31. IFB Modesty vs. Biblical Modesty w/ Amy Miller

And here we go. This is the For Freedom Podcast. This podcast exists to bring to light the legalism and abuse in the independent fundamental Baptist movement, and to encourage believers to grow in grace through the scriptures. Now, here's your host, John Holyfield. Welcome back, everybody, to the For Freedom Podcast. This is your host, John Holyfield, along with our other host, James Safer. How's it going, James? I am doing fantastic, John. We are a couple of days away from our next child being born, and so we've got one more doctor's appointment, and then we will be in the hospital delivering our baby. It's always fun with COVID trying to work out all these details. You know, with all of our other pregnancies, we were in the hospital for four days, and they told us, they said, if we can get you out in one day, we will. They said, we don't want to keep you in any longer than what we have to. So that's a positive for us. You know, we're excited about not having to stay in the hospital for a long period of time, been able to be back with all the kids, and I think my in-laws are going to be in town helping. And so it's going to be a fun time with a new baby. You've got four, so you've done this many times, but it's been five years since we've had a baby. So we are getting prepared for that new adventure there. Yeah. So Maggie was born in February of last year, right before COVID hit in America. And so there was no restrictions whatsoever. And I can be honest with you, I would sort of be bummed out if they only said we had to stay one day. The hospital that we've had three of ours at is almost like a hotel. I mean, they take care of you. It's nice. And then after the baby's born, they will like keep her in the nursery so you can get some rest. So I'm like, man, not having those three days or three evenings after the baby's born, I'd be bummed. I don't know. Maybe I'm just a selfish, sorry individual person. So are you going to have to, will they let anybody else be there or visitors? They're basically just, what's the COVID restrictions like with having a baby? Yeah. So the COVID restriction at this hospital is there is one visitor allowed total. So like if someone's in the hospital, they can have a different family member per day. But for a birth, because it's in the birthing wing, they only are allowed one single person the entire time. So if she's there three days, there's one person, which is going to be me, that can go in and out. And I can come and go as I please. If I need to go get stuff for her, I can go do that. But no one but me will be able to go in. So her family, her sister, my family won't be able to go in. So it'll just be us there. And then we'll come home. So it's gotten better. I know at the beginning it was no one. It was just the mom. The dad had to wait in the parking lot. He couldn't come in at all. So now they've eased up a little bit. I would have hated that. I would have hated to have to sit in the parking lot and hope everything goes well. So. And Allie's having a, is she having a C-section? Yeah, she'll have a C-section and she's getting COVID tested next week. And whether she has COVID or not, they'll still have to deliver the baby. Which is, I don't know why she has to get COVID tested. It doesn't make sense to me. But she asked him, she said, hey. Baby ain't waiting on no COVID. No. She asked him, she said, hey, my husband's going to be in the room with us. Because I get to be in the operating room. Does he need to get COVID tested? No, he's fine. So these rules, they make absolutely no sense. It's crazy. It feels like I'm back in Bible college days ago. Well, we'll be praying. We'll be praying for Allie and you guys. I know you're excited, but that's also a hefty thing to come back from. So we'll be praying for that. I think it's time now. We have an exciting episode for you ahead of you today. But before we jump into the meat of the program, we're going to do this week roundup. All right, James. This week in the world of things, we cover in the podcast the world of the IFB. And so this week in the world of IFB, you have the big conference going on outside out in California, North Valley. Sort of a camp meeting type of conference they're actually doing out there with a bunch of camp meeting style preachers. And IFB Sermon Clips at Fake Sermon has been supplying us with some tidbits of what's going out there. What's been your take so far? Man, if it were me and I were in that world and I couldn't have a camp meeting inside, I wouldn't have camp meeting. I would just cancel the whole thing. But they've decided to go forward with it. So we get some kicks and giggles out of it. Joe Arthur. So you don't like the honking of the horns for amening? No. That's just me, though. You know, Joe Arthur got up and said he clearly stated that he is not a recovering fundamentalist. He is a old-time preacher who was born in the old-time religion, and he ain't changing nothing. So that was interesting to hear that. What's your take so far, John? Yeah, it's funny to see this. Well, it just seems like it's—and I put this on Twitter—it just seems like it's a big toddler sitting in a sandbox after it's run everybody off. And nobody wants to play with him because it's just sitting there crying that they want their way. And that's really what it is. And it's the amazing ability to connect their way with the Bible. Like, in one breath, they'll say, this is the old path. This is this type of thing, singing this type of song, doing this type of ministry. And that's what the Bible tells us to do. No, it doesn't. Where did they get that? I don't know. But it's just—it's—you know, it's one of those things to, like, see if you want to exercise self-control and trying to get your blood pressure under control, do, like, a little test and go watch these clips for, like, 30 minutes to see if you can, like, work on self-control and blood pressure. Some of you need to stay away from it. But other than that, that's going on out there. Also in the world of things that's happened this past week, WandaVision, which me and James have mentioned several times in our This Week Roundup, has ended. WandaVision has ended. What do you think? Well, their series finale, which is not a season finale, series finale, which gives us the clue that there won't be a WandaVision 2. I believe there won't be a WandaVision 2. I think they're going to pick up with Doctor Strange and her. You know, they made a lot of allusions to Doctor Strange. And so I think it's going to be a very, very exciting roundabout when they're going into this magical realm of the MCU. And they're going to have Loki's movie coming out, which is going to be dealing with the magic. I think that it's setting the stage for a great, I think it's their Universe 4, or not Universe 4, but their fourth season or series of Marvel movies. Is that right, John, or is it we just finished three, right? It's called Phase 4. Phase 4. I couldn't think of the word. Yeah. They have, I believe in this year alone, they have like 10 properties being released between full movies and actual Disney Plus