1st Timothy chapter 2 the part of the chapter that I like to focus on is starting in verse 9 where the Bible reads in like manner also that women adorn themselves in modest apparel with shamefacedness and sobriety; not with broided hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array but which becometh women professing godliness with good works. This morning I’d like to preach on the subject of clothing or what the Bible calls here apparel. The Bible is saying that women should adorn themselves in modest apparel, modest clothing and it says with shamefacedness and sobriety not with broided hair or gold or pearls or costly or expensive array saying expensive clothing.
When it comes to how we dress some people would have the opinion that God doesn’t care how we dress. It just everything that matters is what’s in the heart, what’s on the inside. What the Bible actually says if we were to go to Matthew 23 where Jesus himself is preaching he says cleanse first that which is within the cup and platter, that the outside may be clean also. Jesus didn’t teach that the outside doesn’t matter. Jesus taught that the inside matters more and that we need to start with cleaning on the inside that the outside may be clean also. It’s not that God doesn’t care about our outward appearance, it’s just that God cares more about our inward appearance and how we are on the inside.
We don’t want to be a hypocrite like the Pharisees where the Bible says that they appeared righteous outwardly unto men but inside they were full of rottenness and dead men’s bones. They were like a whited sepulcher and so forth. We don’t want to throw out the baby with the bathwater and just say “How you dress, how you look just doesn’t matter at all.” because it does matter. The proof that it matters is that God deals with this subject in the Bible. If it didn’t matter, he wouldn’t give us teachings on this in both Old and New Testament.
In the scripture you see that God is saying that he wants women to wear modest apparel. When it comes to clothing there really 3 issues that need to be addressed when we ask ourselves what we should wear as Christians. Issue number 1 is nakedness. The purpose of clothing is to cover our nakedness according to the Bible. Secondly is modesty and I’m going to talk about what that means as we get later into the sermon. Thirdly would be our gender identity. We as men should wear men’s clothing and women should wear women’s clothing. These are all things that are taught in the Bible and we’re going to go over these things in detail.
Before we get into these things, let me say this. Outside of what the Bible commands because the Bible has teachings on nakedness. It has teachings on modesty. It has teachings on our gender but outside of those type of issues I think that we should dress to fit in with the culture that we live in and not just purposely try to just dress weird or different because the Bible talks about how the Apostle Paul when he went to different places to try to reach different people as a missionary he said “Unto the Jews I became as a Jew. Unto the barbarians, I became as a barbarian.” He said, “I’ve become all things to all men that by all means save some.”
The old saying that goes when in Rome do as the romans do applies. If I were in Germany I would dress like a German. If I were in India, I would dress like an Indian. If I were in China, I’d dress like a Chinese person. I’m not going to violate scripture though so I’m not putting on a kilt in Scotland. Anyway, I’m getting ahead of myself. The point is we want to dress to fit in and I’m going to explain that later in the sermon but let’s deal with each of these 3 issues with our clothing.
Number 1, the first thing about clothing is that it should cover our nakedness. This should be obvious because this is the original purpose of clothing in the first place. Go back if you were to Genesis chapter 2. While you’re there I’m going to read you a series of verses in the Bible that associate nakedness with shame because remember it said that women should adorn themselves in modest apparel with shamefacedness. She said, “What does it mean with shamefacedness?” We should be ashamed to be publicly naked is what the Bible is saying. It’s a normal natural thing for a person to be ashamed of going publicly naked.
Let me give you some scriptures on that. There are a whole bunch of verses that associate those 2 things. You turn to Genesis 2 but the Bible says in Exodus 32:25 and when Moses saw that the people were naked and then it says for Aaron had made them naked unto their shame among their enemies. He said in Isaiah 20 verse 4 so shall the king of Assyria lead away the Egyptians prisoners, and the Ethiopians captives, young and old, naked and barefoot, even with their buttocks uncovered, to the shame of Egypt. Isaiah 47:3 says Thy nakedness shall be uncovered, yea, thy shame shall be seen. I will take vengeance, and I will not meet thee as a man.
Micah 1:11 says pass ye away, thou inhabitant of Saphir, having thy shame naked. Nahum chapter 3 verse 5 says I will show the nations thy nakedness, and the kingdoms thy shame. Then if we were to go forward into the New Testament. Revelation 3:18 says I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich; and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear. Revelation 16:15 Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth, and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame.
Over and over and over again in the Bible it talks about how it is a shameful thing for you to be out naked and that’s over and over again. Look at Genesis chapter 2 verse 25 the Bible says and they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed. The rest of the Bible is talking about being out in public naked and he’s saying hey you’re ashamed but when the man and his wife were both naked they’re not ashamed. Again, we see that nakedness between man and wife is completely acceptable but out in the world, out in front of the opposite gender, out in front of public places we should not be naked. We should have enough shame to cover our nakedness with clothing.
The question becomes, what is the definition of nakedness? Some people will define nakedness as the complete absence of clothing. If we were to define nakedness as the complete absence of any clothing, that would mean that somebody can put on a pair of socks and they’re not naked or they could be wearing a wrist watch or a hat. I think everyone here would agree that that person is still naked if they’re wearing a wristband or something.
The question is, what is nakedness? A lot of people have different opinions about what is acceptable and what is not but we have to go to the Bible as our final authority when it comes to the definition of nakedness. Remember nakedness is not the only concern when we’re getting dressed. It’s one of the concerns because remember there’s also modesty. There’s also our identity but just talking about nakedness go to Exodus chapter 28. Second book of the Bible, Exodus 28. The Bible actually in a few places gives a definition of what God considers nakedness.
Some people could go to extremes in either direction of how to define nakedness. Somebody could say, “As long as you’re wearing that wristband you’re not naked.” “As long as you’re in that string bikini, you’re not naked.” Most people in America today would think that being in a string bikini is not nakedness, but does God define that as clothing? Does God find it acceptable when people just have a couple of triangles of fabric on their body and say “I’m not naked. I’m clothed.” What does God define as nakedness? Then other people in the Islamic world could go to an extreme where they literally dress women from head to toe where they just have a little slit to look out with their eyes and it’s just this black parachute coming down.
We’ve got to go to the Bible to figure out how we should live our lives and what defines as nakedness. Look at Exodus 28 for you. This is actually about men’s clothing not women’s clothing. It says And thou shalt make them linen breeches … [Inaudible 00:08:52] What’s another word for breeches in our modern vernacular? Pants, right? It says And thou shalt make them linen breeches to cover their nakedness from the loins even unto the thighs they shall reach. According to the Bible here in order for these breeches or pants to cover a man’s nakedness they need to span from the loins unto the thighs. You say, “Does that include the loins of the thighs?” If it didn’t they would just be a string.
What the Bible is saying here where it says from the loins unto the thighs it’s obviously speaking inclusively. It’s not saying don’t cover the thighs. Don’t cover the loins, just go between the 2. Guess what? There’s nothing between the 2. When it says from the loins to the thighs they shall reach, its saying to cover the loins and cover the thighs. When it comes to wearing pants as a man that would cover our nakedness, they would go from the loins to the thighs. Basically everything from our waist unto our knee cap should be covered. That’s how long our pant should be. Our pants need to go down to our knee in order to cover the loins and the thighs.
