Welcome to the MHB Podcast. This is Michael Baun. And welcome to my twenty fifth episode. In the previous episode, I discussed some reasons why I think church leaders should wear a suit and tie. I also outlined the wrong motivations for dressing nice, and the consequences of doing it for the wrong reasons. It turns out, I sparked up quite a bit of controversy in my closing remarks of that episode. I want to repeat to you the specific comments that raised eyebrows – directly quoted:
So the next big question is this: If Paul was adapting himself to his audience, then shouldn’t we be dressing down to our congregation? Here’s my claim: how a person dresses him or herself is not an accurate representation of how they think an important person should dress. In other words, they aren’t dressing up for church because they no longer believe church is all that important. This is the core of the problem. Church members are not taking the title of Christian with any degree of seriousness anymore. Some members won’t even give up an hour of their time on Sunday morning. When I first started going to church, I wore sweatpants and a tank top. If I were going somewhere important, like a job interview, I would have worn a suit and tie. Church members and nonbelievers, anyone in the west, is trained from birth to see this type of uniform as the mark of importance.
And so I’m left with this question: As a church leader, if I don’t present myself as if what I’m doing in the church is important, how can I expect anyone else to believe that it is?
So, that is the quote from the previous episode that did not sit well. The controversy is that church members would hear these comments and react negatively to the accusation that they don’t believe church is all that important anymore. I listened to the podcast three times to try to dial in why this negative reaction happened. It turns out that I was not clear enough with my words. So I’ve decided to produce tonight’s episode as a revision of those closing comments. I want to make my thoughts more clear. I want to clarify my position so that listeners will hear what I’m trying to say.
In order to do this, we need to talk about the word important. There are actually two different meanings when it comes to this word. The first meaning is subjective, or dependent on the qualification of an individual. The second meaning is objective, or independent of the qualification of an individual. Let me explain it this way:
Imagine you are a person who loves to collect stamps. As a stamp collector, collecting stamps is important to you. However, collecting stamps is not a matter of national or global security. And most stamp collectors would acknowledge this despite the extraordinary importance stamp collecting has to them. That is what it means when something in subjectively important. The reason why so many people responded negatively to my comments is because God and the church are in fact important to them. The truth is, I never meant to claim that church members are not deriving importance for themselves from what they are doing at church.
Instead, my claim is that many of these same church members do not think the church is important – in the objective sense of the word. Here’s the difference: Imagine you are a stamp collector who believes that collecting stamps is important to you. But you also believe that if enough people began collecting stamps the way that you do, the world would become a better place. Abject poverty? Collect stamps. A natural disaster strikes causing billions of dollars in damage? Collect stamps. Want to change the way your national or state government operates? Tell them to start collecting stamps. You get my point.
When something is important in the objective sense, the quality of it being important is a fact of reality and not a personal opinion. This is one of the areas where I think the church is missing the mark today. For many Christians, church has become a place you go to satisfy your own felt needs and it’s important to you for that reason. God is important to you because you have loved ones who have passed away and you want to see them again in heaven when you die. These are not bad reasons to love God or the church. But they cannot be your only reasons for loving God or the church. These reasons can’t provide you with enough motivation to act out your faith in the world when doing so would be uncomfortable.
Limping along with this sense of subjective importance is why denominations would sooner change Biblical doctrine to fit the culture rather than face the difficulty of offensive ideas. So what does it look like when a person believes that God and the church are objectively important? Let me put it to you this way:
Imagine the creator of the universe revealed himself to you in a book. The creator of the universe. In the universe, there are 100 billion galaxies each of which contains 100 billion stars. The Bible says God has named every single star. You could start counting every second right now nonstop twenty four hours a day seven days a week and it would take you 31 years to count to 1 billion. This is the God that you serve. This is the God whose presence is among you during your church services. Furthermore, he has designed you right down to your DNA. He knows more about you than you will ever know about yourself. He has given you instruction as to how you should conduct yourself in the world so that you live your best possible life. The Bible is a framework through which you can view reality so that you can ensure the stability of humanity at large and provide your own life with an enduring sense of meaning.
