Host challenges a listener's church for inconsistent dress code enforcement, arguing that biblical mandates in 1 Corinthians 11 and Deuteronomy require distinct gender attire regardless of culture. He asserts the Bible suffices for all life, including diet and clothing, to glorify God, while explicitly defending patriarchal headship where husbands dictate wives' garments as consistent with divine authority. Ultimately, the episode concludes that male elders must preach these transcendent standards universally, urging pastors to admit such rules exist rather than claiming hypocrisy when enforcing them against secular norms. [Automatically generated summary]
Transcriber: CohereLabs/cohere-transcribe-03-2026, WAV2VEC2_ASR_BASE_960H, sat-12l-sm, script v26.04.01, and large-v3-turbo
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Dress Codes and Glory00:08:20
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Super chat from Cookies 11.
I could go for about like seven cookies right now.
11 is a lot, but.
I think I could probably eat about seven cookies right now.
It's lunchtime.
All right.
My church says it's legalistic to put standards on how to dress at church.
At the same time, their standard is a one piece suit at the beach, a one piece bathing suit.
What's your thoughts and your thoughts on modesty in general?
Good question.
So basically, it seems like you're frustrated, or maybe you're not frustrated, but you're just wanting clarity on the idea that, pull the question up one more time.
But on the idea that it seems like your church doesn't have standards in one context, namely, The gathering of the saints on the Lord's day, but then they do have standards, dress standards, in another context at the beach, right?
So my church says it's legalistic.
So your church is saying no standards on how to dress at church.
So in this context, no standards.
And this other context, there are standards.
So that's, yeah, I get your frustration.
To be fair, I would be gentle towards your pastor with that because he's not being consistent.
And I think if you did it humbly, I don't know.
I don't know.
But if you did it humbly, I think you could get him to back off of that and admit that he's not being consistent.
Because basically, he's saying, well, we don't have any standards in this context, but we do have standards in this other context.
And that's just a lie.
If someone showed up naked to church, he would say something, right?
So we know he does have standards for Sunday.
So he's saying, we don't have standards for Sunday.
Yes, you do.
You can't show up naked to church.
I'm pulling up a text.
1 Corinthians.
We're going to look at 1 Corinthians 11.
So this deals with head coverings, but I think also that's the primary issue.
It deals with Glory, the concept of glory, the glory of man, the glory of Christ, the glory of women.
It deals with submission.
It deals with angels and the nature of Lord's Day worship and the gathering of the saints, all these things.
But it does also implicitly, I think, deal with just the idea of physical distinction between men and women, especially, I think always, but especially on the Lord's Day, that men and women should look different.
I don't have time to read it, but I would encourage you.
So, this is 1 Corinthians 11, verse 2 through 16.
But you could also look at Deuteronomy, where it says that it is an abomination for a woman to put on men's garments.
So, the Bible talks about men should dress like men and women should dress like women.
And you might say, well, but isn't that cultural?
To an extent, yes.
I think that, yeah, to an extent, there are cultural aspects of femininity and masculinity.
But.
I think there are also transcendent standards where it just, there are certain garments, certain ways of dressing that, regardless of what the culture says, simply would not be masculine because our literal objective frame of men and the biological physical frame of women is different.
And there are some things that are conducive to that and therefore are always universally going to be conducive to feminine dress and masculine dress.
So, your church, your pastor, he's just not being honest with that.
To give him the benefit of the doubt, he's overlooking it.
Maybe he's not being deceitful, but he's just being, I don't know, not particularly thoughtful.
Of course, he has standards for church.
He can't come naked to church.
And I would go beyond that and say women should look like women at church and men should look like men at church, right?
So if somebody comes naked to my church, I'm going to kick them out.
And now, if they're willing to put on clothes, then they could come back.
But yeah, they can't stay in church and worship with us naked.
However, beyond that, it's not just they can't come naked.
It's further than that.
I'm making an argument from the greater to the lesser.
Okay, so start with that.
You can't come naked to church.
But also, if a man comes to our church wearing a dress, we're going to correct that also.
Men can't wear dresses to church because men can't dress like women because it's an abomination.
And likewise, a woman doesn't need to come dressed like a man.
A woman doesn't need to come in some power suit, you know, three piece suit.
No, she needs to look like a woman.
She doesn't need to come, you know, with her short hair and trying to look boyish, you know, and shoulder pads to try to.
Try to look like more of a masculine, strong frame, wearing a three piece suit.
No, no, you need to come as a woman.
You are a woman, come as a woman.
Okay, so men need to dress like men, women need to dress like women at the beach.
Same thing, absolutely.
Are there certain ways of dressing that are objectively sinful and immodest?
Of course, there are.
Now, there can be a debate about where is the line, and we need to be careful with that, not overly legalistic.
I don't think we need to.
Be busting out a yardstick at the door of our churches and measuring how many exact centimeters it is from your shorts from the end of your fingertips.
So, certainly, you can abuse that.
You can be too particular.
But to go the complete opposite direction, pretend as though the Bible doesn't speak to what we wear, is ridiculous.
The Bible speaks to all of life.
That's where we'll hang our hat in answering this question.
That's where we'll land the plane.
The Bible speaks to everything.
The Bible is not just inherent, it's sufficient.
The Bible is not just infallible and authoritative, it's sufficient.
