- Because I am finally getting around to selling it (heads up, Check EBay this week),
- and because I finally have a digital photo of it to post (ha! a digital of an old fashioned photo)
- and because the forum where the article has been posted for years has been going offline (be sure to see the delightful comments folks have posted there).
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“MY DRESS FOR SALE ON E-BAY”
BUSTED: FAKING THE "BIG ONE"
I had been busted.
Immediately plunged into crisis by a simple question.
I intuitively knew that my answer to the simple, straightforward question would change my life. But for the life of me, I had no clue what the answer would, could or should be. The question was innocent and innocuous enough, but any answer would inevitably undress and unveil me as guilty. And it was not a “yes or no” question, but an open essay question. I had to actually talk; I had major explaining to do. But I was numbfounded and nailed. And busted big time.
The practical, provocative question that the bold asker asked, with equal parts “This is so bizarre; I really need to know” look in his eyes, and “I’m not sure I want to know” fearful waver in his voice? Read on, but only if you can handle the truth and whole truth (so help you, God) about me. Hold your breath..and if possible, your judgement. And don’t call the cops on me…yet. The life-rearranging question at hand:
“Pastor, If you don’t mind my asking…
...Why are you wearing a .....
dress?”
Thud.
No, that was not my body thudding the floor (though it was tempted in that direction), but the involuntarily and (hopefully) inaudible thud- gulp of simultaneous terror and relief that anyone whose secret, addiction, or sin has just been unceremoniously uncovered recognizes. I attempted to match my questioner’s bravery by looking him squarely in the eye; knowing I couldn’t opt out or cop out with a “Hey, I’d love to answer that sometime soon, but right now….wouldn’t you know it, it’s the darndest thing….. I feel a heart attack coming on. In fact, it feels like the ‘Big One.’ Say, would you mind calling 911?”
Oddly, in the midst of all this frantic and futile nanosecond daydreaming of escape-scenarios, one of my immediate reactions was admiration for this man’s bold honesty in even asking. Not so oddly, another reaction was praying desperately for every fire alarm on the block to suddenly sound, or at least for Jesus to come back. I knew I had no… good… answer. I nervously wiped my hand across my..uh, dress… and resigned myself to the inevitable: I had been outed. Confession time. I mustered all my inner reserves and resources; swallowed my pride and my earlier thud-gulp, and managed an initial:
“Uh…”
“Uh…well..,” My articulate non-answer uneloquently began. I made a
PAUL HARVEY INTERVENES
But before you call the counselors or cops on me, hear out the “rest of the story.” Starting with the prequel; the gentleman’s first question to me, as he shook my hand (and my world):
"Pastor, I loved the service...But I can ask one question?"
Like the holy fool (more on that moniker later) I was, I stupidly shot back a surefire “Sure!,” oblivious to the bomb about to drop.
Context: I had been doing the traditional pastoral "greeting everyone at the exit door" thing; like I had hundreds of times before; like thousands of pastors have done. You know: shaking hands with visitors, hugging the saints (sinners, too!), kissing babies, passing out cigars (OK, just kidding on that one!) hearing quick confessions and the requisite "Great sermon, Pastor," ….like most mainline church pastors are “job-descriptioned” into. It was maybe 1993….many moons and wineskins ago... when I was happily pastoring as an "underground evangelical missionary" in a denomination that “overground” was mainline, mainly sidelined… and mainly apostate. Despite the challenges, part of what I really enjoyed about being such a stealth Jesus-preaching pastor in a largely derailed denomination (many of my peer pastors were preaching anything but Jesus….from an easily digested Reader'sDigestism to all-out outright worship of Sophia…if worship of anyone at all!), but because the "official" doctrine was solid, and because I was called to that particular tribe, I was able to stay; taking much-needed encouragement from Paul’s model for such ministry: "becoming all things to all people that I might save some."