You are living in a nation that is polarized and becoming increasingly unstable despite the fact that advancement is making life easier. The only one who can save your civilization is yourself working to build individuals through your church. Nothing else will stop the rise of evil. These problems are not political, they are theological. And the creator of the universe has given you everything you need to save the world. That’s what God and the church looks like when they are considered objectively important.
So how does this connect with what I said about wearing a suit and tie? I’m simply saying that dressing down diminishes the presentation of objective importance in the church. I’m not saying we should mandate that everyone dresses up. I’m definitely not saying that we should turn away people who can’t afford nice looking clothes. I have six complete three piece suits that I put together for thirty dollars from the Salvation Army. Thirty dollars. Most people spend more than that on alcohol every Friday night. I don’t accept the notion that come as you are is simply about compassion anymore. Maybe it started out that way, but like many Godly intentions, it has become warped. In many churches, come as you are has turned into dress however you want, but don’t you dare dress nicer than me.
This attitude is indistinguishable from the moral relativism of the radical left. It’s not enough for the social justice warriors that you tolerate every person and every behavior. You must also censor any of your own beliefs that conflict with theirs – or else you are an oppressor. I think this vein is running through the church as well, because come as you are has been perverted into a doctrine of you are perfect just the way you are and there’s nothing you need to do to improve yourself. If people believe that they are without sin and therefore require no improvement, the Bible says they are calling God a liar. In my view, the modern dress of the church is not a reflection of humility, it is a reflection of believing that there is no necessity for improvement in yourself.
How do I know this? Because many Christians are proud of how humble they are. Taking pride in humility does not make you humble – it makes you proud. Truly humble Christians do not take issue with whether or not a person dresses up or dresses down. Instead they dress exactly how they believe they should in order to be as effective as possible when sharing the Gospel. That’s why I’m saying that as a church we should never dictate what people wear. However, I am saying that we should be honest with ourselves about the fact that dress is a reflection of objective importance. And in the west that means a suit and tie.
Again, how do we know this? If you received a call from the President of the United States requesting that you join him for a summit on national television, would you wear a t-shirt and jeans? Of course not, you would wear a suit. That’s because a summit with the President is objectively important. Or what if you get invited to be in your best friend’s wedding? Do you stand up there in jeans and a t-shirt? Of course not, you wear a tuxedo. These events are objectively important and the importance is reflected in the presentation. I’m saying that representing God in our church services is so much more objectively important than these events that we can’t even imagine.
I want to take the time to point out that this objective importance is why I only dress up when I’m going to be speaking publicly in a leadership role at the church. Because in those moments I’m representing the creator of the universe and I’m responsible for the eternal destination of souls who are made in his image. What could be more important than that? But I also work in the sound booth when my senior pastor is preaching. In those moments, he is the leader and the importance of my job as the sound guy pales in comparison to his. So I wear a flannel and jeans.
But wait a minute. If I’m in the sound booth wearing flannel and jeans does that mean I’m contradicting myself by suggesting that the congregation dress up? No, it does not. Because I’m not suggesting that the congregation dress up. I’m saying that we should encourage the church to realize the objective importance of God. I struggle to see how church leaders can do that if we are not reflecting objective importance in how we present ourselves. In the west today, that’s a suit and tie. But three hundred years from now the reflection of objective importance could be a track suit. In which case, church leaders should wear track suits. In the grand design of things, it does not matter what you look like or how you dress. What matters is that you view God and the church with a level of objective importance such that you understand that this business is a matter of life and death for all of humanity. All I’m suggesting is that we do everything we can to convey that importance.
If you find this content valuable, feel free to share it and to use it in your own studies. If you’d like to support this podcast, you can do so at www.patreon.com/michaelhbaun. There is a link in the description. Your generosity goes a long way to promoting the growth of this enterprise and the cause of free speech. Thank you all for joining me this evening, and I will see you in the next episode.
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