ‘admirer.’ Your fashion often gives you a name, a respectful or a reprobate name. It’s up to you what you wish to be called.
Isaiah invites us into the Lord’s beauty salon, and there to “put on thy strength … thy beautiful garments.” According to this prophet, the “beautiful garment” you wear not only gives a kind of self-confidence or “strength,” it also determines both what you attract and the name that you get called. “In thy beautiful garment,” according to the prophet, “there shall no more come into thee the uncircumcised and the unclean.” In other words, you cannot, in such different garments of honour, continue to attract the same scandalous attention and reproachable characters. Not every garment attracts the uncircumcised and the unclean. The previous garments probably did (Isaiah 52:1).
Don’t always blame what you attract. Check your garments. Choose your wardrobe.
From The Preacher’s diary,
Sept 27, 2023.
