Sermon Tone Analysis

What Not to Wear

We started a series last week called TV Guide: A Guide to Life.

And what we are doing is looking at a collection of popular Television show and kind of dissecting them.

Looking at what makes them popular, and looking at the themes and messages inherent in them and shedding Biblical light on some of these themes.

Jesus would often take simple everyday things and teach a lesson based on them.

I cannot think of a more everyday thing than Television.

average person watches more than 4 hours of TV each day If he or she keeps that up, in a 65-year life, that person will have spent 9 years glued to the tube.

So I think it is safe to say that TV is a part of our everyday lives.

David started us off last week with LOST, and today we are going to take a look at the ideas behind the show What Not to Wear.

Who can tell me the names of the two hosts?

It is basically this.

The hosts of the show Stacey and Clinton (I think those are their names) are sent letters and video footage of thousands of people across Amercia who believe that their friends or loved one is in desparate need of a make over.

After sifting through these letters and videos, they find a victim.

Then they set up a trap.

They have the individual believe that they are going to be meeting friends for lunch, or they just walk into their work, or they will be at some sports event and have all the cameras turn on them and the ywill announce, “Hi, I’m Clinton, and I’m Stacy and we are from TLCs What Not to Wear.

And we are here for you”

They tell them that they’re fashion sense is deplorable They’re an embarrassment to society, their family, their friends, and their dog, they’re all embarrassed.

And if it is not enough that they’ve just been labelled a fashion freak, they then make them watch footage of you from the previous week and rip apart every choice they made clothing wise that week.

They make them stand in their 360 mirror.

Where people are given few moments to justify their current clothing choice before the hosts come in and tear apart their argument.

“I wear this one to work”

“This is my Friday night out with the ladies”

“This is my Sunday outfit”

And inevitably they were all too ugly for Clinton and Stacey and are thrown out.

And this is important; The they take that person and they say, “For what you are, For who you are, for where you are at in life, you have been wearing the wrong clothing.”

.

So they take them, they walk them through some rules about the kind of clothing that fits them best, which looks right with their body shape, they take them to a salon where they get their haircut, or some of them just need a comb pulled through their hair, they get their make up done.

And after all this suffering, being told how bad their choices have been in the past, the embarrassment of knowing that your family and friends have been talking behind your back about how pathetic you are in your fashion choices, we come to the end of the show.

All the friends and family who betrayed you are now anxiously waiting in a restaurant or a home to see the new person.

It is cheesy, Disney-esque, Amazing Race slow motion waving them in kind of ending.

And there is crying and hugging, there is usually a spouse going “yeah” They don’t say anything, because throughout the episode they’ve said that they loved their spouse just the way they are, but now their like alright.

For 80 % or 90 % the person is usually fighting the process.

“I like my jacket with 50 pins of 80s bands on it,

I like my hammer pants,

I like may florescent band-aid pants from the late 80’s.

(If you can’t picture that, I’m sure I can find a picture somewhere of myself in 89)

And I have to say some people are freakishly attached to these clothes.

It’s like they have a hold on them.

And it is a painful process for many.

But in the end they are always thankful for having gone through the process.

That’s it in a nutshell

First- they try to help the person identify who they really are and how their clothes need to reflect who they are not cover it up.

Second, they get rid of (and destroy) everything in their wardrobe that doesn’t reflect who that person really is.

Third, the dress the person in a whole new wardrobe based on principles that are designed to reflect who they truly are.

That is what we are going to talk about today.

Imagine – what if someone followed you around for a few days with a video camera, without you knowing it, and videotaped your lifestyle at work, school, at home, in your neighbourhood, and the other places you go that most people don’t know about.

Now we chose one of you, one from each service and without you knowing, we followed you around for a week, everywhere that you went.

So you don’t know who you are, but let’s role the footage.

Today we are going to look at , because Paul who formulated much of the theology of the early church has some of the same things to say to us, as Clinton and Stacy have to say to their lucky guests.

But if we miss Paul’s message it is far more than a fashion fopa at stake.

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2003-2013 Years back there was a show called What Not to Wear.

Who can tell me the names of the two hosts?

It is basically this.

It was one of those shows on the TLC network that peole said was stupid but then they watched episode after episode.

The hosts of the show Stacey London and Clinton Kelly(I think those are their names) would meet up with a fashion challenged person.

After sifting through these letters and videos, they find a victim.

Then they set up a trap.

They have the individual believe that they are going to be meeting friends for lunch, or they just walk into their work, or they will be at some sports event and have all the cameras turn on them and the ywill announce, “Hi, I’m Clinton, and I’m Stacy and we are from TLCs What Not to Wear.

And we are here for you”

They tell them that they’re fashion sense is deplorable They’re an embarrassment to society, their family, their friends, and their dog, they’re all embarrassed.

They make them stand in their 360 mirror.

Where people are given few moments to justify their current clothing choice before the hosts come in and tear apart their argument.

“I wear this one to work”

“This is my Friday night out with the ladies”

“This is my Sunday outfit”

And inevitably they were all too ugly for Clinton and Stacey and are thrown out.

And this is important; The they take that person and they say, “For what you are, For who you are, for where you are at in life, you have been wearing the wrong clothing.”

So they take them, they walk them through some rules about the kind of clothing that fits them best, which looks right with their body shape, they take them to a salon where they get their haircut, or some of them just need a comb pulled through their hair, they get their make up done.

All the friends and family who betrayed you are now anxiously waiting in a restaurant or a home to see the new person.

It is cheesy, Disney-esque, Amazing Race slow motion waving them in kind of ending.

For 80 % or 90 % the person is usually fighting the process.

“I like my jacket with 50 pins of 80s bands on it,

I like my hammer pants,

I like may florescent band-aid pants from the late 80’s.

(If you can’t picture that, I’m sure I can find a picture somewhere of myself in 89)

And I have to say some people are freakishly attached to these clothes.

It’s like they have a hold on them.

And what he’s doing in this letter to a young church, is giving the nuts and bolts of Christianity

And it is a painful process for many.

But in the end they are always thankful for having gone through the process.

That’s it in a nutshell.

In Paul is saying something similar.

He is saying listen there were spiritual clothes you used to wear.

They don’t suit who you are.

That ....

As a New Creation in Christ, we are called to a New Community wearing New Clothes.

As a society we expect people in certain roles to dress and present themselves in certain ways.

Doctors, lawyers, pastors, etc.

If I went in to meet my surgeon and out came this guys, and he told me he was going to be working on my insides.

He may not instil the confidence that I would like in someone who is going to cut me open and work on my insides.

It is time for them to be tossed.

If I go to try out a new dentist and he walks out to greet me, I want to see some good looking teeth.

If this guy shows up and flashes me this smile, I will find the nearest exit

It is the same for you and I who call ourselves “raised with Christ”

Paul wants to be sure that we are dressed in a manner that best displays our position in Christ, and in order to do so he tosses all flowery language out the window.

He is not concerned with eloquence, he wants to make his point and he wants to make it strong.

PUT TO DEATH he says in verse 5 whatever belongs to your earthly nature.