What to Wear?

Image by congerdesign from Pixabay

Disciples' History Moment for June 8, 2025

So . . . what is appropriate attire for attending a worship service? I recall an elder mentor of mine, a fine minister, who advised wearing one’s finest to worship. “God,” he said, “was the audience. Dare we enter into God’s presence with dirty shirts and pants?” Indeed! Are jeans and shorts acceptable? How about t-shirts emblazoned with your favorite team?

Perhaps none other than Alexander Campbell will clarify this once and for all. In his October 1839 issue of the Millennial Harbinger (the publication he edited for nearly 40 years) he wrote: “Our meetings . . . are greatly defective in many respects, and in none more visibly than in the dress and manners of the professed worshippers. The present costumes . . . are in extremely bad taste.” He goes on, “. . .we frequent the houses of prayer and the places of worship with all our “finery” upon us as though our synagogues were theatres of fashion . . .”

So, what did Alexander wear to church meetings? He often wore jeans — “Kentucky jeans” as they were called at the time. A light cotton cloth coarse fabric with a twill weave, in other words, work clothes. They were the kind that he wore around his farm in Bethany while he worked on his 1500 acres and cared for his merino sheep. Doubtless during his many preaching tours in the US and the UK he wore other clothes. But it is not clothes that makes the man or woman. He notes that “slovenly neglect and rustic coarseness” is not really good either but is “more tolerable in Christian assemblies” than showy dress.

What should we wear? It is not about what we wear but about what our hearts bring to worship. Campbell said to not be hypocritical but to be sincere in presenting ourselves to God, because God has “redeemed our spirits from sin and our bodies from the grave, and both should be dedicated to him.”

So, what should you wear to church? A good and grateful heart . . . and jeans are also ok! All are acceptable.

Rev. Kevin K. Adams

Reference: The Millennial Harbinger and The Encyclopedia of the Stone-Campbell Movement