STEALTH PASTOR
So, as much as I could in good conscience, I went native; in many, if not all, things related to church culture-custom. And some were saved. I acculturated myself into the mainline expectations and roles. For example, it was not technically required, but an unwritten expectation/”rule” in this tradition that most pastors worth their salt and seminary would wear pastoral robes or clerical collars; at least for “official” worship services. I was never comfortable submitting to the former (but did for my first few years, as
I felt it was one of the “all things” that would help me gain a hearing..uh, job!), and only succumbed the latter once (That wild story in a minute!).As with many of the oldline denominational adherents, folks in our denominational “family” would move from another state, and upon arriving in our city, simply look up the closest church of that tribe, and go to it, immediately joining it, no questions asked! No need to church shop or hop, you trusted the brand name; the company store. You even brought with you a "letter of transfer." As unwise and naive as that often was, it often sovereignly and serendipitously worked in our favor: people “accidentally” found Christ! People that had never tasted vibrant relationship with the Christ of Christianity, but had grown up in a congregation of our ‘brand name” (sometimes for four generations back) would trust a “transfer” and “lateral move” to our town and church; often experiencing conversion before they knew what/Who hit them! And because they trusted the "company message" , they often trusted Christ. After all, you are “supposed to" trust and obey what the "professionally trained clergy” says. I loved it when people would make an appointment with me (the officially “dressed” representative of God and “home office”) to talk about "getting my kid done" (baptized). When they came in, I didn't chew them out about trusting in a ritual to magically save their kid; I started where they were; and walked them through the (thoroughly evangelical) parental vows in the "official manual" for baptism, and was able to simply point them towards a more biblical view of, and relationship with, Jesus. It was rewarding stuff. Even if the right doors only opened for three wrong reasons: because I went to the right school, belonged to the right outfit…. AND wore the right outfit. Jesus, in Matthew 10:16 had asked us to be “sneaky as snakes and docile as doves.” So I dressed like a snake…uh, woman…uh, “professional “ pastor. But I was a dove inside.
Once I had a 92 year old trust Jesus in my office, when he heard of such a possibility for the first time (though he had attended that church for decades, perhaps since before I..or my parents..were born). I heard later that around twenty years before, he had felt that there might be "something he needed to do" to get right with God. He did what he was "supposed to do," he made an appointment with the pastor at the time, who dutifully told him "Don't worry about it, just join the church, and you will be fine." The pastor assured him that any talk he might have been hearing about "accepting Jesus" was huge hogwash! (the kind of wild-eyed fanaticism advocated by those churches and pastors who didn’t wear dresses).
So what an honor to find that this man was still hungry for the “something more” It was beautiful. Oh, did I mention this was a premarital counseling appointment?! It was unspeakably cool and confirming to officiate the wedding of a new convert nonageneraian and his lovely and Jesus-loving (eighty-something ) bride…even if I did have to don the dreaded dress (the bride’s was far prettier!) for the ceremony.
But it was worth it all to hear stories about the last few tears of this man’s married life, as age and Alzheimers crept in. It seems he would actually say things like "This is my wife..uh, what's your name, honey?....But let me tell you about Jesus!!".
Husband and wife are both with Jesus now, and could it be that they might not be if I hadn’t… dressed right?
HE NEVER CAME BACK
I don’t know, but it’s time to get back to the prequel:
"So glad you felt at home.,” I assured the first-time visitor, whose turn in line was about to take a twist, and last a bit longer than the typical transaction….all because I added, “Sure, ask your question..(famous last word)..anything!"
"Okay.” He hesitated momentarily but spit it out. "Pastor….Why do you wear a dress?"
This is where you came in. Now you recall my thunderstruck thud.
But how could he NOT have asked? Unlike veteran mainliners who knew no other appropriate attire for a “preacher”, this pre-Christian seeker (refreshingly) had zero background with church and Christianese, let alone church culture cues, or dress codes thereof. Thus he honestly had no clue or construct about what to do with a robed preacher. The only possible word he had in his file for what I was wearing was “dress.” (Hey, it least it was my “color,” as the sweet church ladies always told me!).
So it was a legitimate and logical question. Actually, I have no full memory of the particular answer I fumbled and stumbled out. It must have been something like: “Oh, that! (Laughing) Gee, I realize how it could look like a dress; but hey, don’t worry! In our tradition, pastors often wear robes to….” How in the world did I finish that sentence?! I had no acceptable answer, and still don’t, at least acceptable to me. But thank God the good man seemed fairly satisfied with all that I said; at left least mostly convinced that I wasn’t a cross-dresser (Though I doubt he’d let me babysit his kids!).
But the sequel is telling: Even though he admitted loving the worship service that day (he seemed to really mean it, and I already had all kinds of hope for him encountering Christ among us), you guessed it:
He never came back.
Which is partly why my robe is on sale on EBay.
Soon after, I finally quit wearing a robe at that church, I just couldn't do it for a number of reasons. Primary among them was not “What do non-Christians think about guys wearing dresses?”, but gnotty theological problems I had wrestled with from day one of my days in the pastorate, and in the outfit. Note well that I had (and have) no problem with pastors who feel and dress differently than I now do, in fact they had better dress as they believe they are called. But for me, it would be a compromise, even a sin, to wear the old robe (even the one that was my color) on Sundays, and I would actually challenge all pastors and priests to consider prayerfully and carefully the message that the medium (robes) inescapably send. Again, “Some of my best friends wear robes,” and it is invigorating to see new life flood postmodern-sensitive churches are they blend old and new with meaningful liturgy..sometimes involving robes. One need not throw the wine out with wineskin; nor the robe with the vow to eschew “meaningless ritual.” Like Paul in Philippians 1:18, I must rejoice whenever and wherever Christ is preached..clothes of the preacher must ultimately be (pun intended) immaterial.
