Yearly as summer season approaches, the world hastens to embrace its heat. Restaurant patios shake out their snowy mud, children trickle again into parks, sunscreen seems within the checkout aisle, teenage lifeguards prepared the swimming pools, trip advertisements change into relentless — and the clothes departments remodel in a single day.
Outsized sweaters vanish; swimsuits now welcome buyers. Spaghetti-strap attire stand instead of trench coats, and brief shorts overtake lengthy pants. A flock of oddly named tops — crop tops, tank tops, halter tops, tube tops — sidelines the long-sleeve part. Weatherproof boots not mandatory, strappy footwear (of questionable sturdiness) line the cabinets.
The primary glimpses of summer season typically seem on in-store mannequins and on-line fashions. For Christian girls, that glimpse typically causes not solely anticipation, however anxiousness, as that nagging and perennial query emerges: How may we gown modestly?
Asking Questions Rigorously
So, how may we gown modestly? After all, true modesty springs from the center’s disposition, not the closet’s contents, and extends properly past the garments we maintain. As one writer states, “The exterior indicators of what we name ‘modest habits’ — not bragging, not exhibiting off your physique an excessive amount of — are finally signifiers of modesty, not modesty itself” (Shalit, A Return to Modesty, xxv).
On the identical time, when the summer season months roll round, a alternative in clothes nonetheless stands between us and the solar. So, to reply the query, I typically discover myself asking one other: Wouldn’t it be incorrect if I wore this? I think about many ladies can relate. Within the pursuit of modesty, we are likely to censure our clothes for sin — which might be an immature strategy. Although the Bible instructions modest gown (1 Timothy 2:9–10), it doesn’t embody an inventory of modesty dos and don’ts. Had been we to carry up an outfit and ask Matthew or Peter to inform us yay or nay, godly or sinful, we might get little response. “Thou shalt not put on . . .” is, properly, nowhere.
Because of Scripture’s supposed silence, we are able to start to outline “modest” as “not too conceited” — not too very like the world. That’s when the tough questions actually begin firing: Are these shorts too brief? Is that this shirt too revealing? Are these pants too tight? And so we sift by means of summer season clothes racks, trying to find objects that received’t look too very like the way in which the world attire in heat climate.
As such, we place modesty’s which means (and expression) on the mercy of the plenty, whose sense of “too far” solely appear to inch additional away. The tendency is just not distinctive to our age. As early because the second century, church father Tertullian addressed the problem, in a piece suitably known as On Modesty:
The modesty of which we at the moment are starting to deal with is by this time grown so out of date, that it’s not the abjuration [the rejection] however the moderation [the restraint] of the appetites which modesty is believed to be; and he’s held to be chaste sufficient who has not been too chaste. However let the world’s modesty see to itself. (2)
As long as society units our normal of gown, “modesty” merely means being much less conceited than others. However “let the world’s modesty see to itself,” advises Tertullian. How may we? Is there a option to depart the home figuring out not simply that we tried our greatest to keep away from worldliness, however that we actively aspired to godliness? Don’t we lengthy for greater than trying good with out feeling too unhealthy?
Maybe the apostle Paul can help us. Although the Bible is quiet on wardrobe particulars, it’s loud on knowledge ideas. One particularly from 1 Corinthians might assist us to wade into the summer season with reality and style, quite than imprudence or stress.
‘Is It Useful?’
All through 1 Corinthians, Paul tackles a equally delicate matter for first-century Christians: meals. What can they eat, and what can’t they eat? The Corinthian believers wish to know. (Sounds acquainted!)
“In what methods does the need to put on what we would like after we need rule over us?”
Although Paul responds to this rigidity a number of occasions, we’ll concentrate on what he says in chapters 6 and 10. In each locations, he begins by quoting a maxim the Corinthians themselves held: “All issues are lawful” (1 Corinthians 6:12; 10:23). In different phrases: No meals is unclean. As a result of within the new covenant, “it’s not what goes into the mouth that defiles an individual, however what comes out of the mouth; this defiles an individual” (Matthew 15:11). So, what can they eat? In concept, something.
Even so, that’s not the top of his response. Upon declaring all meals clear, he provides, “. . . however not all issues are useful.” Consuming this or that meals isn’t inherently sinful — however that doesn’t make it useful. “Not incorrect” doesn’t spell “routinely good.” May the identical be stated of our clothes?
God’s phrase outlaws no outfits, however that doesn’t imply each outfit “helps” — advantages, earnings, serves, encourages — ourselves and others. So, whereas the questions “Is it incorrect?” and “Is it too [blank]?” are likely to flounder round, possibly we are able to start to anchor our gown in one other route: Is it useful? Following Paul’s lead, let’s take into account the helpfulness of our clothes decisions in two areas.