You say, “It has to go to the ankle.” Was that what the Bible says? No, because the Bible specifically saying that the priest garment was to go from the loins to the thighs not loins to feet, loins to ankles, loins to whatever. The Bible teaches that men should be covered from their waist unto their knee caps that is nakedness according to the Bible. Some people will try to twist this and if you get modern Bible versions that change everything instead of the traditional King James Bible or all the other traditional Bibles. They’ll change this to being a kind of underwear. Instead of saying breeches, it’ll say make it underwear. Underwear that goes from the loins. They’ll say, “That’s just underwear.” Hold on a second it says it’s to cover the nakedness.
I don’t know about you but underwear doesn’t cover my nakedness because of the fact that it’s under my clothing hence the name underwear. Therefore, my nakedness is not anymore less exposed by the fact that underwear is worn. Does that make sense? It’s our outer wear that covers our nakedness. The Bible here is teaching that a pair of pants must go at least to cover the thighs in order to cover our nakedness. Go to Isaiah chapter 20. Remember the Bible has all the answers and we’re looking for clues in the Bible as to how God defines nakedness not how the world would define nakedness.
In Exodus and whether that’s the western American culture of just bikini babes and anything goes or whether it’s the Islamic culture that wants to clothe them from head to toe, we need to figure out what the Bible teaches and right away we see that the loins to the thighs that needs to be covered. Look at Isaiah chapter 20 verse 2 it says at the same time spake the Lord by Isaiah the son of Amoz, saying, Go and loose the sackcloth from off thy loins, wherein Isiaih 20 verse 2 and put off thy shoe from thy foot and he did so, walking naked and barefoot.
The Lord said, Liketh my servant Isaiah hath walked naked and barefoot 3 years for a sign and wonder upon Egypt and upon Ethiopia so shall the king of Assyria lead away the Egyptians prisoners and the Ethiopians captives, young and old, naked and barefoot, even with their buttocks uncovered to the shame of Egypt.
Here we see another teaching on nakedness saying having the buttocks uncovered is an exposure of your nakedness. That makes sense because it’s in that zone that he mention in Exodus from the loins to the thighs. Instead of the front, now we’re talking about the back. He’s saying “You have buttocks covered in order to cover your nakedness.” Go to Isaiah chapter 47 verse 1. You’re already in Isaiah chapter 20 go to verse 1 of chapter 47. Isaiah 47 verse 1 says come down and sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon, sit on the ground: there is no throne, O daughter of the Chaldeans: for thou shalt no more be called tender and delicate.
Take the millstones, and grind meal, uncover thy locks, make bare the leg, uncover the thigh, pass over the rivers. Thy nakedness shall be uncovered, yea, thy shame shall be seen: I will take vengeance, and I will not meet thee as a man.
Again this is not coincidental that this scripture says that the thigh will be uncovered in verse 2, uncover the thigh and then in the next verse it says thy nakedness shall be uncovered. The thighs being uncovered and the nakedness is being uncovered. He says thy shame shall be seen. If this were the only verse on this subject, you could say, “It’s not a real strong verse.” When we compare it with the key verse in Exodus 28:42 that specifically says cover your nakedness by covering the loins and things then we come to this verse as a supporting passage where about a woman it says if she uncovers the thigh they nakedness shall be uncovered. Then we go to Isaiah 20 and it’s saying if your buttocks are uncovered, your nakedness is uncovered.
Go to Nahum chapter 3 for further support. We’re seeing that the Bible is consistent here in explaining what our nakedness is as human beings. Look at Nahum chapter 3 verse 4. The Bible says because of the multitude of the whoredoms of the well favoured harlot, the mistress of witchcrafts, that selleth nations through her whoredoms, and families through her witchcrafts. Nahum 3 verse 5 behold, I am against thee, saith the LORD of hosts and I will discover thy skirts upon my face, and I will shew the nations thy nakedness, and the kingdoms thy shame.
Again, nakedness is being associated with shame and here when he talks about showing the nakedness he says I will discover thy skirts upon my face. What are the skirts? If you look at this word every single time it’s used in the Bible, it’s used very consistently the skirts are any part of the garment that is below the waist. For example, it talks about Saul wearing a coat. It talks about the skirt of his coat. What does that mean? The part of the coat that dangles below the waist because they would wear long coats and so forth even as we do. Even my coat has a skirt in a sense so the skirts of the garment.
This could also refer to what we know in modern vernacular as a skirt because it starts at the waist and it comes down and flows down that’s why a skirt. When the Bible used the word discover it’s an old word actually what it would mean in our modern vernacular is uncover. That’s what it mean. Whenever the Bible used the word discover, it always means to uncover. What it saying here I will discover thy skirts upon my face this is talking about the clothing that’s down here being lifted up to here. Obviously, what’s exposed at that point? The loins and the thighs when the skirt is discovered upon the face. Therefore, the Bible’s role consistent in all the scriptures we look at what nakedness is.
Once you know this teaching, you have to ask yourself “What is acceptable to war and what is not acceptable to wear?” This is especially important around summertime because a lot of times even people who dress modestly and cover their nakedness normally when they go swimming all bets are off, and all of a sudden they just throw out all of the normal decency and modesty that they would have. All of a sudden they will just strip off their clothes and go in a way that the Bible would define as naked. They’ll basically wear a bathing suit that exposes their thighs and in many cases exposes their buttocks. The Bible says that its nakedness.
You can sit there and say “It’s a swimsuit.” No, it’s nakedness. The Bible doesn’t have a clause in here, a little footnote that says “You dig a hole in the ground, fill it with water and as long as you’re within so many feet of it the clothes can come off and you can become naked.” That’s not what the Bible teaches. As men we need to follow this also. We need to make sure that when we go swimming our swim trunks go down to the knee and cover us up and not be wearing these little short shorts. Thank God those are out of style. Somebody scared me the other day said they’re coming back. I hope that’s a rumor or something.
Honestly when I was a kid they were popular. When I was a kid early 80’s and stuff that’s what they would wear. Thank God long shorts are in style now. Whether it’s in season or out of season we as Christian men should always make sure that our shorts cover our thighs, cover our loins and thighs.
How about the ladies though? This is what women will define as modest swimwear. Here’s what they’ll say a one piece swimsuit. One piece is modest, 2 piece is immodest. I’ve got news for you. Your belly is not the problem. That’s not the issue here. Is God making the belly the issue here? It’s all about that bellybutton. What the issue is, is the loins, the buttocks and the thighs. That’s the biblical issue when it comes to nakedness. Don’t sit there and make some [inaudible 00:18:42].
I remember when I was in Christian school this is what they would say. At school the girls had to wear knee length skirts. Amen, that’s a biblical standard of saying hey make sure your skirt goes down to the knee. Then when we would have summer camp, they had a different rule. They would say fingertip length shorts. Here’s the thing. Fingertip length is not a biblical standard of how long your garment should be as a woman or a man because fingertip length is only about halfway down your thighs. You’re exposing half your thigh unless you’re an orangutan and have arms … if you’re like this then maybe. I remember the girls used to do that when they check them. Let me make sure those are fingertip length it’s like trying to kind of like …
The point is that that didn’t make sense to have one standard at school and then when we go to summer camp it becomes fingertip length. Then when we go swimming with the girls it became a modest one piece swimsuit. There’s nothing modest about it when you’re exposing a lot of nakedness. The fact that your bellybutton is covered isn’t really offering consolation here according to scripture.
