Christian Women Modesty
Another controversial topic I’d like to take head on! Caution: Ages 18+ only please, as this is X-Rated (Christian) Content
Hot take…
THE DILEMMA
The easiest way to explain the current state of our world is influenced. We live in a culture that pushes sex. We all know this. Our broken human hearts can’t stop staring and it just simply sells. I’d like to argue that the cost is to ourselves. The cost is larger and more damaging than most people dare to explore.
Modesty is something I am deeply passionate about and at the same time I am the most easily tricked. I’m here to be honest with you and relate with you! I’m not interested in acting like I have everything figured out, put together, like I don’t make the same mistakes we’ve all made, and as if this is an easy subject.
My sympathy extends to you, Sisters. The pressure is overwhelming and we can talk about that, thankfully, but nothing changes. Nothing budges. We are in a crisis! The way women dress today is a crisis for everyone.
Back when I had an Instagram (deleting social media was the best thing I ever did for myself), I was highly interested in some of the stories of ex-porn stars and the experiences they had gone through. As a woman who was not raised Christian, I fell victim to the traps of sex-work myself. I’m not ashamed to talk about how easy it is for women to fall into not only showing their bodies, but profiting from it. We do it all day long emotionally, and it’s incredibly easy for women of all ages to monetize their bodies. Hollywood. That’s a large source of the problem and here is why.
Here is a deeper understanding thanks to a website called fightthenewdrug.org. A large percentage of girls in pornographic videos are not giving consent. They are kidnapped, or drugged, or cohersed or threatened. Some are employed and don’t enjoy what they are doing. Some cannot get out of the industry. Some are trafficked. I won’t get into too much more horrifying detail, but check out that website, it is extremely worth the look. As a summary, the industry of the sexualization of women including both Hollywood and Pornography is fueling this culture that women need to keep up with what they are seeing in advertisements. They feel the need to compete. They feel the need to outshine others. They want to be seen. They show their bodies in an attempt to be loved and accepted.
MEN
Hot take! And this is not what culture will tell you: This attitude of flaunting and shaking-what-your-mama gave you is traumatic to the souls of men. And they aren’t even aware of the damage it does to their future or current marriage! The consequences are often unseen or Spiritual in nature. How would they know of the damage without us women to request respect and faithfulness of them. Wait, but what about within the context of marriage? Oh my gosh, yes, have at it! Sex is beautiful! A gift. Women and men are gorgeous creations of God! Enjoy your spouse! Our God gave us sex within very specific boundaries, and it is a gift to us. Have fun. But keep it sacred, holy, and give honor to God. Marriage is a picture of how Christ loved the Church.
So for men, I apologize on the behalf of the women who simply do not know how hard they make it for you to remain faithful to God and your spouse. I apologize for the ones who gain so much joy from you looking in their direction. For the ones who yearn for your eyes. Jesus had eyes for His church alone and He was jealous for their love - this is the picture of husbands toward their wives, too. Let us not take lightly when Jesus went into detail about what not committing adultery actually looks like:
“But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” - Matthew 5:28.
This is a big ask, right? Men who honor God “bounce” their eyes quickly away from the adulterous women so as not to fall into her trap or “pit” as the Bible calls it.
“For an adulterous woman is a deep pit, and a wayward wife is a narrow well. Like a bandit she lies in wait and multiplies the unfaithful among men.” - Proverbs 23:27-28
It is one thing to see beauty and appreciate it, and the line has been defined in the past like this:
Thought: “That is a pretty woman.” STOP! No further. The second you say “Oh wow, a really pretty woman. Very, very pretty.” At that point you have already crossed the line. Very close Christian male friends of mine have explained that this is difficult. They have explained that their best way to overcome thinking of a woman other than their wife in any way like this is to make all women their sisters. If you walk around and see your sisters everywhere, you would never desire to look at them further than this. Wisdom of men!
Yet the problem lives on in the streets. It is something we cannot change. We must instead be aware that what is meant to be sacred and shared with one man alone who is dedicated to taking care of your heart (a husband) is now shared with the world and that does not make it right. Women are plastered all over advertisements scantily clad and we blame our men for salivating. I know what you’re thinking!!! Men need self-control. They need to not look at women like a piece of meat. No man should be walking around staring at women or sinning in their minds. No faithful man in marriage should be looking at pornography or checking out any other woman but his wife. This is truth. But good golly gracious why make it so hard for them?! This is a team effort.
“Be careful, however, that your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak.” -1 Corinthians 8:9
We are forgiven of all sins, right? Past, present, future. True. And that grace should inspire you to walk set apart.