1. Is it useful for my soul?
Paul first mentions lawful-yet-unhelpful issues in 1 Corinthians 6. There, he equates helpfulness with what’s personally worthwhile: “‘All issues are lawful for me,’ however not all issues are useful. ‘All issues are lawful for me,’ however I cannot be dominated by something” (verse 12). In different phrases, we “assist” our religion alongside solely as far as we flee something that seeks to dominate us — govern us, management us, dictate us — other than God. What our hangers maintain isn’t any exception.
Will we fidget over seem costly, or match, and even completely unkempt? How a lot maintain does an approving or affectionate look have on our coronary heart? In what methods does the need to put on what we would like after we need rule over us? If somebody we respect and admire have been to query our swimsuit decisions, would we mutter to ourselves about “legalism,” or would we stroll away from the dialog open to the notion? “Inward examination,” writes Kristyn Getty,
shouldn’t make us fearful. It’s mandatory as we search to repair our eyes on Christ. We don’t maintain the course of steadfast religion by accident. It’s a pricey path that requires diligence, repentance, and the Holy Spirit’s sanctifying work. (ESV Ladies’s Devotional Bible, 1551)
If we worth Christ above the whole lot, then we’ll gladly take into account whether or not anyone factor (even our favourite gown) is competing for our affection. And after we do, we’ll develop in godliness and improve in pleasure. Completely satisfied is the lady who has no motive to go judgment on herself for the garments she buys, for she is aware of that her purchases proceed from religion, not trend (Romans 14:22–23).
2. Is it useful for my neighbor?
However dressing “helpfully” reaches past what bolsters our personal religion. In 1 Corinthians 10, Paul expands the which means to incorporate what’s loving towards others: “‘All issues are lawful,’ however not all issues are useful. ‘All issues are lawful,’ however not all issues construct up. Let nobody search his personal good, however the good of his neighbor” (verses 23–24).
With regards to our garments, now we have the identical freedom as Paul’s first-century readers. Neither dietary legal guidelines nor gown codes bind new-covenant Christians, irrespective of the period. But in addition just like the early church, now we have the identical accountability to make use of that freedom helpfully. “Don’t use your freedom as a chance for the flesh, however by means of love serve each other” (Galatians 5:13). A correct response to our freedom in Christ, explains John Piper, is just not merely to claim our freedoms.
No, that’s not the way in which a Christian talks. We ask, “Will or not it’s useful? Will or not it’s worthwhile? Will different folks profit from my enjoyment of this?” . . . That’s the precept of affection.
With nice freedom comes nice love towards God and neighbor.
However how does that love gown on Monday mornings and Saturday nights, in church and on the pool? We should reply for ourselves. What is useful for me (as a Coloradan spouse and mom of little ones, with long-standing battles towards satisfaction and envy) might differ from you. Solely let each of us reply the query “How may we gown modestly?” in a method that lovingly, sincerely seeks others’ good (1 Timothy 1:5).
For pews and grocery shops alike brim with folks God loves, folks for whom Christ died (John 3:16; 1 Corinthians 8:11). Given the astounding lengths to which the Godhead went to avoid wasting them, may we be prepared to regulate the size of our shorts?
“The precept of helpfulness allows us to be severe about our garments with out being legalistic about our garments.”
Maybe now we have a good friend delicate to her measurement. Greater than doubtless now we have sisters in Christ, whether or not teenage women or friends, trying to us as fashions for modest attire. Bear in mind likewise our brothers, who might battle towards lust. Although by no means chargeable for others’ sin, we must always search to not provoke it unnecessarily (1 Corinthians 8:13). Perhaps a brand new acquaintance, an unbeliever, learns that we’re Christian, and since we gown so in another way, this individual wonders aloud concerning the God we are saying we serve — not simply with our lips, however with how we glance too.
From Coronary heart to Head to Toe
If we’ll let it, the precept of helpfulness allows us to be severe about our garments with out being legalistic about our garments. Humbly we stand earlier than the mirror, asking God to disclose to every of us, as girls with totally different temptations and contexts, gown helpfully.
The extra we prize God’s gaze above the world’s, the extra we’ll take each outfit captive to obey him (2 Corinthians 10:5). The need to honor him with our hearts can’t assist however attain from head to toe.
Collectively, might we change into so enthralled with pleasing and proclaiming God that we care extra about “good works” than becoming into present trend (1 Timothy 2:9–10). Typically, maybe even typically, the 2 can coexist. However after they can not, might we fortunately decline to decorate just like the occasions for modesty’s sake — which is to say: for God’s glory, our pleasure, and others’ good. Seen this manner, “How may we gown modestly?” sounds so much much less like a nagging query, and much more like an invite.
