Consistency

From Modest Clothing Bible Study by Ray and Elaine Powell

Are You Consistent in Your Everyday Life?

We all have an influence on others. What message are you sending? When others look at you, what advice is your life giving to them in the area of fashion?

Should you appear modestly attired at all times? Are you consistent in your everyday home life? Are you training your little ones to blush easily? Do you allow (and thus encourage) them to run around the house clothed in only their underwear, slip, T-shirt or diaper? Are you consistent in this area yourself? Have you been known to walk around the house before your children in your underwear or slip? Are you modeling before them a consistent example of modesty?

Also, consider the pictures and photos on display in your home. Are the pictures you display to the public eye consistently modest? Have you re-evaluated them lately? Perhaps you have forgotten about a wedding or graduation picture which exposes bare skin or form-fitting clothing. Look closely at the necklines, skirt lengths and modesty of old photographs. Perhaps the photos are favorites, but are they modest? Is Godliness portrayed by a graduation picture on exhibition of a daughter donned only in a puff of feathers? Will you encourage your young daughters to develop a modest, meek, and quiet spirit by displaying snapshots of them without adequate clothing, even if they were babies or toddlers when the photos were taken? Why should you accept as a picture in your home what you will not accept in practice? Are you consistent?

Have you evaluated the magazines, newspapers, advertisements, or books lying around your home? Extra caution must be exercised to make sure that modesty is upheld in the pictures which you have on display purposefully or by negligence in your home. Many times advertisements which come through the mail must go straight into the trash can because of the ungodly apparel or risqué advertising featured.

What about your children’s storybooks? Have you looked at them closely? Do they contain pictures of immodest dress (or undress)? Sadly, many Bible story books and teaching aids are filled with pictures of Godly men clothed in what could only be classified as underwear! These immodest pictures will have an impact on our children's understanding of Biblical modesty. Pictures of Adam and Eve can be seductively displayed, even in Christian books. Fill in with a marker or paste something over the pictures, as needed. These immodest pictures can become tools which Satan can use to desensitize our little ones. Do not be lax in purging your home of immodest pictures wherever you may find them. Do you have pictures in your home that you would run and hide should the Lord Jesus ring your front door bell? Do the pictures in your home send a consistent, Godly message to those around you?

Are You Consistent on Special Occasions?

Another area of consistency is in the Christian wedding. Is God glorified when a bride is decked in a gown which reveals her form, her bare shoulders, or possibly even more? Are wedding garments exempt from the instruction of I Timothy 2:9 and I Peter 3:3? May the wedding party blamelessly bare their flesh and bodies on this one occasion?

Is it wrong to wear an outfit that completely reveals both of your shoulders at a church function, but okay to wear it for your graduation pictures? Is it wrong to wear a miniskirt to a gospel meeting, but okay to wear one as a cheerleader? Is it wrong to wear a backless dress, a plunging neckline, or a dress with sheer shoulders to a Sunday morning worship service, but okay to wear them as a bride, bridesmaid, or at a formal dinner? What message does your attitude send about your consistency as a child of God?

Why not evaluate everything you wear and find out what pleases the Lord? Are you trying to please the Lord? Your peers? Your boyfriend? Your classmates? Your neighbor? Yourself? Whom are you trying to please?

Copyright 2010, W.R.P. Publishing, all rights reserved. Used by permission. Copies may be reprinted for non-profit personal or educational use only.