Nakedness

It was few years back when our kids were very little. While I was reading one of those interesting psychology books, I don’t remember which one; I read that in every human heart, there is this deep seated desire to be naked. I said to myself, “You must be kidding me!” The author continued saying that not only we desire to be naked but we desire others to be naked as well.

I said to myself; “That is absurd!”

Well, I respectfully disagreed with the idea and moved on to the next one. But the idea kind of stayed with me. Then to my surprise, I noticed something.

Whenever I change my kids’ diaper or about to give them shower, it becomes very difficult for me to do it as fast as I want to because they run from me and run around enjoying their naked body. Three of them used to run away from me, going from one room to another making fun of each other’s body; having a blast seeing and enjoying their naked bodies.

If one of them is done with the bath, they all beg me so that he/she will be naked all over again so that they will play together. They never got tired of this game until of course they grew out of it.

Then one day, sitting on the bathroom tab looking at my funny and goofy kids, I remember what I read about the desire to be naked and I said, “After all those psychologists are not lunatics.”

Before you go anywhere else with this, let me say this. This desire to be naked, as I understood it, has some kind of spiritual origin and I will tell you why I said that.

The Bible says (I know you may probably say, “And you also have a Bible verse to confirm that?” Well, you know it!)

So, the Bible says Adam and Eve were naked before they sinned against God (Genesis 2 & 3). Right after they sinned against God, they hid themselves to cover, not their “nakedness” but their “shameful nakedness,” the body that was struck by sin. And God, the first Dressmaker/Tailor, made clothes for them. That is how clothes came into the picture.

But originally Adam and Eve were created to live and walk around without clothes, naked. But that nakedness was not as we think it is now, without clothes, in part it is but it has more of a spiritual essence than physical.

God warned Adam saying, the day you eat the fruit, you will certainly die (Genesis 2:17), but Adam and Eve didn’t drop and die (physically) after they ate the fruit; because the death God was speaking about was spiritual death, being separated from the life of God. The flesh we know it now was not as mortal as it is now. After Adam sinned against God, God said to him, “dust you are and to dust you will return” (Genesis 3:19).

There was light in Adam’s spirit and that light was blown out by sin and darkness took over and flesh became the lord of Adam and Eve; then they knew they were naked.

This leads me then to my point: When everything is said and done, we all want to be naked and we all desire others to be naked as well so that we can enjoy life freely. But we or others can’t be naked apart from God because He is the only One who can take away our “shameful nakedness.”

After we come to God through the Cross of Jesus Christ, the life of God which was lost because of Adam’s sin comes to our life. Then our dead spirit will be quickened and light will shine through darkness. However the light won’t shine in a day. It is a lifetime journey of going from “one glory to another.”

We have lots of stuff we want to hide but our spiritual journey with the Holy Spirit should lead us all to that complete nakedness where we have nothing to hide from God or anyone else, complete nakedness where we enjoy our God without any limit. As we are heading to that “ultimate nakedness”, others will find it easy to see God through us; that is what is called transparency. When our life becomes transparent, nothing blocks the glory of God from reflecting through us. We will be transparent so that others will come to us and see, not us but He who is in us. We will be so naked that we won’t have anything interesting in us but the One who covered our “shameful nakedness.”

Once we are in that journey of transparency, the one thing we so desire for others to have is the same transparent life we have so that we can rejoice and worship God together in spirit and truth, like little kids.

Jesus said to His Disciples: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” Matthew 18:3

The one thing children tend to enjoy is their nakedness because they have nothing to hide. They don’t “pose” to look like someone they are not. They will show you who they are the moment you meet them. They don’t change their names; if you ask them their age, they will tell you exactly how old they are to the minute and second and if they are able to take out all their clothes, they will do it so that they can run naked and enjoy their freedom. That is our original creation which didn’t need any covering.

Adam said to God, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.” And God said to Adam, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?” (Genesis 3)

After all, we are hiding many things because we sinned or are sinning against God and man. That is why we are unable to enjoy our “nakedness”.

The Bible says, “Adam and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.” Genesis 2:25

Wow! Did you hear that? The Word says, they were naked, “and they felt no shame.” A life free from shame! Naked but without shame!

That is our ultimate goal, to get to where we can be naked without feeling any shame!

So, this is my message for today: Let’s strive to be naked before God and man; let’s bring our darkness to light and put to shame our enemy, the devil, who loves to see us live in secret, in the dark, in shame and guilt. Let’s strive to have a life which is transparent so that others may see Christ in and through us. After all, that is the purpose of our existence here on earth; to tell others about Christ but telling them is not good enough but showing them who Christ really is by the way we live.

To tell you the truth, that is what people of this world are begging us to do, to show them Christ, not us. And to do that, unless we are naked, we can’t do it. When we let God and others come into our life, we run out of things we need to “cover with leaves.” And just like a child, we let go of all our “coverings” and run naked, as we are originally created and as we are supposed to be so that others may see Christ clearly!

Let me close this with what Jesus advised the Church in Laodicea to do:

“I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful NAKEDNESS; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see.” Revelation 3:18 ///