On a recent Sunday, I arrived for Worship Service and was surprised to find the pastor in a T-shirt and jeans.  Looking around, I realized he wasn’t the only one.  “I didn’t know it was Casual Sunday,” I commented.  I learned that they were doing a special, contemporary service that day.

It was a nice change of pace, although I admit that casual dress at church always seems strange to me.  When I was growing up, my family went to church most Sundays and my parents insisted we dress up for services.  I would never have been allowed to wear jeans to church.  Although my parents taught me that God would rather have you in church in whatever clothes you’ve got, I still grew up with the sense that it was disrespectful not to dress up for Sunday service.

Even now, when no one would stop me and casual dress has become much more common and accepted in churches, I still can’t bring myself to dress down for church.  I guess that just shows how strong my parents’ teaching on the topic was.

Several times in the service, reference was made to the fact that you can “come just as you are to worship.”  Maybe it was the fact that I would never dream of coming to church in jeans that made me hear that phrase in a different way.  When I heard “come as you are,” I didn’t think of jeans and T-shirts, I thought of the messy state of my soul.

The last couple Sundays have found me struggling.   Both times when Sunday morning rolled around, I nearly didn’t go to church.  I didn’t feel up to it, didn’t feel like I had the energy and strength to be in a room full of people I didn’t know or barely knew.  It seemed like more than I could handle.

Perhaps, in a way, I felt like my heart and soul were in such disarray—dirty and wrinkled and shabby—that I shouldn’t go to church in that condition.  Still, underneath my discomfort I knew that God accepts us in all states—dressed down or just down—and that all seekers are welcome in God’s presence, not just the shiny, well-dressed ones with calm, happy hearts.

So, I took my shabby self to church anyway and hoped the people wouldn’t notice or be offended by what a mess I was.  I figured that it is shabby souls like me who most need to be in God’s house.  Hearing over and over to “come just as you are to worship” reminded me that God accepts us in church even if we aren’t at “our Sunday best.”  And that was such a blessing to me.