Connections Archive

Dr Bruce Manners
Senior minister, Avondale College Seventh-day Adventist Church

In the British film Hope and Glory, set during World War II, two friends rummage through racks of used clothing at a make-do-and-mend session.

"How I hate all this scrimping and squalor," says Molly.

"I don't mind it. It was harder before the war," Grace responds. "I'm trying to keep up appearances. Now it's patriotic to be poor."

Not many wanted it, but the poor look was in. When the war was over and supplies gradually restored, another look took its place as keeping up appearances came back into vogue.

Fashions come and go. The grunge look one year, the peasant look another, and the next season it changes again. Nowadays, even the poor look, when it's fashionable, is as expensive as any other.

My dad had the theory that fashions always came back. He never gave away a tie (he wore them only one day a week so there was no need for a garage to store them). He had ties dating back to the Stone Age--wide, thin, loud, subdued, paisley and non-paisley, flowered and non-flowered.

The interesting thing was that the next time they did come around, the old ones never quite worked. There was enough difference in the style that it was unfashionable to wear the old ones.

Hyacinth Bucket (pronounced "bouquet" she says in the British sitcom Keeping Up Appearances) lives her life as if appearance is everything. She just doesn't get it. And that's the joke that keeps the sitcom going.

Real life is no joke and needs substance, and certainly something deeper than appearances.

In his passage on fashion, the apostle Peter reckons we should forget the fancy hairstyles, expensive jewellery and beautiful clothes and opt for beauty that comes from within--a gentle and quiet spirit (1 Peter 3:3, 4, NLT).

Now there's something that never dates, that never goes out of fashion.