shows. So it's going to be pretty crazy. I liked it. I thought that it was a surprisingly very, very good show. And if you have caught on, the overall theme of the show was dealing with grief, dealing with loss. And, you know, it was very well done. To be honest with you, as a comic book nerd and an MCU nerd, I was a little disappointed at the end. I thought there was going to be a little bit more payoff to some of the things. But at the end of the day, overall, it was a really good show. The only thing I was disappointed with, John, is I wish they would have gave us a small clip at the end about White Vision. Just to know. Oh, really? You want to see what happens there? Well, I want to see what happens. I want to see if he's going to be a player in the future. You know, there hasn't been a lot of talk about it. If he's going to come back, they haven't re-signed on the actor. So I'm a little – I wish they would have used a third clip at the very end and just, you know, White Vision landing in a field somewhere trying to figure out who he is. Something just to show us, hey, we're going to still use this character. Yeah. Speaking of going there, let's transition to the next thing I wanted to discuss. I guess they're going to be putting out new movies and this idea of the movie theater sort of opening back up. I mean, they got movies coming out. Some areas of the country, the movie theaters are open and they have their COVID regulations to where you could go see it. James, when was the last time you've been to the movies? It was three weeks ago. I went with my wife to watch the new Wonder Woman movie when we were in Asheville together. And I felt bad. I had to repent. I had to go to the altar because, you know, going to the movie house is against the law. It's against God's will for us. And I'm being facetious there. But, yes, it was a good time. You know what? That's a good point. We should do an episode on entertainment and going to the movie house. Going to the movie house. We should definitely do that. But I went once when Tenet came out. I haven't been back since. I do plan on in April, April 1st, though, I have a date planned with my oldest daughter. And she wants to go to the movies to see Godzilla vs. Kong. And she's a big monster movie lover. She's seen all of those so far. So she's excited about that. So we're going to go to the movies. You've got to see that one in theaters. I mean, come on. It's big, big, massive monsters. But that's the end of the This Week Roundup. And we're going to do this next segment really quick. And this is one we started last week. This is John's IFB Sermon Archive. So this is from a message. I've played two clips so far from a message that was preached when I was in Bible college about Tony Hudson. And so we played last week a clip about him like, you know, you better like his tambourine and ripping some Bob Jones graduate. And this one is since the Preacher Boys podcast put out an episode about Bill Gothard, which I think was excellent. Here is a little clip where Tony Hudson rips Bill Gothard. And it's quite interesting. Also, pay attention to how many things he jumps on in two minutes. Here it is. What about that wise as serpents? It's in there, too, bless God. You've got to feed them. Well, Bill Gothard said, hey, is he paying for the grossest? Since when are you going to let a, hey, since when are you going to let a bachelor tell you how to raise youngers? There ain't no bachelor going to tell me how to, how to pat a husband, a wife, bless God, or father, children. I can tell you that, bless God. Hey, it's preaching time up there in the back. Can y'all hear me up there? Act like you can then. You did run well. But they, man, they began to really impress you. Well, I got to be like they are. If I don't like what they like, if I don't look what they like, if I don't dress just like they dress. Now, listen, I believe in modesty. But, sir, I'm going to wear my overhauls if it hairlips the Pope. You're not going to come to my church and try to look, press me into something. Listen, I hate ties. I believe the person who put ties ought to be hung by a tie. That's the biggest waste of money. Some of these things cost $50 and $60. If we were to have a revival and sell these ties and put it in a mission fund, we could reach the world. I'd feel a whole lot more spiritual about it, too. Man, I'd go barefooted on visitation if it's the right house. Say amen. Amen. You did run well. You was doing fine. And all of a sudden, the legalizer shows up at church. Let me show you some videos at home. I know the preacher means well and everything, but I went to the headquarters. I've been to the headquarters. Let me just say something about you homeschoolers. Look up here. Get mad. Get glad. Say, your kids ain't no better than mine. I'm so tired of you thinking that Joe Youngins is so much smarter than mine. Look up here. My public school boy can beat up your homeschool boy. And by the way, there's something wrong with an 11-year-old girl reading bridal magazines. You did run well, John. You did run well. Yeah. There you go. That's him actually ripping on legalism by giving his own form of legalism. So there you go, everybody. Wow. I mean, he rips on Bill Gothher, rips on homeschooling, rips on a bunch of other things. And overalls. Overalls because he's for modesty. He's for modesty. And you know what? Speaking of modesty, James, speaking of modesty, that's what we are going to cover today in today's episode. And we have a very special guest today that we're excited to have on. And so let's welcome today blogger Amy Miller. Amy is a wife and a mother of four and a blogger on the Coffee and Grace blog. Really great blog. I've actually read a couple of her articles and does a fantastic job. Amy, how are you doing today? I'm doing good. I'm excited to be here with you guys. Yeah. When I started the podcast, we wanted to sort of dive into the specific issues of legalism and those types of things. And this was like one of the first issues. Here we are 31 episodes later actually getting to it. And James and I were talking and we thought, you know what? Most of the time when modesty is dealt with, it's actually geared or directed or targeted towards ladies. And we thought, how silly would it be to have two guys talking about how ladies should dress? So having a lady on to talk about that as well just seemed like it made sense to us. So before we get started into that, just tell everybody a little bit about yourself. Maybe a quick bio of where Amy is and how you got to the point you are to where you're doing a blog about some of these issues. Um, well, my name is Amy and I am a wife to my husband of almost 12 years and I homeschool my four kids, like you mentioned. Um, so I started my blog actually when I was still very heavily into legalism and I just wanted to share kind of things that I would read in my Bible. And, um, we were a part of a very controlling legalistic church. And so I, I didn't explicitly start dealing with issues, but it was kind of how I shared my journey out of that. Um, dealing with postpartum depression and things like that, kind of how the