The reason why they had that double standard is because of hypocrisy because of the fact that they wanted the school to look to outsiders, the pastors of the churches who sent their kids there. They wanted the parents and the pastors to see this image of a bunch of well-dressed girls and boys but when they go to summer camp and they’re not under the watchful eye we have a different standard. Then we go swimming we have an even different standard. The problem with having all these different standards and with being inconsistent with scripture is that what happens is when these kids grow up what they’re going to start doing questioning the rules.
All of us question rules, don’t we? When you’re a kid you’re given rules and as you get older you start asking yourself “Are these the rules that I’m going to continue to live by after I leave my parents’ home?” If my parents have an arbitrary rule that’s based on their own opinion and their own preference then I’m going to follow that rule while I’m in their house. When I go have my own house, I might have a different rule. Here’s the thing. If their rules are based on God’s rules then I’m going to say “Just because I move out of my parent’s house it doesn’t mean that I’ve moved out from God’s house and I still have to follow God’s rules.”
When we tell kids here’s the rule fingertip length you can't find that in the Bible. Then what happens is these kids grow up and eventually they just reject all the rules because they say “These aren’t based on anything. These are just your opinion. They’re just your preference.” When you start teaching stuff that’s not in the Bible then you start basically building upon a house that’s on a foundation of sand that does not withstand the test of time. Whereas if you build a consistent set of standards based upon the rock of God’s word, you can remain unchanged as time goes by and you can enforce these things consistently on yourself even after your parents aren’t enforcing it on you. You enforce it yourself because you have the character to live for God and follow his rules on your own.
The Bible is teaching here where God draws the line and that’s where God draws the line of nakedness. Therefore if you wear a miniskirt, the Bible says you’re showing your nakedness. You wear a swimsuit, a bikini, you’re showing your nakedness. If it’s a one piece swimsuit you’re showing your nakedness. They say “You just don’t want us to go swimming.” I have no problem. I love going. Who likes to go swimming? We live in Arizona who doesn’t like to go swimming but here’s the thing, you don’t have to go naked to go swimming. This is a real revolutionary idea that you can actually go swimming without getting naked.
What’s funny is that men do it all the time. Men going so swimming with shorts on that go down to their knee and they’re not naked and they do it all the time. Suddenly, women we can't swim with clothes on. Guess what? Women did it in America until less than 100 years ago. They swam with clothes on. I’m not saying that you just wear street clothes into the pool but you could wear some kind of a swimming garment. My daughters and my wife wear swim dresses and they’re actually made out of swimsuit material and everything. It’s a dress that goes down to the knee and it has a sewn in legging on the inside so that it’s not going to flying up. It’s attached and everything so it doesn’t come … that way their skirts is not discovered upon their face as the Bible says.
It’s all connected and everything like that. They can actually look like a lady and be dressed and have their nakedness covered and go swimming. You say, “They look like a goofball.” No, you don’t. You don’t have to look like a goof ball. When my daughters wear these and my wife wears them, she’s complimented on them. They look stylish. In fact, they look so cool you wouldn’t even have to just wear them swimming, you could wear them to the store for crying out loud. To sit there and say “You must put on a bathing suit or a bikini.” Even some women that aren’t even Christians are not comfortable striping down to that level.
If you see out in public sometimes you’ll see women who are wearing a really long shirt or they’re wearing shorts over it or they’re wearing something because not every woman is just comfortable just striping down what the Bible calls naked. It’s shame but there are some women that have no problems [inaudible 00:24:23] but wait a minute as a Christian lady who’s listening the sound of my voice, what are you going to do? Are you going to walk out of here and say “That pastor is too radical. He’s the Taliban and he wants me to be covered when I go swimming.” You know what? I got it from the Bible.
You cannot biblically justify exposing your thighs and your buttocks just because your swimming. You say “I want to fit in and be cool.” Sometimes there are things that are more important that fitting in and being cool and you can also be cool with clothes on. You don’t have to strip down to be cool. Fitting in is not always the best way to be cool anyway. Be the rebel. I’m just kidding. Be a rebel and go to this pool with clothes on. Seriously, it’s like you’re being rebel just doing what God says these days because we’re living in the day where men call good evil and evil good.
The obvious question that would come to some people’s mind when you preach this and say “Here’s what the Bible is defining as nakedness. Cover the loins and the thighs.” Basically they’ll say “What about women and their breast? What about the top? Getting the top cover. Is that nakedness for a women to be topless?” This is what people ask because you’re showing them biblically defined it’s from the loins to the thighs. If you would flip over to Song of Solomon chapter 7 and let me make this statement. If you disagree with this statement don’t freak out, actually hear me out and listen to my point of view biblically before you just reject it out of hand is that the Bible does not define breasts as nakedness.
I’m not saying “Hey everybody go topless.” That’s not what I’m saying because remember there are 3 things to be considered when we’re getting dressed. Nakedness, modestly and identity but to define breasts as nakedness is false and there’s a reason why this is important because you might say “What in the world are you teaching?” Let me start off by saying this. This is not some new teaching that I’ve come up with. I’ve been preaching and teaching this ever since I started pastoring. In fact, Brother Segura at his old church even got a letter … Remember Brother Segura? He got a letter from the deacons of his church telling him they needed to quit listening to Steven Anderson’s preaching. What year was that? 08 09?
09.
Steven: Back in 2009 he got a letter from the deacons of his church saying you need to stop listening to Steven Anderson’s sermons because he teaches and they were listening my grievous teachings. They said that I taught this morally [raw 00:27:10] teaching that breasts are not nakedness. They tried to construe it as I’m saying “Hey everybody just take your tops off or whatever.” which is not what I’ve ever taught but that’s how they wanted to construe it. I’m just bringing that out just to show you this isn’t something new. This is something that I have consistently believed and preached and taught. I’ve been studying the Bible for decades and this is what I believe and this is what the Bible teaches.
You say “Why is it important that you say that breasts are not nakedness?” Simply because of the fact that breasts have a very important function in life and that is to feed children. The breasts are used to feed. Even just me talking about this right now people are becoming uncomfortable but here’s why. It’s because our society is weird about this. You really shouldn’t be uncomfortable and in fact do a search on the word breast in the Bible it talks about breast all day long. The reason that people are uncomfortable about it it’s not because of anything in the Bible that made them uncomfortable it’s the world that has made them uncomfortable with this subject.
There’s nothing wrong with talking about the subject and breast are not biblically defined as nakedness. Here’s why that’s important because women have to breastfeed their children. God has designed them to breastfeed their children and when you breastfeed your children you draw out the breast and breastfeed your child. Let’s say for a minute that God defined breasts as nakedness. He said “Your breast are your nakedness.” Let me ask you this. Would you ever want to be naked in front of your children? Think about it. Would you want to be naked in front of your 10 year old son? Of course not. That would be obscene, wouldn’t it?
