The King's New Clothes

I'm sure that most of myh readers will be familiar with the story of 'The King's New Clothes' but for those who aren't here it is (bear with me on this one'cos there's a point to this story, honest!)

A certain vain King was very bored and frustrated with his royal wardrobe - a familiar state in many households at this time of year! However, this King was very rich and had absolute authority so he decided to commission a set of new clothes from some of the best tailors in his kingdom so that everyone would know when they saw him that he was very rich and powerful. When the tailors had finished their work the King saw each one and their clothes so he could choose the one he liked the best. The problem was that he didn't like ANY of their designs and ridiculed them publicly. As he was doing this a very clever and crafty young man heard the comotion and had an idea. So he sent a message to the King saying that he could make a set of new clothes that would leave everyone marveling at how wonderful the King was.

By this time the King was so frustrated that he agreed to the plan and set up a time to try on his new wardrobe. When the time came the King ushered in the young man and shut the doors on all the people so he could make avoid any further humiliation. The man instructed the King to take off all his clothes and then lood in the mirror so he could see for himself these 'magical' clothes that "only those who truly love the king will be able to see". The King was completely taken in by this trickster because he didn't want to appear foolish and of course he loved himself so much he imagined the finest clothes possible when he looked in the mirror!!

A royal parade was organised at which the King would wear his new clothes but he told no-one what they were like because he didn't trust the people and wanted to find out who truly loved him as the man has said. At the parade the people waited excitedly trying to imagine what wonderful things this young 'fashion guru' had possibly come up with. Suddenly the King appeared walking down the streets of the city, stark naked! At first nobody said anything but first one, then another, cried out 'wonderful your majesty', 'we never saw such splendour', 'surely now all the countries around us will know you are the greatest King who ever lived'! So it went on until a small boy who knew no better, called out "the King has got no clothes on, don't you see!" The people tried to shut him up but he cried out all the more and ran about shouting "where are these great clothes then? You're not wearing anything at all!". They tried to have him arrested but he was much too quick for the guards and soon other people began to echo his cries until the whole crowd started to chant "the King has got no clothes, the King has got no clothes!"

Now, you're wondering, has this got to do with anything? Well here goes. Many times in the history of God's dealings with man the people He chose to represent Him failed to live up to the job, both the old and new testaments are full of stories of God's people blatantly pretending to be something they were not but nobody said anything because they were too afraid of at best looking stupid and at worst being killed. Often God asked, called, someone to speak to the people about this (prophets and others) but when they spole out they were called trouble-causers and were threatened and ridiculed. So here's the point, in what is widely known as christianity there are some who live for the truth, others who are living for something else and the majority who just want a comfortable life and don't want to think too much about what they really believeas long as they are comfortable (NOTE: this is a view of the 'western church', in many countries things are much more polarised). The unhappy consequence of this is that a relatively small number of people can have a large effect on popular church thinking and can lead many into error and ower emphasis of certain truths resulting in the kind of distorted view of christianity i've mentioned be3fore. Unless somebody, like the boy in the story, stands up and says 'there's something very wrong here' this situation will never change and the world will look on and laugh because even those who supposed to know the truth can't see what's really going on!!

In the time of Jeremiah the prophet the situation wasn't all that disimilar to today and he came and said this when the majority said all was well "woe to the prophets who say 'peace, peace' when there is no peace". Now, as then, many will say 'be quiet, don't talk about these things' but it was the leaders who taught falsehood and prophets who spoke falsely who bore the blame in God's sight for what was wrong in the nation. (see also Revelation 3, the letter to the church at Laodicia and note the similarity with the story above)

On this blog we will not be silenced, there's too much at stake.

Goodnight.