Lord really began to deal with me about my own personal legalism and maybe some twisted ideas I had about mental health and all of that. Um, so yeah, that's, that's, what's gotten me into blogging and kind of sharing my journey with people. And, um, yeah, that's, that's kind of where we're at with it. Fantastic. Fantastic. Um, so we're going to talk about modesty today. And, uh, this is, uh, sort of the idea of modesty as probably the three of us have heard it, um, in, in years that we've spent in the fundamentalist culture. Um, and so we're going to, we're going to juxtapose that to, uh, what I believe is biblical modesty. And, uh, I believe I've actually had some conversations with some people that sort of will push back on this and they say, well, some of these people's view of, of modesty, uh, for instance, the, uh, ladies should only wear, uh, skirts or skirts to their knee. No, ladies shouldn't wear pants. It's just a different, uh, way of interpreting the Bible. To classify it as legalism may be going too far. And, uh, I think that's wrong. I think that it is a form of legalism. I think it's a very gross form of legalism. And, um, and so before we jump into the thing, I think it's important because it's been a while since we've, we've hit legalism head on to, to real quickly, uh, define it. Pastor Kent Keller in, uh, in the book on modesty that he wrote with Martha Peace, uh, did some, uh, very good handling of, of the subject. And so he broke down legalism in three sections. So me and James are going to rush through this real quick, just to catch everybody up. And then we're going to discuss the topic. Um, he, he breaks it down as legalism is, is manifest itself in addition, subtraction, and algebra, uh, for those, uh, math wizards out there. So Paul warns us not to exceed in first Corinthians four, six, exceed what has been written. This error comes when we equate our additions with God's commands, or when we believe that we have to obey our higher standards in order not to sin. Uh, he writes external methods by themselves will fail to address the heart and will never reach the core of the problem. And that is so, so true. That is so true. Um, and, uh, the biblical counseling that I, I work through, I mean, that's, that's all that we're, we're trying to get to is get people to get to the root issue. And legalism is basically ignore the heart. Just look at what's the outside. Uh, we avoid legalism as long as we keep dress codes on separate level under the authority of God's word. God never gave any literal measurements in his word to describe what is modest or immodest. And that's sort of like a thesis statement of what we're going to, we're going to get to, um, and, and talk about James talk about, uh, the subtraction part of legalism. Well, the subtraction part is simply stated you're subtracting love out of anything. Um, and so Paul talks about this in first Corinthians 13, where it is taking away the love God, um, good actions minus love is simply equal to legalism that rejects God. Um, and so when we begin subtracting these things, um, in essence, we begin to look like Pharisees. We began to look good on the outside. We're drawing attention to how modest we are. Uh, we're saying, you know, we're going to play some clips later, or maybe play this one, um, about how, you know, we're going to keep the dress down to our half mid calf because we just want to be so modest. And so there's no love in that. There's no, uh, drawing of showing love, but it's simply just showing, um, how prideful legalism can really affect, um, every day of our life. Um, you know, I've experienced this in a lot of areas of my life, um, and even in our first ministry and even to this day, sometimes, because I was so indoctrinated into this, um, you, you know, my wife, me and her were having a conversation just the other day about an issue and she said, well, you're against that, but I'm not. And you're, and she said, I'm against this, but you're not. Uh, but there was no love there. And so there's still that, um, that issue of trying to balance the love and the modesty or the love in any rule, anything that God has for us, um, and not take away that love out of spite. There was so many times, uh, as me and John have just recently come across our old sermons from college. Um, I found a lot of mine. And so I'm starting to download those and just listen to what we were in and just the hateful speech, the subtracting of love out of it, um, just to get an amen. One of the pastors even said, I'm going to say this because I'm on a Bible college just to get an amen. He said, cause I know I'm going to get an amen. I'm like, what, why, why is getting an amen even anything? Uh, but that's where this is, is taking that love out. It turns us in to Pharisees. So John, give this last one about algebra, and then we'll continue on with a couple of things. Well, I think this spurred a question. I know we didn't want to spend a whole lot of time right here, but Amy, have you seen, have you seen that? Like the pride aspect of how legalism, when it subtracts the love, uh, that pride just takes over? Yes. Um, you know, whenever I would dress a certain way for church, um, you know, in skirts and dresses, obviously I would think, I would think I was so much better than everybody else at church. And I remember one time, um, in the church, my husband and I kind of grew up in, um, there was a woman that got on the platform and pants to sing. And I just was, you know, like, that's terrible. Why would you do that? That's so disrespectful. I'm so much more separated and consecrated because I'm in a dress. Um, and to be honest with you, I didn't even really hold the skirts only belief personally, like outside of church, but at church, I mean, it was all about looking the part and God wasn't in that. And my love for the Lord wasn't in that. It was really just elevate myself above other people. So that's a, that's an interesting thought you, it wasn't necessarily your conviction away from church, but the pride aspect still, still got there. I mean, and I think James brought a good point too. This is not something that we have conquered. It's something that we, we still struggle with. Like, you know, uh, we're doing a podcast. We're better than other people because we're calling this stuff out. I mean, that pride can, can really creep up and it's, it's, it's really the, the satanic sin that just, uh, our flesh gravitates to all the time. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I agree. Um, you know, you, as you leave fundamentalism, you can start to look at people that are maybe still in it and don't see the things that you see. And you'll be like, oh, I see it. You don't, you know, and that's not the right way to be either. We have to be patient with others. So, um, yeah, we can't, we have to give others grace and we can't be lifted up in pride over these things. And I thought that was important too, because I hope people understand there might be a little bit of sarcasm come out in today's episode. There might be a little bit of frustration come out in today's episode. And so I want everybody to understand our heart. It's, it's not like we're trying to say that we have come to some, some Gnostic, uh, secret knowledge. It's, but there is a place, I think, for correcting this error and calling this out. Um, so the, the last form of legalism that, uh, this guy Kent Keller explains is the form of algebra. This is, uh, the form of legalism as a metaphor. And the idea is replacement. See, in algebra, you replace numbers with letters for a variety of purpose, which many of us have, uh, objected to once we get to that point in our education and, uh, see, maybe our kids come to as well. But, uh, in the area of using the metaphor, this form of legalism replaces grace with works, which is always, uh, always detrimental to your, to your Christianity. Uh, and so we see that so many times. And I think that as we were just pointing out that, um, replacing grace in seeing other people in different, in basically how other people are comfortable in their own dress with our works of what we think they should be wearing. And, um, and so that is another form of legalism. So that's what we're talking about when we talk about this, this area of legalism. Now let's get to the modesty issue. So the, uh, I believe that this, these presentations of modesty is legalism. And, uh, so we're going to introduce this subject to, so you know what we're talking about. Here's a couple of IFP preachers just throwing this out there. James is going to play us a couple of clips. And you're the hypocrite, right? And first you, by the way, most of the time it's those wives that's running those men. They ought to go ahead and turn in their, their papers. They ought to go ahead and go back where they came from. Cause I was saying he's supposed to be the, he's supposed to have control of his family. Right. She's running the thing. All right. Don't bow your head, sir. Come on. Only preacher, won't preach against a woman wearing breeches is a preacher whose wife's got an arm. Don't you get quiet on me, huh? I said, don't you dare get quiet on me. I was invited to preach here. You're supposed to treat your hips when we're sick. And I know how you'll have your pastor stands. Hey, man. And I know how you ought to. Come on. I know how you ought to. I know we were just going to play those and go, but that was straight up abusive. Yes. It's awful. I couldn't imagine. I would get up and walk out at that point. Yeah. I think sometimes people are afraid. I mean, if you're going at people like that, I mean, if you got up and walked out, shoot, you may be scared that he's going to come after you. When I was younger, I would have just sat and endured it. And I don't know, probably felt horrible about myself. I don't know. Well, there was a time when Tony Hudson came to chapel where we were at, John. I think John had already left. Or you may have still been there. It may have been your senior year. But it was when Chris Lynn wore pink suit. Okay. So he gets up and Tony Hudson starts ripping and preaching. Chapel is supposed to be 30 minutes. Right after chapel is lunch. And then most of the people were heading to work. Chapel was never 30 minutes. It was supposed to be. Okay. And then lunch. And then I went to work right after lunch. I didn't have any afternoon classes. Well, Tony Hudson starts going. And I kid you not, it was about an hour and a half message. And there were guys that were getting up and leaving because they had to go to work. It wasn't because of anything. They just, they had other responsibilities. And he started preaching them because they were leaving. These guys that are leaving, they're getting convicted. They're following under the Holy Spirit. They can't handle hard preaching. They're leaving. No, they're leaving because they had to go to work because you're preaching for an hour and a half. So, oh man, that's, but that's the same thought. If someone would have got up and left, he would have just started preaching at them. Yeah. Because they were leaving. Yes. I think it was JC Groves that said that he and his friend had gone to church and they were walking out and he called them a couple of queers or something leaving together. And JC turned around and was like, yeah, we are or something like that. Yeah. It's camp meeting or something. Yes. Oh, it's ridiculous. Yeah. All right. James is going to play this next one. This introduces subject, but I've got to warn you, this is pretty blasphemous. Now watch this. When you got dressed today, when you got dressed today, watch this. When you got dressed today, you dressed deity. I can promise you that the Holy Ghost doesn't want to go around town looking like an escapee from a nudist colony. Amen. Amen. Amen. Dr. Hamlin. Preach on. Yeah. I don't, I don't have any words for that. Honestly. Yeah. I mean, I think his point is because we are indwelt with the Holy Spirit. Therefore, he can make some kind of connection that we, the way we dress, we're addressing deity. But man, that, that, that was just blasphemy. That was blasphemy. Yes. We're indwelt by the Holy Spirit, but that does not deify us at all. Right. We're just a bunch of little gods, John walking around. Maybe he was referring to himself. He was referring to himself as a little God. I don't know. I'm glad you can joke about that, James, because it's really like got my blood pressure out this morning. When I hear that, I think of how preachers are taught how to dress in the pulpit with a suit and tie. And I mean, not just any suit and tie. They've got to be like top of the line looking sharp if you're going to be anybody. Right. And as we're getting ready to dig into modesty, that's kind of the opposite of what modesty is. So, you know, yeah. No worries. Okay. So we are going to look at a couple of common passages that are used to, to break this down. The first one, and James, you have your, your Bible ready. We're going to look at the first one and then we'll jump into Deuteronomy 22. But the first one I do want to cover because I heard this and this, this one really had more of an effect on me than the Deuteronomy passage because I always felt wrong about, even when I was in the IFB culture, I never felt like my wife and I were dating. And then when we got married that, you know, I was like, listen, you, you do you. I'm not going to be that guy that, that, you know, you just, I never felt right about that. Uh, and then, but this passage always sort of had me, I was like, and I never read it. I heard it quoted, but I never read it. And that was the idea of Isaiah 47, one through three, that talked about where, uh, God views what is actual nudity. Uh, that was sort of the, the presentation of what this was teaching. So James, you have that verse. I do. I'm going to read it in the King James, just in case anyone is listening and says, we don't like the King James. It says, come down and sit in the dust. Oh, virgin daughter of Babylon, sit on the ground. There is no throne. Oh, daughter of the Chaldeans, for thou shalt no more be called tender and delegate. Take the millstone and grind meal. Uncover thy locks, make bare thy legs, uncover the high, the thigh, pass over the river. Thy nakedness shall be uncovered. Yay. Thy