Here’s the thing though. Women who breastfeed their children they’re 8, 10, 12, 14 year old son is sometimes going to catch sight of his mother’s breast because she’s taking out the breast and feeding the child. There’s some people out there that would teach and say “Any time a woman breastfeeds she has to cover it in a blanket.” There are many problem with that and I’m going to talk about this because I think this is a real important subject. First of all, let me say this. The reason why our society has become squeamish about breastfeeding and about breastfeeding uncovered is because of the fact that there’s been a whole generation of people who did not breastfeed.
If you go back to the 1950’s and 60’s there was a whole generation where literally 99% of women bottle-fed, 99%. There was a time when it was just breastfeeding almost fallen off the face of the United States. Not of the earth but from the United States culture nobody is breastfeeding. Even today with breastfeeding making a comeback, most women don’t breastfeed today. 50% of women are not even breastfeeding like 6 weeks after the baby is born. As far as actually exclusively breastfeeding 6 months after the baby is born that statistic drops below 20%. We’re talking about the vast majority of women not breastfeeding today but before that we had a couple of generations where there was almost no breastfeeding.
Doctors would literally hold up in the office breastmilk in a bottle and formula and say “Look how thin and see through the breastmilk is. This is healthier.” Why would what manmade be healthier than what God made? The Bible even compares the Bible to breastmilk. It says as newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the word that you may grow thereby. That which God has made his word is like under that which God made breastmilk. Some factory somewhere that’s churning out formula is not going to be able to produce the same thing that God has produced. It’s going to be different.
Number 1, we had a whole generation that didn’t breastfeed in this country. Number 2, we have the birth control movement where people are having an average of 2 kids. If you only have an average of 2 kids, how much breastfeeding are you doing? Not very much. Even if you exclusively breastfeed, you’re only breastfeeding for a few years. In societies where birth control is not practiced, the average woman has 9 kids. If you have 9 kids, you’re going to be spending 15 years breastfeeding. That’s a lot of breastfeeding.
If you have all these women and they’re all spending 15 years breastfeeding, you’re going to see a lot of breastfeeding everywhere you go whereas in our society we don’t see it because number 1 women are breastfeeding. Number 2 people aren’t having kids and so it has become socially unacceptable in 2015 America to breastfeed in public because of those reasons.
Let me ask this question. Who here amongst us be honest has ever seen your mother breastfeed? Who saw your mother breastfeed? Put up your hand. Notice how few hands are up. Here’s somebody from Africa that’s got their hand up. There’s a few people that say I saw my mother breastfeed but did you notice the vast majority have never seen brother ... Nobody seen their brother … The vast majority have never seen their mother breastfeed. Do you think that’s normal? I never saw my mother breastfeed ever. You know why? Because I’ve one younger sibling and she was born when I was 20 months old.
By the time she stopped being breastfeeding that’s when I started having a memory so I can't even remember ever … The first time I ever saw a woman breastfeeding in my entire life was when I saw my older sister breastfeed her child when I was a teenager. That just shows how it’s so removed from our society it’s something that you’re not used to. When you’re not used to something, then it’s like “Whoa what’s going on?” because you’re not used to it. Just like when you talk about breast people “Whoa!” because they’ve been brainwashed by society. What do we see every day?
We see women using their breast to sell stuff on ads. You turn on the TV and it’s all sensualized. On ads, on magazines, everywhere you look, the breast are in a sensual context. Here’s the thing. That’s not the way it’s been throughout history and that’s not the way it is in the rest of the world. Ask my children if they’ve ever seen their mother breastfeeding. They’ve seen it a thousand times because they live in the home. You say “It should be covered at all time.” Here’s the thing. If God said hey it’s nakedness then you’d have to cover it in front of your own sons. Are you telling me that God intends women to breastfeed under a blanket even in their own house so that the other kids don’t see it?
You say “Yeah. Why not? What’s wrong with that?” Here’s what’s wrong with that. Because of the fact that when a woman breastfeeds under a blanket, guess who’s not happy about that? The baby. I challenge you to go to lunch today and eat lunch under blanket the whole lunch. Here’s the thing. If you were to eat lunch today under a blanket. Let’s say you were to put a blanket over your head and eat lunch today you could do it, right? Here’s the thing. You probably wouldn’t be enjoying it number 1. Number 2 you know what you’re going to do? Probably east as fast as you could. When you sit at the table with your friends and there’s no blanket over your head, you take your time. You eat. You talk. You relax. You shoot the breeze.
If a blanket were over your head and they’re like you can take that blanket off your head when you’re done eating, you know what you’re going to do? You’re going to eat as fast as you can and say “Oh get this blanket off my head.” That’s what babies do too. Even if it’s in your home, you sit there you put a blanket over them. You know what they’re going to do? They’re going to take 5 minutes, eat as quick as they can and then pull of and say “Okay, I’m done now.” Here’s the problem with that. The problem is that then women will get pregnant again way too soon.
I know I’m getting real technical and everything this morning but I have to because this is knowledge that everybody used to have but its fallen off the face of the earth because we’ve entered this weird society where women are on birth control, where women are feeding with bottles and it’s so unnatural that basically we’ve forgotten how the human kind has been doing this for 6000 some years since God created us. Mankind has always been doing it this way. This is what it is.
My wife and I don’t use birth control. All of our children are naturally spaced. We don’t believe in birth control. Because of that, our children are naturally spaced. Here’s what people will say though. They’ll say “If you don’t use birth control you’re going to have a kid every 9 months Irish twins. Here’s the thing. That isn’t healthy. It’s true. It’s not healthy to have a kid every 9, 10, 11 months but actually if you follow the natural order of things by actually a woman gives birth of a child and then breastfeeds the child, the children will be spaced about a year and a half to 2 years apart which is how my family is proof we don’t use any birth control and yet all of our kids are about 2 years apart from one another.
How did we do it? The way that we did it is not by abstaining from anything, it’s just simply by my wife breastfeeding. If you tell this to a doctor, if you walk into a doctor and tell them “Here’s how our children are spaced. We just use breastfeeding.” They’ll laugh at you and say, “That doesn’t work. That’s an old wives’ tale.” Oh really? Well look at my family and it actually works for 99% of women. It doesn’t work for all women but it works for 99% of women to naturally space the children out through breastfeeding.
While a woman is breastfeeding, she’s unable to get pregnant with the next child. The reason why this doesn’t work for people is because they feed for 5 minutes under a blanket and that’s not enough to stop them from getting pregnant or they’ll put the child in a crib at night or a basinet at night and so it goes hours and hours without eating. If you have the child in bed with you and feed it on demand throughout the night, feed it on demand throughout the day that’s enough suckling to where a woman will not get pregnant until the child is weaned. Did I [inaudible 00:38:03] song of Solomon?
Before we do Song of Solomon let me read for you from Hosea chapter 1 verse 8. It says this now when she had weaned Loruhamah, she conceived, and bare a son. Here’s an example Hosea’s wife when did she conceive a son? After she weans the last one. See how the Bible has all the answers in there. She weans the one she gets pregnant with the next. That is the natural order of things in this world. Here’s the thing. If you’re breastfeeding under a blanket it’s going to hurry up and finish it’s meal whereas if you breastfeed without a blanket, you know what its going to do? It’s going to chill out on the breast for like 45 minutes.