HOLY - SET APART
Do you have the choice to dress how you wish? Yes you do. Are you going to Hell if you show your thighs or you stomach or your cleavage? No. Absolutely not. So long as you believe in Jesus Christ as your Savior, you are saved.
How much do you love Him though? How much do you love your brothers? How much do you love your sisters?
How can we show our fruit better? How can we show a fear of the Lord?
The fact is that once we belong to Christ and profess Christ as Lord, we are saved. Lest we not forget, though, God is Holy. Holy means set apart. God desires us to be set apart, too.
“Be Holy, because I am Holy.” -1 Peter 1:16.
How can we be set apart? That means to be called out of this world.
“I have given them your word. And the world hates them because they do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world.” -John 17:14
Our God calls us to be different. To reflect Him. There should be an obvious difference between Christians and nonbelievers. If you are living the same as you did when you learned of Jesus, then you are not yet truly His. He wants your heart. He wants to teach us how to sacrifice.
A NOTE TO MARRIED WOMEN:
I heard some amazing advice recently that I’d love to share with you. If you marry a man who fell in love with you for your body, he is going to love everybody else’s body too. If you’re blessed, you have a man who understands modesty and desires to present a clean and holy wife to those around him. If you’re blessed, your husband will be more attracted to a woman who honors God with her body by covering it modestly. If you’re blessed, you have a husband who is perplexed by the way women dress and expresses that he wishes they didn’t and is honest about it being hard. A good husband will bounce his eyes no matter what, whether you are present or not, and that is bare minimum.
Should you find yourself in a predicament where your husband enjoys the tight clothes and the leggings that make women’s butts look voluptuous, or if he has no problem with how other nonbelieving women dress… First, I am sorry. Second, I have known how you feel. It hurts.
It is the hardest thing in the world to free ourselves from comparison to other women around us. Whether you’ve done it a long time or you are new to the pity party like me, we compare ourselves to the women around us ESPECIALLY when we are married - we want to know our other half of our Oneness is devoted to us in mind, body, and soul. How can he be devoted in all three areas if he desires to look upon a woman in this way? You? Yes. Let him look, ladies. Let him DELIGHT in the breasts of your youth! Weird way to say that, I know, but it’s in the Bible okay? Read the famously steamy book, Song of Songs, if you don’t believe me.
As a married woman, my constant OCD thoughts from the enemy plead for me to analyze what my husband is thinking about these scantily clad women around us. The way women dress breeds paranoia for a woman of faith if you don’t have an understanding of who is in the fight with you. It is so hard to win against worry. We have a diseased population currently that walks around half naked… The new movies are mostly pornographic (our family uses VidAngel, a filtering service that streams your favorite movies and shows without nudity thank you Jesus), and our young girls are indoctrinated into crop tops at ten years old. Does your husband fight this with you? My guess is that you long for him to if he doesn’t. My guess is that it would save a lot or worry if you knew your husband was on board with holiness so that you wouldn’t hesitate to cover up.
TIPS TO MAKE IT EASIER
If you are struggling like I do to win the war in our minds and dress modestly amidst the pressure, here are my tips that have made it easier for me to slowly make the switch. We need to stand firm in Scripture. Speak Jesus over ourselves. Fast if you need to.
The Word says that we stand alone before God on the day of judgement.
Married or not, we are accountable for how we dress.
My hope is that these tips will help you rise above the pressure:
You have young women looking up to you. If you don’t feel like you do, you should seek out opportunities to mentor younger women and girls. Being female is hard. It comes with many challenges, and some can be prevented by with the help of older, wiser, women. I can’t tell you how many older women have cared about me (praise Jesus!) and have saved me years of trouble in my life from sharing what they have learned. Women need women.
Be that woman for the little eyes. Make a covenant with yourself if you have to that you will stay accountable to yourself that you will be a good example for younger women. You have no idea who is looking up to you! It could be at the store, at an event, at dinner, and YES, definitely at church. Little girls see you, and they need you to show them what it looks like to be set apart from the other world and to follow Jesus.
Get an accountability partner. Share with a friend that you are struggling to dress well.
“Confess your sins to one another so that you may be healed.” - James 5:16.
I live by this statement! A ridiculous amount of healing has come into my life because I stopped hiding what I was struggling with from the people who could pray for me and ask me about it. Tell those trustworthy, Christian friends that modesty is hard for you! Tell them when you need some encouragement, send an extra text before you dress to leave the house if you’re feeling too frisky. Lean on one another and walk in the light!