shame shall be seen. I will take vengeance and I will not meet thee as a man. So John asked me to look at that a little bit. And, uh, when I looked at that, we, we hear this quote, you know, we've heard several pastors say the thigh is referring to nakedness right there. It says, uncover your thigh. Thy nakedness shall be uncovered. And, uh, when you look at that word nakedness right there, it is not referring to the naked body. It is showing that you were your works and your deeds in life are going to be uncovered. So that's why they're calling for these people to come out of the mountains. And they're saying that these things are going to be uncovered in your life. And so if you're going to take this verse and you're going to use the same exegetical principles of nakedness to the thigh, then you have to take that same thought and say, okay, it says take off your veil, uncover your locks. So if a woman is not wearing a veil that is considered naked. Yes. If a woman is showing any part of her leg, cause it says make bare your leg, then you're naked. And then it goes on to uncover your thigh. Now, the reason it is saying this is because of the very last part of verse two, it says uncover your locks, take off your veil, make bare your leg and uncover your thigh. Why are you doing that? To pass over the river. Your clothes don't need to get wet. You don't need to walk through the water and get everything soaking wet, pull up your stuff, walk over the river and then recover your body. Okay. So that you can come and be judged for your works and for your deeds. It is not referring to your leg being naked. If you're saying your legs naked, then if you're showing your hair, if you are not having a veil on, then you are still considered naked. If you're going to take the same principle to apply to this passage. Amy? Yeah, that's basically what I got out of it too. You know, it also talks about a grinding flower and like you said, passing over river. So, I mean, it's a little silly to take that out of context when it's not even a biblical command as to how we're supposed to dress because then you would have to apply it to all those other things. So, yeah. I just had a funny thought of how you just explained that the reason for uncovering that was to pass through the water. And I just thought about all of those really legalistic IFB families that go to the beach or go to the swimming pool and wear jeans or the poor girls wear culottes down to their ankles just to swim in. And I'm like... Yeah. Triple S days. My husband wore jeans in the swimming pool. He had to wear jeans and a t-shirt when he went swimming. And to me, that was... Because I didn't grow up IFB like he did. So, that was completely foreign. I was like, blue jeans? That's really sort of a safety hazard, isn't it? It is. I feel like... Especially if your child doesn't know how to swim. I had to wear jeans one time going swimming because I had a teenager to push me in and have my clothes on. But I mean, other than that, I don't wear jeans going swimming. Oh my goodness. Yeah. James. Okay. So, the next one is the next passage that is probably the most commonly used passage. Now, there are some New Testament passages that are used for modesty that are used to this. And there were some other podcasts that's been doing this subject. I think Bill Reeves' podcast has tackled modesty recently. The Higher Grounds podcast tackled modesty. I listened to those episodes. They were pretty rough. Just to be honest with you, as far as their handling of the Bible. One of the things that frustrated me with them is that they kept saying, now, we're just going to break open the Bible. And I'm like, it took them 40 minutes to actually go to the Bible. They really just... And my end conclusion to them was they basically were just extracting their modesty principles from culture. And... But before we turn Amy loose, and this is where we're really going to just let her fly with this subject, I do want to get her blood pressure boiling by playing two clips that have to do... She's like, no. So, that have to do with Deuteronomy 22.5. And these may be familiar to any of those that follow IFB Ceremony Cliffs. So, go ahead, James, with those. And then, there's distinctive dress. Deuteronomy 22.5 is actually... It teaches the principle of distinction. It's the particular of what you wear. A woman shall not wear that which pertaineth to a man, neither should a man put on a woman's garment, for all that do so are an abomination. So, pertaineth... The word there, pertaineth, means it's something that belongs to the man, or it's something that belongs to men. It's not like my wife can't wear my particular clothing. It's not talking about what pertains to a man individually. It's taught... The word pertain means it pertains to a man, to what men wear, or the thing that distinguishes men as a whole culture. And let's remember that what we wear, clothing, is tied to the question of authority in the Bible in 1 Corinthians 11. So, the question is, if the Bible says that there is a article of clothing that I do identifies men as men, what is it? What is it? If we're honest, we clearly understand that it's pants. Now, we have to think, we have to erase all kinds of stuff from the last 100 years, because as I said before, our culture has rebelled against that. Our culture has made it, has fought against that, fought against that, fought against that, fought against that, fought against that, so much so that if we were just dropped in here from outer space, and tried to look around and said, well, what is it that distinguishes men from women in their clothing, we would have a very hard time figuring it out. Because most women wear pants. But if we're honest, with the scriptures, and with just even being around, if we didn't fall off the turnip truck yesterday, we know that if there's going to be one, and the Bible says there ought to be, or that there is one, if there's going to be one, and there is, it's pants. Yes. Amy, what say you? My goodness. I think he's saying he's looking at the scripture. He's getting all this from scripture. I think he's trying to say that he's believing that the Bible was written to 1950s America, maybe, and how the cultural standards were back then. Obviously, the way men and women dress, the Bible does want us to have gender distinction, but that is often brought on by culture. And so, if the Bible wasn't written in the 1950s, or even 100 years ago, and just so everybody's, in case anybody's wondering, it wasn't 1611 either. We go all the way back to Bible time, and men and women actually wore very similar garments. The men wore the robes down to their knees. Women wore the robes down to their ankles, but they were distinguished in other ways, like, you know, men had beards, and women wore head coverings, and women wore jewelry, things like that. So, there was a gender distinction. And so, if we were going to apply it to each culture and each time, now we look at today, I'm sorry, men's pants and women's pants are different. I mean, I was wearing a pair of slacks the other night, and they were cut for the shape of a woman. If my