Why not? Seriously my wife will just be sitting there and he’ll drag it out. Just chill out, relax, looking around, eating, happy, content. It’s comforting to the child to be nursed. He’ll chill out. He’ll do for 45 minutes. He’ll nurse all night whatever and then guess what? It keeps the mother healthy and it keeps the children spaced out naturally so you can sit there and say, “Why not just cover in a blanket? Why not just put a blanket over it for crying out loud. Nobody wants to see it. Put a blanket over it.” [Inaudible 00:39:22]
Here’s the problem. Now all of a sudden you’re going to get pregnant way too soon and then you’re going to say “Wait we need to be using birth control.” Then you’re going to get on birth control. It’s like a domino effect. When you start making up stuff as you go along and making new rules because what does the Bible say not to do? Don’t teach for doctrines the commandments of men. Here’s the biggest point on this subject. The Bible is 1189 chapters long. The Bible is … I hope I haven’t lost anybody yet. Everybody listen and hear me out to the end.
The Bible has 31,000 some verses. Wouldn’t you agree that in most societies that aren’t pumped full of birth control like we are in the United States wouldn’t you agree that in most societies breastfeeding is a pretty everyday activity for a lot of people? If the average woman is having 9 kids and spending like 15 years of her life breastfeeding and there are all these millions of women spending 15 years breastfeeding then breastfeeding is a real everyday activity. Ask my wife if it’s an everyday activity. How long have you been breastfeeding for straight now honey?
Speaker 2: Almost 14 years.
Steven: She has breastfed for the last 14 years virtually uninterrupted almost nonstop. It’s a big part of her life. She’s not alone. Guess what? Wouldn’t you think if god demanded that a woman cover up while breastfeeding, wouldn’t there be a verse somewhere in this book that said that? Just think about that logically. You got 1189 … Does God like to make rules? God has got hundreds of rules, right? Why is there not a single rule that says “You need to breastfeed under a blanket or under a cover or keep your breasts covered while breastfeeding.” If that were a rule it would be in the Bible because the Bible is a big long book that talks about every subject. The Bible talks about breastfeeding repeatedly many times but yet there’s never that teaching.
How can we get up and say “Hey thus sayeth the Lord go put a blanket or a cover.” Listen, if you go to the typical independent fundamental Baptist church it’s not even enough for them that you cover. They want to put you in another room. We went to a fundamental Baptist church where we were in our early married years and we just had 2 boys, they sent home a letter because breastfeeding was just getting out of control. Women are breastfeeding under a blanket in the service. Oh say it isn’t so. Here’s what happened. They said on the letter and said you can't even do it under a blanket because they said it makes us think about what’s going on under that blanket.
That’s like saying you women can't even come to church because it makes us think about what’s under those clothes. What in the world? Those people are nuts. That leads you into the Muslim territory of just putting on a black tent and then we won’t think about anything. She has pretty eyes, whatever. There’s nice twinkle in the eye. They would sit there and say “You can't breastfeed.” But isn’t it interesting that everybody in that church is having 2 kids. They’re using birth control. That’s easy for them say.
I remember when they’d want us to put our kids in the nursery and force us to go to some room somewhere for the child to be breastfed. Here’s what they’d say. “Oh this is just a little short phase in your life. It’s kind of tough and inconvenient.” It’s not a short phase in our life, it’s our life. We always have a baby. It’s easy for the birth control people to sit there and say “This is just a little phase you go through.” No, for some of us it’s a real long phase.
In fact, a bunch of people from our church less than a year ago went to visit another fundamental Baptist church in town and a few of our ladies that came with us were banished into a literal closet to breastfeed. What was the size of that room? It was like 4 by 6 or something. It was like your wife, Mrs. Baker and Mrs. Martinez were put in a room like 4 by 6 feet where it’s like “This is where you’re going to breastfeed.” We went to another church where the breastfeeding room was like in the bathroom. It was like a stall in the bathroom that had been gutted out and they put metal folding chairs and you had to take a ticket on your way in and it’s like be out of there in 15 minutes.
What happens when you discourage … Listen, it’s already hard for women today 2015 to breastfeed. If it were easy, everybody would be doing it. Why are 50% of women hardly even making an attempt? Why are only 20% or less even making it to 6 months as a breastfeeding mother? The reason why is because it’s hard. We can't sit there and just make it harder on women by imposing manmade rules and laws that aren’t in the Bible and saying “You need to go in this room somewhere. You need to put a blanket over that. You need to do all this.” Then what happens is there are far worse consequences than the so called consequences of “Oh no a woman is publicly breastfeeding.”
First of all, a woman is publicly breastfeeding I’d like to know how many marriage that has destroyed. I’ve heard about a lot of people getting divorced over a lot of things. I’ve heard of a lot of marriages being destroyed but I’ve never heard of a marriage destroyed. It all started when I saw her breastfeeding and I couldn’t control myself. It all started when my wife started breastfeeding publicly and then all these men came … I’ve never heard a story like that ever. If you have a story like that, share with me after service but I’ve never heard of one.
You know what I have heard a lot of? Marriages being destroyed by women going to work and working with another dude all day and building a relationship on the job. I have heard of marriages being destroyed because they only have a couple of kids and as soon as the last kid moves out of the home they split. In fact, did you know that the most common time to get a divorce is in the first 2 years of marriage or the first 2 years after the child leaves the home? I’ve heard of marriages being destroyed by birth control. I’ve heard of marriages being destroyed by women going out to the workforce and hanging around with a bunch of other men. I’ve heard of stuff like that.
It’s funny I’ve never heard of breastfeeding destroying a marriage. What’s worse my friend? What’s worse the horrific spectacle of a woman feeding her child like people have been doing for thousands of years or the specter of birth control, putting your kids in the nursery, putting them in daycare, going in and getting a job and all this stuff that our western society embraces that actually does cause more adultery and ruin marriages and ruin lives etc. God only knows best if we would just follow God’s word.
Some people would say “Pastor Anderson are you trying to say that a woman’s breast have no sensual value that they’re only for feeding?” I would not be so stupid as to make such a statement. That would be ridiculous for me to get up and pretend breast have no sensual aspect. They’re only for feeding babies. We all know and the Bible talks quite a bit about that aspect too, doesn’t it? The Bible will talk about the sensual aspect. I’m not foolish but let me say this though “You can sensualize a lot of other parts of the body too.” For example, how about the mouth? Kissing, right? Hello? Does mean that our mouth has to be covered at all times that we can never eat without putting a little blanket over it? Even though that could have a sensual aspect.
Look at Song of Solomon because here’s the thing about Song of Solomon. Song of Solomon is a book of poetry that is between husband and wife and it goes into their love life and it’s all about the love between husband and wife. He’s praising her beauty and she’s praising his beauty and so forth. There’s something real interesting you’ll notice that the Bible here never gets explicit or inappropriate in the book of Song of Solomon. It never gets pornographic. The Bible talks about how pure and clean the word of God is so we know that the book of Song of Solomon is not an obscene book, is it?
