THE NAKED TRUTH

“And there followed him a certain young man, having a linen cloth cast about his naked body; and the young men laid hold on him:
And he left the linen cloth, and fled from them naked.” (Mark 14:51-52)

The above passage is one of the weirdest in the New Testament. Billy Graham has said that the above passage describes the first streaker. And I think Billy’s probably right about that. I’m aware that some people might not know what a “streaker” is but back around 1974 there were a number of instances of totally naked students running through their colleges (and occasionally high schools). Many Bible scholars believe the young man who fled naked was John Mark, the author of Mark, who would have been a very young man at the time of Jesus’ arrest.

The topic of being naked has been in the news this week. Just a few mornings ago, a Virginia man was arrested and charged with indecent exposure for being totally naked in his own home.

Eric Williamson was making coffee in his kitchen this past Monday morning. He wasn’t wearing any clothing. He believed that since he was in his own home, this was not a problem. Unfortunately, a woman and her 7-year-old son happened to be trespassed through his front yard and saw the 29-year-old having breakfast in the nude through his window. She called police and that was that. This incident provoked many calls on talk radio this week defending nudity in one’s own home.

I think the police in Virginia overreacted and should not have arrested Williamson. I also think the woman and her child should not have been trespassing through the guy’s property. That said, I think you’re crazy to walk around your house naked! I heard a story several years ago about a group of people who stopped in to visit a family out in southern Worcester county. The Dad was taking a shower and walked out of the bathroom completely naked in front of all the company. As the story goes, he announced, “It’s my house and I’ll do what I want!” I’m almost surprised the “company” didn’t have HIM arrested. I think if I was part of the “company” I’d have made a mental note to avoid visiting that home in the future.

A lot of people sleep totally naked. I try to not do that. What if there’s a fire in the middle of the night? Don’t laugh- about nineteen years ago our family DID have a fire in the middle of the night! I don’t think you want to meet the fire department completely naked! (The fire was in our basement. The fire department got there very quickly. The only real damage was that smoke permeated the house and we had to have clothes dry cleaned, etc.)

I will admit I DO sometimes walk around the house in my underwear. My girls used to hate that. “Dad you’re in your UNDERWEAR!” “Dad put some clothes on!” they’d say... and I usually did pretty quickly. Even when I’m walking around in my underwear, I’m nervous that somebody will come to the door and I’ll be in an embarrassing situation. You never know WHO is going to come to the door! One year on New Year’s Day, the door bell rang and rang. I opened it up to find several Town of Framingham employees. The guy ringing the bell kept saying, “Permian water!” I had to keep asking him to repeat himself, and he kept saying, “Permian water!” I finally realized he did not speak clearly at all and that he was ACTUALLY saying, “Framingham water.” He then told me they were shutting the water off and doing some work. I think I was in a robe or something at the time, but at least I was not in my underwear or worse!

King David gets a bad rap for his sin with Bathsheba, and he WAS wrong. However, some people have also criticized Bathsheba for being able to be seen naked bathing (kind of like the guy in Virginia) and have even wondered if she was trying to seduce David. I guess only God knows that.

Back to streaking. In the 1970s there was a very funny comedy song entitled, “The Streak”. It was about a hick couple who went to a high school basketball game. The man was mortified when someone streaked the game. Then he looked closely and realized the streaker was his wife, Ethel. Furious and in a loud hillbilly accent he yelled, “You git yer clothes on!!”

That’s my advice: You get yer clothes on! Don’t be walking around the house naked. It will just plain save you a lot of problems. AND, don’t be trespassing through people’s property, either!