husband put those on, he would look ridiculous. So, I mean, that's, you know what I mean? It's different for each gender. And so, okay, so I'll give him a little bit of leeway to say that there is gender distinction, but that isn't necessarily a time capsule or whatever in the 1950s, you know, where we have June Cleaver and her really pretty dress, and the husband, you know, dressed the way he is. It changes throughout culture, and especially once you leave America, you can see that it's like that everywhere. Yeah, I thought that was funny. Whenever I was in high school, I remember this, because I didn't grow up in a, I grew up independent fundamental Baptist, but even the North Carolina church that James and I grew up in, that wasn't a big deal. Like, we never really heard that. The Christian school I went to, we were, I remember we had a Bible teacher who was from Bob Jones, and he was talking about how he had a friend who's dating a girl, and her dad was very much, like, big on that. Now, his girlfriend didn't really understand it, but she had to dress this way, and they ended up getting into an argument about it and all this stuff. And so she said that, you know, all the, you know, pants are the garments of men. And so he, as a college student, not really concerned about making a good impression on the dad, decided to, okay, let's test this theory. So he went to the store and bought a pair of ladies' jeans that had sequins all over the rear end that he could fit into and wore them to their house to pick her up. It was just waiting, waiting for the dad to look at him and say, those are women's jeans. Yeah. Well, I mean, that's the way it is. And gender distinction can go beyond what's, you know, kind of pants or skirts you're wearing. You know, obviously, the way women wear their hair, their makeup, their jewelry, they carry themselves differently than men generally. So, yeah. Well, you brought out a very interesting point, too, about the way that the dress culture was even during the Bible times. I mean, if we go to Deuteronomy 22, 5, we think of proper way of interpreting the Bible. We look at the culture of what it was whenever Moses was pinning this to the children of Israel. And if we understand, like, as Amy was saying, that the purpose was really to separate gender distinction, well, how was their dress? I mean, you have to think about that. Was Moses telling them in the wilderness while they're obtaining the law of God that, hey, guys need to wear pants and girls don't? So, what did it mean to them that gender distinction to be? You know, and so you come up with ideas of, yeah, these were more along the lines of how they cared with them as set apart or as to set against what the pagan cultures, maybe the Egyptians or the others, were actually blending the genders a little bit in that understanding. It's just, it's a gross form of eisegesis to just put pants in that. Like you said, it's taking a 1950s form of American culture and reading it straight into the Bible. Yes. I like how you put that. Yes. You know, and even with that, John, we were at the same church, of course, growing up, and they necessarily didn't preach as hardcore on this issue as we heard in college or as you heard in Christian school. But at the same time, they would say, okay, you need to dress modest. But yet, I was there at our church growing up and we did a womanless beauty pageant. John, do you remember that out at Sloan Park? When they had all of the men dress up as women and they did a beauty pageant for the men dressed up as women. And I've seen churches all across the country that do that for fun, joking, but men are putting on the attire of women. And it's okay to cross-dress then because it's for a good cause or whatnot. But when a man does dress or when a woman does dress like a man, that's wrong. But we can allow a man to dress like a woman and do a quote-unquote beauty pageant and make fun and have a good time. But when a woman does it, it's wrong. John, do you remember that? I do. Those things are absolutely ridiculous, though. So I think somebody that – let's say if somebody was listening to this that disagreed with that started from a position of what we are trying to rebuttal, okay? What would we then say, Amy, is – would the biblical position or the Bible's position on modesty be? I mean, is modesty a thing that is taught in the Bible? It is. I will say that as I began to study and think upon it, it's not as explicitly defined as many preachers have claimed. I think of detailed books like the one that I had sent you, Modesty and Matter of the Heart. We had a revival several years back, and a preacher had given this to my sister-in-law, and she was always kind of a flamboyant dresser and wore like really high heels and stuff. And she brought it to me and she was like, do you think he's trying to imply that I'm immodest? And I remember sitting down and reading it, and it has very detailed descriptions with pictures about how a woman should dress and all of this. But honestly, when you actually get into the Bible, it doesn't have these explicit details. It is actually pretty simple. Um, and I'm gonna give a quick, well, no, I'll get to that in a second. So I just want to look at what the Bible has to say about modesty. Um, we'll just start in 1 Timothy 2.9. Um, it says, women are to adorn themselves in modest apparel with shamefacedness and sobriety, not with broided hair or gold or pearls or costly array. And then the ESV says to adorn in respectable apparel with modesty and self-control. So modesty for my study is not a word you'll see in scripture in any other place, but it is a theme or idea mentioned all throughout. Um, so full disclaimer here, if a lady is listening to this, looking for me to give them a specific list on what to wear, I can't give her one. All I'm going to do is look at the Bible. So, um, the word apparel comes from the Greek word kastastole, which I know they love to talk about meaning down or descending down. Um, but that simply just means clothes and dress. I've studied it out. That's all the word kastastole means. And so, um, modest means, uh, it comes from the word kosmios. Um, and it is related to the word cosmos, which means orderliness and propriety. Cosmos means respectable. And it is the same exact word. We get the phrase of good behavior from, uh, in 1 Timothy 3.9, where it's talking about the qualifications of overseers. So again, it's talking about good behavior, respectable. Um, so at the very least, a little thing here, we can gather that, um, it is, this could apply to men too. This isn't just a woman's issue. So, um, let's see. Paul really was talking about church behavior here and Timothy, and he's, you know, speaking to men about prayer and he talks about women, how she should present herself modestly. And he talks about respectable dress, self-control and modesty. And he also talks about braided hair and jewelry. So, um, what do we understand about this? Uh, Paul wanted the emphasis to be less about appearances and more about the heart. Peter agreed with this when he wrote, not to let your adorning be external, um, the braiding of hair and