I want my lifestyle to be different than the lifestyle of this world.
In many cases, our clothing is going to be different.
And look, I believe in dressing with the styles of the day, as long as they're not weird and
sinful.
I'm not saying we should dress like some other bygone era.
I'm all for wearing today's clothes, as long as they don't involve sagging my pants and
showing my underwear.
As long as they don't involve me wearing skin-tight clothing, as long as they don't involve me
wearing a feminine, sissy clothing, I'm fine with wearing today's fashions, amen?
And you know, you ladies, hey, wear today's fashions.
I'm not telling you to dress like Little House on the Prairie.
Hey, why don't you wear the most up-to-the-minute, 2021 fashion, but why don't you just make
sure that it covers your nakedness, and why don't you make sure that it's feminine?
And you know what, even you can, look, I could take you to the most worldly department store,
and I could find you clothing that's acceptable for a Christian lady there, easily.
I could take you, well, okay, maybe not the most worldly, but anyway, I could take you
to any basic department store and find righteous clothing all day long.
I could find you some righteous threads, okay, if you're a man, woman, I don't care.
You can find the right clothes out there, but then there's the other section, okay,
and I'm not telling you to dress weird, I'm just saying, why don't we dress with some
class and dignity and modesty?
Why don't men dress like men and women dress like women and just cover up our crack?
That's all I'm saying.
Is that so hard?
And that's what God expects us to do.
And by the way, when it comes to being in the world but not of the world, one of the
most worldly things out there is our consumeristic culture that's just all about name brands,
fancy clothes, fancy cars, how much money you have, how expensive things are.
Folks, that should not be us.
We should not buy into that philosophy.
The love of money is the root of all evil, is what the Bible says.
Look what the Bible says in Matthew chapter 6 verse 7, "But when you pray, use not vain
repetitions as the heathen do, for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking.
Be not ye therefore like unto them."
And the only reason I'm reading that is just to show you, don't be like the heathen.
Don't be like the worldly people.
Now jump down to what I really want to show you in verse 31.
"Wherefore, take no thought, saying, What shall we eat, or what shall we drink, or wherewithal
shall we be clothed?
Watch this, for after all these things do the Gentiles seek.
For your heavenly Father knoweth that you have need of all these things, but seek ye
first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.
Take therefore no thought for the morrow, for the morrow shall take thought for the things
of itself, sufficient unto the days the evil thereof, worldly people, are out seeking what?
Food, and drink, and clothes, right?
They would love nothing more than to eat fancy meals, spend a fortune on crazy meals that
are just way overpriced, and clothing that's way overpriced, way too expensive.
What do they want?
They want to lay up treasure for the future as well, and they want to have some massive
retirement fund, they want to have the gigantic 401(k), they want to have the stock portfolio,
they want to have all the money laid up, fancy clothes in the closet, and they want to go
out to dinner at fancy places all the time.
This is success unto them, right?
I mean, driving a fancy car, living in a fancy house, hey, that's not what it means to be
peculiar people, because if that's what your life is about, you're just like the heathen,
you're just like the, that's what the Gentiles seek after, but we are the spiritual Israel
of God, and we are the peculiar people, we're the chosen people, and so we ought not buy
into this materialistic, consumeristic, and you know, children are especially susceptible
to this.
I was once a kid too, and you know what, my mom bought me Levi's, no, Wrangler's, or
not even Wrangler, because that was probably too name brand, it was probably like Rustler,
you know, they try to have something that sounds kind of like it.
And my shoes were Pro Wings, not Reebok, not Nike, not necessarily Converse or Adidas,
it was Pro Wings, which was the store brand of Hey Les, Shoe Source.
And when I wasn't wearing Pro Wings, I was wearing XJ900s, and that sounds a lot cooler
than it is to you young people today.
It wasn't cool.
I wasn't wearing Air Jordans.
I was wearing off-brand clothing, and I remember just when we were kids, it's like, you just,
you really wanted to have the Levi's and the Nikes, the Reeboks, you know, you wanted the
Reebok where you could pump it up on the tongue, you'd be like, sss, sss, supposedly you're
gonna be able to jump higher, no matter how white you are, you know, you're gonna be able
to jump high and play basketball.
Yeah, right.
You think that little pumping your shoe fold air is gonna make you jump higher?
Nonsense.
But you know, we're kids, we buy into that, this was before the light-up shoes, you know,
this was the little psss and then you'd let it out like, "Who knows what I'm talking about?"