And not just for the way of salvation.
The Bible explains sufficiently how to be saved.
No, the Bible says for life and godliness, so that the man of God might be fully equipped for every good work.
So, what is the Bible sufficient for?
Not just the way of salvation, but all of life.
The Bible itself says it's sufficient for all of life.
Is dressing?
Are clothes a part of life?
Yeah.
Right, what about cooking?
What about diet?
What about food?
Uh, is food religious?
Yeah, food is religious.
Go to India, visit India, and ask them if food is religious.
I mean, think about Israel.
Ask them, Is food religious?
Do you eat pork, shellfish?
Right, I mean, of course, food is religious.
Everybody knows food is religious, and even under the new covenant, as New Testament Christians, we believe that food is religious.
How we eat, right?
So, Jesus says, Nothing is unclean, right?
So, Jesus puts you know.
He puts shellfish back on the menu, right?
When he says it's not what goes into a man's mouth, but what comes out of his mouth that defiles him.
And parenthetical statement right there in the text it says, and thus he declared all foods clean.
However, not what you eat, but how you eat.
There's a Christian way to eat, right?
Not necessarily a Christian menu, but even then we can get that there are certain things that are good for your body and things that aren't.
And we should be good stewards of our body because of 1 Corinthians chapter 6.
Your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, right?
So there's all these different things.
So even the what we eat, even under the new covenant, there's something to be said for that.
But certainly, how we eat, whether you eat or drink, do it all for the glory of God.
So, there is a way of eating that glorifies God, there's a way of eating that's worship.
And so, it is with clothing, right?
There's a way of wearing clothes that is right.
What you wear and how you wear it and how you present yourself, the Bible speaks to these things.
So, yeah, it is not, I'll say it like this it is not inherently, inherently, just objectively, right out of the gate, legalistic to say that the Bible says some things about how we dress.
And here are some of the things that I think the Bible says.
And I think that right now, the way you're dressed is inappropriate.
That is not an inherently simple statement.
Husbands Leading Wives00:03:15
I'd have to hear what specifically they said.
Because, again, making an argument from the greater to the lesser, if a pastor is saying, hey, you can't come naked to church, then I 100% agree with that pastor.
And if he's saying, hey, you can't be a woman dressed like a man at church, I also would 100% agree with that pastor.
And to go to the beach, because your pastor's admitting, oh, well, there are standards at the beach.
And the standard that you mentioned in your question is that you should have a one piece bathing suit.
I also agree with the pastor.
And that's something that me and my wife talked about early on in our marriage or before we were even married.
I think when we were engaged, you know, I let her know, hey, I don't want you to wear two piece bathing suits.
I don't think that, and it's not about what I want.
It is a little bit if I become your husband, but we were at the time, I wasn't.
We were engaged, but I don't think that God wants you to wear two piece bathing suits.
And then once we were married, and she started doing it then, but once we were married, then she definitely submitted to my authority.
What?
Oh my gosh, that's patriarchy.
You're saying, As a husband, you tell your wife what to wear?
Yes.
I'm her authority.
Yeah.
Uh huh.
The government tells your wife what to wear.
The government tells her she needs to put a mask around her face.
The government says she needs to inject foreign chemicals that we haven't even long term tested into her body.
Not just the government, but let's talk about her employer, right?
You send your wife to work, you squishy, weak Christian.
You send her to work.
Is there a dress code at her work?
Can she wear whatever she wants to wear?
Yeah, so the man at her job gets to tell her what to wear.
And the only time weak evangelical Christians object is not when a corporate man tells women what to wear, not when the civil magistrate man tells women what to wear, but when a husband who actually loves that woman tells her what to wear.
Then we object.
So stupid.
So hypocritical.
Yeah, I don't rule my house with an iron fist.
I'm not totalitarian, but I do have authority.
Headship actually does mean something.
It actually does mean something.
And my wife doesn't feel like I'm ruling the house as a tyrant.
You know why?
Because my wife, I'm submitted to the word of God and so is she.
And 99.9% of the time, when I give her instruction, she sees it as God's truth and she joyfully submits to it.
That's why every dude that I talk to who's patriarchal in his views, every single one of them, the wife is also patriarchal and loves patriarchy.
And she loves her husband and is far more happy and far more joyful actually building up her home instead of tearing it down with her feminism and building up some corporate man's home.
And she's raising children who fear the Lord and their dinner table is filled with laughter and joy.
Feminism is such a lie.
It's such a lie.
So, yes, it's okay to have dress codes in different contexts.
And I think it's okay if husbands should ultimately do this with their wives and their daughters.
But if they're not, then yes, it's okay for the male elders of a church to say, yeah, there are certain things that you can't wear at church.
Church Standards and Preaching00:00:53
And for them, even from the pulpit, to preach.
And there are certain things, not just at church, but in all of life, whether it be at the beach or the mall, there are certain things that you shouldn't wear because the Bible says so.
And let's not get overly particular about where we draw the line.
Let's be careful with that.
But in general, to say that there are principles, the Bible does speak to how we dress.
Of course, it does.
And all the way back to the question, the final thing I'll say is I agree with your pastor and what he's saying about the beach.
And I think he just needs to be consistent and admit that he also has standards for church.
And if he says he doesn't, he's just, he's either not being entirely honest or he's just not being completely thoughtful.
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