the putting on of jewelry or the clothing you wear, but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God's sight is very precious. So simply put, um, we, the way we present ourselves is not to flaunt ourselves in pride or to show off wealth or status, because that's kind of what he was talking about with the jewelry. Sometimes women would come in, you know, with the jewelry flaunting themselves. Um, but the way we present ourselves should not be to show ourselves off, but to magnify Christ. We should take care to adorn our souls and beautify them rather than our bodies. So is Paul commanding women in this to be drab or frumpy? No, but the emphasis shouldn't be on our fine clothes or expensive jewelry. Um, and all of that to promote self, because that would be a modest. And I find that to be really interesting. I think of where I'm from Easter Sunday, that's like the independent Baptist fashion show. And everybody, I remember in my husband's family, everybody always about like matching outfits, the finest clothes on Easter Sunday. And everybody would show up and they kind of look at each other. There'd always be those two ladies that would wear the same exact dress and they'd be kind of competing with each other about who looked better. Um, and it was always to show off, or I think of camp meeting. That was another one is you've got to have your best on and you, so you can get meetings. Right. Um, and so, um, it was really self-promotion and not about Christ. Um, and I really think that rather than, um, you know, I know that we, these people are dressed very conservatively and they've got their bodies, you know, covered up. Well, um, there's a spirit of pride there. And I think instead we should follow Jesus example in this. Um, I got a good quote from Maggie Comtenthal from, uh, Desiring God. She said, he meaning Jesus was not the gaudy militant leader. The Jews expected. They asked Jesus, who are you? His answers culminate with a declaration before Abraham was, I am the whole world was made by him and through him. Yet he made himself nothing. So here we have ourselves in churches today in America, where, like I said, everybody's really flaunting themselves, but Jesus was lowly and simple. He was not gaudy. He was not flashy or prideful. And he was the son of God. And yet he never boasted in a prideful or attention seeking way. So when we consider biblical modesty in the heart of that, Jesus should be our example. Another thing to note was whenever he was in the synagogue the first time, uh, as an adult and he stood up and taught, you know, people looked at him and they're like, who is this? This is just Joseph's son. He was really just a regular guy that just blended in. And like I said, you know, uh, John Hamblin talking about dressing deity. That is the opposite of what Jesus presented himself as. And he's the King of Kings. Reach. Come home. I'm just saying. Get me fired up over here. Yeah, we did. I did get fired up when I heard that. It made me, my husband was like, do I really have to listen to this? Yes. Yeah. And I had to play it several times. He was like, oh, um, so this is really modesty. The heart of modesty is humility. Um, a person can be well covered, like I said. Um, and, but if they're flaunting their wealth or maybe flaunting. Sorry, I have like 20 alarms through my day. Um, so maybe they're flaunting their position in the church or maybe how holy they are or whatever. Um, you know, this is, this is again, promoting Christ. So even in spite of having the right clothes dressed conservatively, like I said, they would be considered immodest. So the questions we need to ask ourselves is not necessarily how well dressed I am. Although we'll get into that. That is important. Um, but how's my attitude? How am I reflecting Christ? How am I showing love to one another? You know, one statement that I've heard among a lot of women who wear skirts full time is I wear skirts and people know that I am a Christian because I wear skirts. And that's not in the Bible anywhere, but the Bible does say they will know that we're Christians by how we love one another and how we show love to, you know, the lost, to other believers. Um, so, and I'm not, I'm not saying that, you know, dress isn't important, but it's really the heart. If we, if we're all dressed up and looking great, but our heart is prideful and lacking the humility of Christ, then we are immodest. So, um, the clear cut specifics are just not there the way that these books have taught. And I don't even understand how some of these people have like week long conferences on modesty because really it's, it's really very simple. Um, and really just a consistent emphasis on the purity of the heart and allowing our lives to display Christ is seen repeatedly. Um, so somebody is probably listening to this and wondering what in the world do I wear? And, uh, that's a little shout out to any lady that's ever read that book by Kathy Coral. Um, I never have, but it's a, from what I have gathered, it's a doozy. Um, so you're saying that modesty is basically. Biblical modesty doesn't really have anything to do with our dress. It's about our internal state. Yes. It's, and it's a matter of the heart. I don't like that book said, but they really missed it. And it's when your heart is right, they really did when your heart is right, it's going to reflect and it's going to show forth in your actions. Um, but I know, I know somebody is really wanting somebody out there is going to listen and really want to know what I have to say about our clothes. So I'll get into that. And I'm going to, I'm somebody that likes to ask the really weird questions. Um, so I want to, I want to make a couple of comments though. I want to, I want to come back to that because you said so many, like, I think we need to sort of, Oh, because you said so many great things there that it's just like, we need to let it breathe some because you, uh, I mean the, the thing that you've said about how, if we're actually going on about our dress and doing that really maybe reveals a heart of pride. I mean, holy cow, how much have I seen that? I think even you mentioned specifically John Hamlin. That's, that's this first thing my mind went to because my first ever introduction to this guy was in Bible college chapel and they had him come in. I had no idea who he was and he carried himself like he was some kind of big deal. And he gets up there and he preaches and I'm sitting there the whole time, you know, still sold into the IFB culture. But the whole time this guy's turning me off because I'm like, he's all about himself. And then he makes this statement. I'll, I'll never forget it. Word for word. He said, there's a rumor going around about me and fundamentalism that Hamlin has monogrammed pajamas. Yeah. And he's like, I'm here to settle that today and let you know that Hamlin does have monogrammed pajamas. And I also have monogrammed shirts. All of my shirts are monogrammed. And I'm like, you are basically displaying your pride about how you looked. And then, you know, just the comparison of that, that you made about, about Christ. Christ did not behave this