You know what’s never described in Song of Solomon when they’re sitting there going through their beloved and talking about how beautiful she is? Literally in order from head to toe the body is described, but you know what’s not described? The reproductive organs. You know what’s not described? The thighs and the buttocks. It doesn’t go into stuff that’s basically off limits to be outside the bedroom something that will be shameful. Isn’t that interesting? Look at Song of Solomon chapter 7 verse 1 because we’re starting at the bottom right here.
He’s describing to his wife how beautiful she is. It’s say song of Solomon chapter 7 verse 1 How beautiful are thy feet with shoes o prince's daughter! The joints of thy thighs are like jewels. You say, “Wait a minute thighs!” No, the joints of the thighs are like jewels. They’re talking about the knee cap being like a jewel. That’s the joint of the thigh. It says the feet, the joints of the thighs which would be the knees, the work of the hands of a cunning workman. Thy navel is like a round goblet, which wanteth not liquor. Thy belly is like a heap of wheat. Don’t try this on your wife it’s not cool anymore. Different culture.
Thy belly is like a heap of wheat set about with lilies. Thy breasts are like 2 young roes that are twins. Thy neck is as a tower of ivory. Thy eyes like the fishpools in Heshbon, by the gate of Bathrabbim. Thy nose is as the tower of Lebanon which looketh toward Damascus. Thine head upon thee is like Carmel, and the hair of thine head like purple; the king is held in the galleries. How fair and how pleasant art thou, O love, for delights! Do you notice I went from foot to head? He said the feet are beautiful. The knees are beautiful and then all of a sudden we jump to the navel. Do you notice that? He’s describing her body.
Notice what he doesn’t describe? Thou with which we shouldn’t be talking about in an erotic sense. He jumps from knee to navel and then works his back up again. He’s not describing the buttocks or the things or anything like that or the reproductive organs. Why? Because that would be inappropriate to go into detail about those things that are considered shameful to be publicly revealed because they are private between a husband and his wife.
Let’s sit there and say the fact of the breasts are brought up in Song of Solomon is proof that their nakedness well then I guess the head, the eyes, the nose, the mouth, the neck, the navel, the belly and the feet are all nakedness too so when are you going to pick up your hejab and your chador and your burka or whatever because that’s where that teaching would lead. It doesn’t make any sense. Now I have to hurry up and move on from that point but go if you would to 1st Timothy chapter number 2.
The bottom-line that I’m teaching this more here what I’ve always taught for the last decade and even before I start passing the church I believe this because we had to deal with this in other churches that persecute you for breastfeeding and let me tell you this. These churches that are persecuting you for breastfeeding that we grew up and that we still visit around here from time to time. All the kids are in the Christian school. The parents are only having 2 kids. Their kids are in daycare. The mom is going off to work. It’s a whole different culture.
You can sit there and say, “They’re more righteous.” No they’re not because that culture is a wrong culture. The natural culture of man being the provider and the breadwinner. The wife being a keeper at home as the Bible says marrying, bearing children, guiding the house, being fruitful, multiplying, drawing out the breast, giving suck onto the young ones this is all biblical and normal and natural. If we live in a society where everywhere we went every day, women are breastfeeding at the bus stop, at the restaurant, in church we wouldn’t think anything of it.
It’s only because we’ve been programmed by Hollywood, Madison Avenue, etc. where we only have a sensual connotation. If you look back at old pictures, you’ll see old pictures all the time of women breastfeeding in church. Nobody is batting an eye. Nobody cares because it’s not that crazy of a thing. I’ll say this if you’re a woman and you say “I want to breastfeed under a blanket.” Knock yourself out. Go ahead. If you want to breastfeed under a blanket, fine. You want to go to another room to breastfeed, go ahead but don’t try to impose your preferences upon other people because God has enough rules in the Bible without you adding rules to impose your preferences and force them on other people because it’s not natural or biblical.
We need to be sure that we stay within the parameters of what the Bible teaches. Listen, my wife breastfeeds uncovered at home, at church, at the store, at the restaurant. She’s probably doing it right now. I’m kidding. She does it all the time. You know what? She’s not going to stop. If somebody comes to you and harasses you at our church and says, “Get under a blanket or whatever.” Then basically just know that didn’t come from me and that didn’t come from my wife. It also didn’t come from the Bible if people are going to around and say stuff like that.
Listen, I can't even count how many times I’ve been walking through the store with my wife. My wife and I were just walking through Costco recently and my wife is literally just baby on her left breast walking through Costco like this. There’s nothing obscene about it. This is what she did. She’s got a skirt on. She pulled up the left side of her shirt, puts the baby on and then the shirt comes down and rests on the baby’s face right here. You see like a little sliver of the belly.
You see a little sliver of stomach, maybe a little sliver of skin of the breast or whatever because most of it is in the baby’s mouth. Then there a shirt coming down. Literally we were walking through Costco “Oh look at this.” Just natural as rain. The people weren’t gawking or acting weird about it because there’s nothing weird about it. It’s totally normal.
I spent way too much time on nakedness so we need to move on. I got to just blow through these last few points. Number 2, is modesty. Now just covering your nakedness doesn’t mean that your clothing obligation is complete. Does everybody get that? No, Pastor Anderson is not saying that women should go topless. I have never taught such a thing. I don’t believe that but what I am saying is that they should be able to breastfeed publicly because that is a normal natural activity that God created them to do that they’ve been doing for thousands of years without having to jump through all these weird hoops that our birth control bottle feeding society wants to foist upon us.
But just covering the nakedness doesn’t finish the job of getting dressed because the Bible says that we should be in modest apparel. What does the word modest mean? Look down at your Bible there at 1st Timothy 2:9 In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness, cover the nakedness and sobriety. Sobriety means seriousness. Does it sound like its kind of serious how you dress? It matters. Dress with sobriety. He says not with broided hair or gold or pearls, or costly array but which becometh women professing godliness with good works.
He’s saying your adornment, your decoration should be your works. It should be your deeds. It should be who you are not a physical drawing attention to yourself with the way that you dress but rather that people would notice you for your good works. They would notice you for your righteousness. Let me give you the dictionary definition of modesty. I just went to dictionary.com and just typed in modesty. Definition number 1, everybody listening? You tell me if that matches what the Bible is teaching. 1st Timothy 2:9 teaches one thing. Let’s listen to the dictionary. Having or showing a moderate.
Notice the word modest, moderate having or showing a moderate or humble estimate of one’s merit, importance etc. free from vanity, egotism, boastfulness or great pretentions. Think about how we would use the word modest. What if I said I have a very modest home? What am I saying about my home? That’s in a black [inaudible 00:57:12] which is the eyes viewing and just the windows showing. No, if I said I have a modest home, what am I saying about my home? It’s not expensive. It’s nothing fancy. It’s not somewhere where you go “Whoa! Look at that house.” It’s just a modest humble normal home. There’s nothing expensive about it. There’s nothing … by the way I do live in a very modest home.
Here’s the thing. How would that apply to clothing? If modest is not both. What if I said I would show you my skills on the basketball court but I’m too modest? What does modest mean? You’re not a braggart and obviously that’s an ironic statement because you’re bragging by saying that. Bragging, boasting, these are things that are immodest. If someone bragged, you’d say they’re an immodest person because they’re telling you [inaudible 00:58:11]. How would this apply to clothing?
