This is not my shirt...

Raise your hand if you’re familiar with the whole “armor of God” thing, you know, the breastplate of righteousness, the belt of truth, so on and so forth.

If not, you can read about it in Ephesians 6:10-18 – the whole idea being to go into your daily routine prepared to battle the schemes of the devil.

Anyway. As I go through my morning routine, I not only put on my regular plain-jane clothes, but I also attempt to pick out a cute spiritual outfit as well. I like to imagine myself layering up with as much God as possible. When I pull on my jeans, I imagine myself sliding truth through my belt buckles. Then I snap up my righteousness, and tug a little salvation helmet over my obnoxiously thick hair.

And then I go to work.

So with all these little preparations, you’d think I’d be all set to face an entire days worth of “challenges”.

Not always.

The other day I was sitting in church grumping about something so silly I won’t even tell you about it, and God told me to open my eyes. Not metaphorically, like really open them, so I could see the clothes I had on.

I thought it was weird, but I did it anyway. Cause I know that sometimes God asks you to do things that are weird.

And then He says to me “this spirit of whining. It’s not yours. You put on faith, salvation, truth and a bunch of other stuff this morning. I was watching. You did not put on any cranky pants, grumpy socks or sour shirts. These pickle-puss clothes don’t even belong to you, so why are you wearing them?

Hmm. Good point. Looking down at my attire that morning I could imagine myself wearing a ridiculous get up of clothes that were 2 sizes too small, obnoxiously flashy, and obviously not mine. They looked like something that should be on its way out to the burn barrel.

I took out my mental eraser and erased all the ill fitting clothing that was making me so uncomfortable and redrew my clothing as it should be. This time I secretly added a robe of splendor just for my own amusement. And because Jesus said I could.

And you can think it’s silly if you want to, but I totally felt better after my little wardrobe swap.