If you are really serious about dressing modestly like I found myself at one point… You need to make new Christian friends who dress modestly or lean into the friendships with those you currently love that are walking in modesty. You don’t have to toss your other friends to the curb - we all have our own strengths and weaknesses in our faith. But if you are looking to make serious heart changes and learn the joy in a new way of living, then you need to be influenced properly until you can properly influence others. Just like an alcoholic shouldn’t hang out with their friends that encourage drinking, my friends, don’t be putting yourself in a situation where you feel like the odd one out, or tempted to wear less because your friends are. Be around the women that inspire you to dress well! And let me tell you, okay, modesty does not have to be frumpy. It does not have to be absent of style. I adore fashion, and with the right wardrobe, I have been able to modify my outfits to honor God and represent Him better as I go about my day. What you do when nobody is watching defines who are you. Just because you aren’t at church doesn’t mean you should be wearing that alluring outfit. Following Jesus is full time. We make mistakes, sometimes we falter, even in innocence (hence staying accountable to your community), but there is not only forgiveness, but with it, a second chance.
My last tip to make modesty easier is for those of you with social media. Growing up in the 90’s, we didn’t have all of these models plastered all over a hand-held device pressuring you to look a certain way and making you feel as if you’re simply never going to be pretty enough to feel confident, worthy, and loved. Hint: your worth is not found in your beauty. If anything, you have more worth to Jesus by stewarding His temple He gifted you with well. Do you have good health? Keep it. Do you have a beautiful body? Save it for your future husband.
I thank God that I never fell into the trap of comparison until I was about 28 years old and faced with a situation that made me feel entirely ugly and unworthy. I built back my worth slowly over time in a fully new way with Christ at the center, and part of what helped as a catalyst to that was both my husband and I not having social media - thank you Jesus! Instead, we chose to use our phones well. Here is something I do know about Social Media from when I had it. There are plenty of “Christian” influencers who dress immodestly. They are influencing in a very silent killer type of way by leading their following to believe that this is just the new way of doing things. They are causing girls to grow up thinking they can honor God and be posing in bikinis at the same time. Let me tell you something I know for an irrefutable fact. You can not be living with your body on display to the world if you desire to be Holy, honor God, and live the life He called you to. God needs to know you are trustworthy to His calling on your life. The most use you will ever be to God is when your heart is fully His and when your desires are the same as His and reflect His Word. When you are living in the world but not of it. He desires us to be without blemish (Ephesians 5:27) and have nothing to do with perversion and impurity and sexual immorality and adultery! All of which are linked to the way we dress ourselves.
Literal Standard Version
”Flee the whoredom; every sin—whatever a man may commit—is outside the body, and he who is committing whoredom sins against his own body.” -1 Corinthians 6:18
“But among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality, or of any kind of impurity, or of greed, because these are improper for God’s holy people.” -Ephesians 5:3
New International Version
”The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity, and debauchery; / idolatry and sorcery; hatred, discord, jealousy, and rage; rivalries, divisions, factions, / and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.: - Galations 5:19-21
My last note is that these verses are not to condemn you. For there is no condemnation in Christ. I will spur you on, though, to see this as encouragement. To see this as a seed. I encourage you to be convicted where you may, and even just to think about starting the journey in the future.
New International Version
”Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death.” - 2 Corinthians 7:10
This verse is one of my favorites. It shows that there is no reason to be consumed in the sadness the world has when it comes to regret; it calls us instead to a godly grief, (sorrow, or sadness) that inspires us to change. This is the meaning of conviction. When God tugs on your heartstrings and says, “hey child, I am saddened that you sin this way,” He is intending your reaction to be godly enough to respond with “I am sorry Lord, I will go and sin no more.”
There will be time to grieve your identity that you had found in the way you dressed. There will be time to have shame over what you used to wear. You name it. Like I have said before in my recent accountability post, changing your heart is painful. God wants your heart though. How long will you hold onto this thing that is holding you back from experiencing God’s fullness?
And if you guys think I didn’t love you enough to give you a little bit more, for an extra study and much needed time with the Lord, read all of Ephesians 5.
Thank you for the read. Thank you for the ears to hear. I hope this spoke life into you and I pray you will stick around to hear more from what God has taught me. I desire to guide the faith of many women straight into the arms of the Lord!
God BLESS you and KEEP you.
Have a lovely morning, afternoon, or evening, wherever this finds you. Don’t forget to follow me on Pinterest so you don’t miss my future posts!
-Mackenzie