Basically clothing that draws attention to yourself is immodest. Clothing that says “Hey everybody look at me!” That’s immodest. Clothing that’s real expensive. Would that be immodest also? Even as a man, the Bible said women not to wear immodest [inaudible 00:58:33] but what about as a man putting on the Armani suit and then the woman shopping at the real expensive boutiques, real fancy purse, real fancy glasses, fancy everything that … what does the Bible say friend? Gold, silver, pearls, costly array, does that sound like its talking about covering your nakedness? He’s talking about wearing expensive fancy stuff drawing attention to yourself.
Let me ask you this. If a woman goes topless, is she drawing attention to herself? Oh yeah of course. A woman with a real low cut top, is she drawing attention to herself? Let’s face it, she is. What about this. What about an Amish person, what about an Amish women in a prairie dress, is she drawing attention to herself? Is she being pretentious? “Hey everybody look at me how righteous and holy I am. Everybody look at me.” Here’s the thing, she can cover up and be just as modest and she could be just as covered and wear a stylish outfit just a normal stylish outfit but no they choose to wear purposely ugly floral prints. Nothing wrong with floral prints. I’m saying ugly floral prints. They’re purposely outdated, purposely looking weird. Why? To draw attention to themselves, aren’t they?
Everybody could see how righteous and holy though art with your prairie dress and then the men will do the special Amish Abraham Lincoln beard and just have a real stern look on their face. It’s like “We’re better than everybody else.” That’s how they act. Look, I’m a Christian. I’m a pastor. I’m a fundamental Baptist but I refuse to go in public walking around acting like I’m better everybody else. I’m not going to have my wife dressed in a way where let me turn my collar backward and have big long tailcoat and show everybody how holy I am. It’s what the Catholic priest love to do, the nuns, the orthodox with their weird hats and the Jews with their weird hat and everything. “Hey everybody look at me. Look how spiritual I am.” That is now what the Bible teaches.
The Bible teaches that we should have modest apparel and people should know us by our works and know us by our fruits. That we should be adorned with righteousness and put on zeal as a cloak and not sit there and dress in a way that draws attention to ourselves. If you’re out in a bikini aside from being naked, you’re also drawing attention to yourself. If you’re out in a prairie dress or a burka or a chador, you’re also drawing attention to yourself unless you’re living in that country where they all do it, you’re drawing attention to yourself. It’s not modest. It is pretentious. It is boastful. You’re showing egotism, vanity.
When it comes to dressing Muslim if you would go to 1st Peter 3 I’m just blowing through these last few points. Go to 1st Peter chapter 3. Again, you have to be able to differentiate what is the Bible saying here being modest apparel so when it comes to the whole breastfeeding issue if you think about it what’s a woman’s motive when she’s feeding her child at a restaurant, at church, on the bus, is it egotism?
Speaker 2: No.
Steven: Vanity? Hey everybody look at me? That’s ridiculous. That’s not what’s going through a woman’s mind when she’s breastfeeding her kid. It’s not egotism. It’s not vanity. It’s not hey everybody look at me, it’s actually feeding her kid because she’s going to spend years of her life breastfeeding all day. It’s life. Anyway, as opposed to a woman who’s basically wearing the low-cut top or going topless or whatever. Can you see a little difference there of like trying to accentuate her body and show off and point.
Here’s the thing. You can do that without even being undressed. You could wear a dress that goes from neck to ankles and just cover it in sequence like a Las Vegas show girl. Would that be modest? It does matter how much you’ve covered if you’re walking like a disco ball through the grocery store you’re drawing attention to yourself. You put a bunch of necklaces around your neck like Mr. T, you’re drawing attention to yourself at that point.
Look at 1st Peter chapter 3 verse 3 talking about women, whose adorning let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel but let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price. What’s the Bible emphasizing over and over again with the way that we dress? It should be yes covering our nakedness by all means from the loins to the thighs need to be covered. The buttocks need to be covered.
Beyond that he says that women should be dressed in modest apparel meaning that they should not be egotistical, vain, drawing attention to themselves in any way, shape or form. If you stop and think about it with the different styles of dress that women wear and so forth a lot of women are dressing to draw attention to themselves even if they’re naked in skirt. Think about this. What if you wore these yoga pants? These skin tight ultra-thin fabric pants and you say “My nakedness is covered.” Is it modest I mean when you can see everything anyway? Just real tight fitting clothes. Even if you wore skirt that was just ultra-tight form fitting, it could be immodest, couldn’t it? Possible.
It’s not just covering nakedness and you’re done. No, you also need to dress modestly and that also means somewhat fitting in with the culture that you live in. Not just dressing dramatically different from your culture that you’re in. Again, that’s just all about egotistical and isn’t this how teenagers always want to be different. I’m going to dye my hair green so I can look totally different than anyone else. That’s a sign of immaturity, isn’t it? We as Christian need to be mature and dress normal.
I love the word normal. It’s a word that people don’t like anymore because everybody wants to be a freak and a weirdo. Be normal. Dress normal. Breastfeeding is normal. Put on a normal outfit so that you don’t just stand out like a sore thumb everywhere you go. Whether you’re doing it to this extreme or to that extreme, it’s wrong but you also need to stay within the parameters of what God expects and then lastly this. The last thing go to Deuteronomy chapter 22. The last thing is our identity. We got the modesty, the nakedness and the identity that we want to deal with when it comes with getting dressed.
When we say identity is that it’s not enough just to be covered and it’s not enough just to be modest, we need to also wear men’s clothing as men and women’s clothing as women. This should go without saying but it needs to be preached today more than ever. It says in Deuteronomy 22:5. The woman shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man, neither shall a man put on a woman's garment for all that do so are abomination unto the Lord thy God. Let me just point something out here. He doesn’t say as is often misquoted he doesn’t say hey if you put it on the other gender’s clothing that’s an abomination.
He says if you put on women’s clothing you’re an abomination. It’s not what you’re doing that’s … you’re an abomination. He says to women if they put on that which pertained to a man, he says you’re an abomination. What is an abomination? It’s basically something that is held in contempt. Like oh man we don’t want that. Look if a man today were to walk in in a dress would it be an abomination of thus?
Crows: Yeah.
Steven: We would say like “This guy is an abomination. What’s he doing? He’s walking in women’s clothing.” Here’s the thing. In our society we have no problem with women wearing men’s clothing all day long. No problem with women. It’s a double standard but does God have a double standard? God says it both ways right here. He says the woman shall not wear that which pertains unto a man, neither shall a man put on a woman's garment for all that do so are abomination unto the Lord thy God.
Let’s play a little game real quick. I realize I’m almost out of time. We have time for a little game here. Let’s play a little game here. I’m going over to the board and I’m going to say the woman shall not wear _____. It’s like a little quiz. Kids, are you listening up? How about this, neither shall a man put on _____. [Inaudible 01:08:29] The woman shall not wear _____ neither shall a man put on _____. The reason I’ve left that blank is because in the Bible it says a woman shall not wear that which pertaineth to a man and it says the man should not put on a woman’s garment.
Here’s what we’re going to try to do kids. Let’s figure out what is a woman’s garment because the man shall not put on _____ a woman’s … I’m going to take as many answers as you can give me. What is a woman’s garment?