You know, kids, they wanna have the name brands, the fancy clothes, but you know what?
I try hard to teach my children that that's all vanity and that it's meaningless and that
labels mean nothing, name brands mean nothing.
But you know what?
We have a bunch of overgrown children today.
We have 30-year-old children, 40-year-old children, 50-year-old children, and when they're
not watching superhero movies, they are, you know, they've got it.
Now it's the Gucci and Louis Vuitton.
And what are the name brands?
Somebody help me out.
I need help.
Dooney and Burke.
Hugo Boss.
What?
Hoach.
Hoach?
I thought that's the opposite of first class.
What in the world?
Diesel.
Chanel.
Guess.
Oh man, that was the '80s.
Is that still around?
Oh man, I remember in the '80s, it was all about the Guess jeans and the Guess skirt and
the Guess jacket.
The jean jacket, except you'd put tears in the back of it, so you'd be like Johnny Depp
in 21 Jump Street with the tears in the back.
Look folks, it's vain.
When I became a man, I put away childish things.
Hey, you know what?
I want to have durable clothing.
I want to have sensible clothing, durable clothing.
And look, like I said, I'm not telling you to dress poorly, but you know what?
If you have a problem with used clothing, you have a big problem.
Why are you so snobbish and highfalutin that you can't wear a used garment?
All my clothing is used virtually, you know, unless I get a gift typically.
You know, why?
I'm not too good to wear used clothing, because you know what?
Jesus Christ walked on this earth as a humble man and he dressed in humble garb.
And I can do the same thing.
And so don't buy into the snobbery of having to have all the name brands and the fancy
jewelry.
You know, the Bible says we should wear -- you say, "Well, Pastor Anderson, you're just giving
your opinion.
Why don't you preach the Bible?"
Okay, how about this?
Modest apparel.
Isn't that what the Bible says?
Go look up modest in the dictionary.
In fact, let's look it up in the dictionary right now together, shall we?
Because the Bible says that the women should adorn themselves in modest apparel.
So let me pull up my dictionary app here.
Modest.
Don't show me an ad.
What?
Listen.
Modest.
Number one.
Having or showing a moderate or humble estimate of one's own merits.
Being modest.
Like I would tell you how good I am at basketball, but modesty forbids.
And I'm not good at basketball anyway.
Number two.
Everybody listening?
Free from ostentation or showy extravagance.
So what is modest apparel?
Free from showy extravagance.
Hey, look at me.
Look how expensive this is.
Check out the Rolex.
Check out the Louis Vuitton.
Check out the coach and the Hugo Boss and whatever else.
Tommy Hilfiger or whatever.
Number three is not really applicable.
Number four, limited or moderate in amount.
So I think number two is what we're talking here.
Free from showy extravagance.
For example, a modest house.
Modest comes from the same root word as moderate, right?
So you're not wearing super expensive clothes.
And that's why the Bible says that they should be dressed in modest apparel, not with gold
or pearls or costly array, right?
Gold, silver, pearls, costly array.
What's he saying there?
He's saying you don't need to have all this really expensive stuff.
He said be adorned with good works.
Be adorned with a meek and quiet spirit.
But I am against fancy clothes for myself or my family.
Because I believe God wants us to wear modest apparel.
So you know what, if I got a million dollars tomorrow, I wouldn't change the way I dress.
I would not change the way that I dress.
Why would I?
You know, I would find something to do with that money other than wasting it on showing
people, hey, look at me, you know, I'm wearing an Armani suit.
And you know what, there are a lot of preachers that wear Armani suits, and none of them, unless
they got it as a gift, probably even cares about the things of God at all.
You know, you got preachers that are multi-millionaires, you got Ravi Zacharias owning a bunch of
massage parlors on the side where he abuses the workers, you know, and it's like, hello,
all of these televangelists are bad.
All of these millionaire preachers are bad.
You know, unless a preacher became a millionaire before he was a preacher, he's bad.
How do you become a millionaire while you're a preacher unless you're bad?
How do you become a millionaire while you're a politician unless you're bad?
How do you make $144,000 a year in Congress or however much they make, $200,000 a year,
whatever?
How do you become a multimillionaire in Congress because you're bad?
How do you become a millionaire as a pastor because you're bad?
Now, you can become a millionaire in business and be good, and you're just really good at
business and you worked hard and you built a business, but as a clergy or a politician,
you're supposed to be a servant.