But I must live with myself…and I can’t myself live with a robe which was intentionally intended to communicate (against my will) that I am of a higher class/caste: a “clergy” who alone can authentically and apostolically teach the lowly “laypeople, ” as I am intrinsically and inherently (by virtue of my schooling and whose hands and “seal of approval” were laid on me) more “anointed.” I’ll never forget the shock of realizing what the colorfully red neckline represented on my pastor’s robe: I had been thinking all along it carried some neat theological connotation: blood of Jesus, Pentecost, whatever. Then I found out it was the “doctor’s bars” of academic robe! I just couldn’t wear something like that..in church. You can have more degrees than a summer day in Fresno, and still not be a servant- leader.
My district superintendent, who helped assign “appointments” of pastors to churches, often (half)teased the pastors under his charge: “Just because you’re anointed doesn’t mean you’ll be appointed.” I won’t claim to belong to a higher class of Christian, just because I am a pastor. In fact the only “higher level” specifically promised Christian leaders (viaJames 3:1) is a “stricter judgement” !! And the word “layperson” comes from the original biblical Koine Greek “laos” which clearly means simply “people.” So for me to claim a title of “clergy” implies that I am of a higher class and genus than “people.” Hey, I am only people, too…pastoral calling and all: which of course was one of the Reformation’s trumpet calls a few hundred years ago. But ironically, the Reformation didn’t go far enough, in fact it perpetuated some of the problems embedded in the system it was trying to shed, and directly infected the infested system that “Protest-ants” have inherited today!!
“Reformer John Calvin determined he would NOT wear priestly robes,” Jim Rutz writes in “The Open Church”. “As a protest to the costumed pageantry of other clergy, he stuck to his business suit for even the most formal church occasions.” Sounds good and God-inspired so far? I think it was, and it’s pretty much what I did for the first few years of nonrobed preaching. Yet the clincher: “But alas, his followers through the ages have also worn a business suit—EXACT COPIES OF CALVIN”S BUSINESS SUIT. And thus today, when you see a Presbyterian minister in full regalia, you are looking at a sixteenth century Swiss Brooks Brothers boardroom special.”
For those wanting more powerful, provocative evidence of the often antithetical, at times pagan origins of many of the “sacred cows” of Protestantism (from pews to pulpits) , or church in general, start with the Rutz book just quoted, or the explosive online expose b y Gene Edwards, which lives up to its title: “Beyond Radical.”(Free online here).
SACRED COWS AND PROFANE TESTIMONIES
Sacred cows often make better burgers. But I don’t desire to be inordinately iconoclastic, or a rebel without a cause; or fall into the “Polo Shirts are the new robes” trap, or even to make a big deal about what on the surface appears a superficial and neutral issue..like clothes. Yet because clothes are literally surface issues, (that is, on the surface of my frame) and thus unavoidably visible, I cannot NOT consider the implications of what I wear. My clothes speak. I cannot not preach by what I wear. I am glad that most Sundays, I just wear what I want to; I am not intentionally and reactionarily sending or not sending a message…except the unspoken message to all us “laypeople”: it just may be alright with the Almighty if we chill out and wear what we want (within reason and season of course! I love the statement on our church website: “Dressing up is accepted, but not expected”..Anyway, here (
is a photo revealing how I typically dress when I preach on Sundays (if I preach on Sundays at all, another shift in which cows are sacred) .And it should suffice as evidence that I don’t necessarily think any pastor is in the wrong to wear a robe that mine is soon for sale on E-Bay..where some of you might actually buy it (take my robe…please!)…and even (gasp!) wear it to preach in! I didn’t burn it; right or wrong, I’m E-Baying it. Though I am fine with whatever use you want to put it to: Halloween costume, satirical skit (someone actually borrowed my robe once to play a judge…hmmm, there’s another wake-up call regarding what message a robe sends!), kindling. Be imaginative! But don’t imagine me wearing it again…
For some reason, though ( I hope its just nostalgia about the story I am about to tell), I haven’t been able to take my clerical collar off the mirror and into the trash..or onto E-Bay. I’ve already teased about telling about the day (one only) I wore it. Let me say upfront that it’s Harry’s fault! I probably wouldn't have done it for anyone else but Harry! I officiated his
wedding, too ( in a suit, thank you very much! He didn't ask me to wear a dress, thank God!) On a more serious note, the story is this: Harry's brother lost his wife suddenly, and though the family were nominally Catholic, and actually had no church; there was the background and vestige of Catholicism so woven into the fabric of the family history that nothing would authenticate a funeral officiant more object width="425" height="344">
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