Speaker 3: Dress.
Steven: Tell me what’s a woman’s garment? Give me answers.
Crowd: Skirt
Steven: Skirt, dress yeah. Here’s the thing. Who here does not agree that a skirt is a woman’s garment? I think everybody would agree a skirt is a woman’s … how about a dress? A dress is a woman’s garment. What’s God telling men not to wear?
Crowd: Dress.
Steven: Good. You say “Just preach the Bible.” Here’s the thing. If I just preached the Bible then I wouldn’t even be preaching if just read the Bible and didn’t expound it. The whole point of preaching is to expound the Bible, to take the Bible and apply it to the day that we live in and to bring it … okay. How do we apply this? Hearing Deuteronomy 22:5 is going to do and say goodness we apply it. What in 2015 America can we avoid here as men when he says don’t put on a woman’s garment? A dress, a skirt that’s what we’re talking about. You say. “You’re talking about the color pink but wait a minute the Bible doesn’t mention colors.”
In other cultures pink is not even a feminine color. In some cultures men wear pink and it’s normal in that color. I know I won’t wear it in America because that’s not our culture but in other culture it can be fine. We all know that a woman’s garment is a skirt or a dress. He’s saying men don’t put on a woman’s garment. Don’t put on a dress. Don’t put on a skirt. Then over here we have the woman shall not wear _____ and this just remains blank. Let’s just close in prayer and go home. It’s a big blank. Look he must … everyone would agree that he must be telling them not to wear something? Otherwise the verse would have no meaning.
If he’s saying hey women can wear all kinds of clothing but a man can't wear a woman’s garment. He could have said that but that’s not what he said. He said a woman shall not wear that that which pertain to a man. What article of clothing pertains unto a man? Our society would just say well nothing rendering the verse meaningfulness but you know what it is, it’s pants. I know this is real shocking to people but even the sign on the bathroom door shows you the difference between men and women’s clothing, pants versus skirt.
Did you know that in our country 100 years ago it’s illegal for women to wear pants in America? Did you know that? Women are arrested for crossdressing literally. Literally, look it up. There are even people that are still alive today that remember when it was considered inappropriate and considered just crazy for a women to be going publicly in pants. It was considered a scandal. It would be like a man today going in a dress that’s how it was considered back then. It was like women don’t wear pants. Women wear dresses. Men wear pants.
You say “Pastor Anderson I disagree with you. I think you’re crazy because there’s women’s pants.” There’s man’s dresses. What if I had a camo dress on? Jean dress, camo, put some chain on it or something. One time I saw a Harley Davidson biker wearing a really manly skirt. It wasn’t cool though. I stayed as far away from the guy as I could. To sit there and say “There’s no such thing as a garment that pertains unto a man.” What’s the spirit of the law? We not only want to look at the letter of the law, don’t we also want to look at the spirit of the law? What’s the spirit of the law here? He wants there to be a difference in the way that men and women dress, isn’t that the sprite of the law?
If he says “Hey men don’t put on a woman’s garment. Hey women don’t put on a man’s garment.” The spirit of the law is to say dress different. Don’t look the same. Here’s the thing. If we went by American Christian culture, are jeans okay on me? Yeah. Jeans okay on my wife? No problem according to American culture. Hood and sweater on me, is that cool? Hood and sweater on my wife? No problem. Tennis shoes cool with me? Tennis shoes cool with her? Then you know what we could do my wife and I can dress identical and the world considers that perfectly fine. If we’re both in jeans, we’re both in a sweater. We’re both in shoes.
Our society listen and I know it sounds crazy but you thought I was crazy on the breastfeeding point. Here’s the thing. Our society has become gender neutral in our clothing is what’s happening. Look the men in skirts is coming. The men in dresses is coming.
Speaker 4: Not to me.
Steven: I know but it’s coming. What I’m saying is that’s where society is headed. You know it’s true. Your transgender LGBTQMICKYMOUSC all the different letters they keep adding but the bottom line is that God is not pleased when we all dress the same. God is not pleased if we’re all like in a futuristic space movie we’re all in a jumpsuit and a space helmet or something. There’s supposed to be a difference in the way that we dress. God said there’s a man’s garment and there’s a woman’s garment. I don’t have time to show you all in the Bible. I have it all in my notes but all the times that pants are mentioned it’s always on men in the Bible.
It talks about girth up your loins like a man. Why? Because you have pants underneath your coat. It talks about the fact that when men use the restroom, they cover their feet meaning that they drop their drawers, meaning they’re wearing pants, breeches. It’s mentioned over and over I have a whole page of notes on that. I don’t have time but the bottom-line is we need to do some soul searching and we need to do some scripture searching when it comes to this thing of how to dress because of the fact that what we’ve been in church may not be right.
What we’ve been taught by the world is for sure not right and we need to go back and think about these things and say wait a minute how should I dress as a woman and you know what I think if you study the subject, study the Bible and just think about Deuteronomy 22:5 with those blanks there you’re going to realize that god has to be prohibiting something on women. If it’s not socks, if it’s sweaters and it’s not church we all know what it is he’s telling not to wear something and it’s pants. That’s what he’s telling not to wear. He’s telling men not to wear a dress or a skirt because men are supposed to wear pants. That’s a man’s garment.
At the end of the day we as men need to dress normal. Don’t dress like a freak or a weirdo. Dress like an American in 2015. Make sure your shorts or pants go down to your knee. Don’t dress like a fag then … this stuff is real simple. Then on the lady’s side, what do you need to wear as ladies? Look ladies be stylish, be beautiful but you need to cover your nakedness and you need to wear a skirt or a dress that goes down to at least your knee. People can say, “You’re legalistic and you’re judging and blah, blah.” I’m not going to be the police that comes … I’m not going to catch you at Trader Joe’s in a short skirt or in pants and confront you. I don’t care because it’s your life.
If I catch you manning a dress you’re going to get your butts kicked. I’m just saying if I see you out, I’m not judging you. I don’t care but I will judge in my own home because I’m the boss of my home. In my home my wife and daughters and sons are going to dress in a way that I believe is biblical and acceptable. What you do in your home is your business. I’m not trying to lord over you. I’m not trying to tell you “These are my rules. These are Faithful Word’s rules.” What I am saying is this is what the Bible teaches and you need to stop just blindly “Oh society says a one piece swimsuit is modest let’s do it.” No, you need to stop just blindly following the world or blindly following what church is telling you.
You need to use biblical standards. You know what? Whether you like, love or hate the sermon and whether you agree with what I preach this morning, I’ve used the Bible to prove all my points. I use the Bible to prove my breastfeeding point. I use the Bible to prove my point about the thighs and the buttocks being nakedness and I use the Bible to prove my point about gender specific clothing. He that have an ear, let him hear. [Inaudible 01:17:52] word of prayer.
Father, we thank you so much for your word Lord and we thank you for these guidelines. Help us to realize that it is a sober matter how we dress or help us to think about how we dress. Lord, I know you don’t want us all to be robots and automatons that all dress identical and wear uniform Lord. You’ve given us great freedom in what we can wear and women and men can express themselves in how they dress Lord but please just help us to do it modestly. Help us to do it in a way that covers our nakedness and that it is gender specific. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.