way at all. No. And John, even as, as she was talking, I went in, I went, I went ahead and looked up John MacArthur's thought on this verse here of in second Timothy or first Timothy two. And he says that women in the church were living in pure and self-centered lives. And he said, he was almost commending Paul to call out this problem because they were distracting the principle of the worship. They were calling attention away from why they were actually forming and why they were gathering to worship was to lift up Jesus. And they were lifting up themselves. Just like you just said with John Hamlin, he's lifting up himself. He's bringing the attention back to him and not putting the attention onto Christ. And it's so important that, that that's what Paul was talking about here. Yeah. I would, I would even make a point to, uh, beyond MacArthur, not just the women, but even the men. I mean, men can be, men can be guilty of that too, of, of, you know, I've seen that in churches. James, we saw that in the church we grew up. We were always trying to wear the best tie and the flashiest suit on Sunday. How many times when we went to a youth rally or youth conference, we get together and make sure we had the best outfit on. And John, I like that tie better. Can I wear it? Cause it matches me and we're trading stuff. Cause we want to look good. Cause we want to impress people. We weren't going for, for religious reasons. We were going because we were wanting to impress someone and we were wanting to make a girl think we were attractive. And that was the reason we were going to be honest. Okay. And we would swap cologne and we would make sure we smelled the best. We didn't care. We could care less about what the preacher was preaching because we were too self-centered. We were too thinking about ourselves, trying to make ourself look good because Hey, if we sit on the front row and we look good, the pastor may say, man, look at these good looking men down front, sitting right, got their towel looking like a bunch of good preacher boys down here. That's what we were looking for. That's why we were dressed like that because we wanted that attention. We wanted that, that self praise because we could walk out and say, man, we were, we were mentioned in the service today and we didn't know what the preacher preached about. You know, honestly, with what Amy just told us, we have developed a culture, not of modesty, but of immodesty. Yes. Because we're so concerned about what's on the outside and not what's on the inside. Yes. And we will, we will emphasize that by how we look at other people, somebody coming into church and thinking, wow, look at how they're dressed. I'm not like that. You all were talking about youth meetings. I, we used to go to a camp meeting every year where the pastor would have all these preachers stand up, probably 50 of them. And they would all get up in front and introduce themselves. And obviously if you're in front of this huge group of people, you don't want to look nice because that's like I said earlier, that's where you get your calls for your meetings and all that kind of stuff. And one year there was a guy there who had, uh, he had long hair. I don't even know like what gave him compelled him to come to an IFB church camp meeting, but he had long hair and God, yeah. God had called him to preach and nobody in this particular moment, nobody was mean to him. But I just remember how he stuck out like a sore thumb. And my husband said that back in the prayer room, they were all kind of, the men were kind of joking, probably the guy, Grizzly Adams and stuff, you know, just kind of looking down on him. And man, that made me so sad. Cause I'm like, you know, he might really have a Lord at heart for the Lord. And you are just completely dismissing him by the way he looks and that, that really, really, really got my grand, my gears grinding back then. Um, so yeah, I just. Well, I'm reminded, even when you say that I watched a video, this was a couple of years ago of a pastor who was, had gotten voted in at a new church and the next Sunday was sort of his transition Sunday. And he came in dressed as a homeless man. He made himself stink. He sat on the very back row and he came in and not one person said a word to him. And the next Sunday he got up and he said, the person that you guys didn't talk to who you neglected because they didn't smell like you. They didn't look like you. They didn't act like you. That was me because I wanted to see just how religious you were. And you guys showed me that you were so religious that you couldn't talk to a homeless man that came in and was seeking Jesus. And their faces were just distraught. You can look it up. It was somewhere. I saw it on a video on YouTube or something, but it was just amazing because how many times is that our attitude? Someone comes in and looks like us. We'll go and talk to them. We'll make them feel welcome. But when they come in, they don't look like us. They don't act like us. They don't talk like us. We're not going to act like we're not going to go talk to them because we're not making them feel welcome. And it goes back to the way that we were raised. It goes back to this thought of pride and making ourselves look good and only looking at the outward appearance when God says that we're like whitewashed tombs. We look good on the outside. We're dead men stinking on the inside. And that's what this is. Yeah. Yeah. So, Amy, what direction would we go to? So maybe a criticism somebody would say from this as well, which I think is idiotic criticism, would be like, so you guys just think that anybody can, you know, why don't we just, you know, everybody parade around, you know, naked in something. I'm being facetious there. But, yeah, I mean, as believers, is there any type of, I guess what I'm trying to ask is where does clothing, does it play a part in this conversation at all? Sure. Well, that's what I was getting ready to get into. Why do we wear clothes at all? Right. So I'm going to go all the way back to Adam and Eve, the very first time that we ever see clothes being worn. And we all understand they were naked and unashamed before the fall, completely innocent, weren't even aware of their nakedness. But after they sinned, they hid themselves from God with fig leaves. So they were aware of their nakedness. And I got a really good quote from, let's see, Modesty More Than a Change of Clothes, that book you had sent me. It says, the God-given reason for wearing clothes is to cover our nakedness so that we do not experience guilt and shame for sin. So God found them, they had themselves covered, and he clothed them in grace by providing garments of skins. And so instead of, you know, killing them immediately for their sin, he clothed them in grace. But however, they never returned to that innocence. So clearly from all of this, we can see that now after the fall and after the sin, nakedness is associated with sin and shames and clothes. It's what covers that. And we do see one allowance, obviously, for nakedness in Scripture, which is in the bounds of marriage. And that's both found in Song of Solomon and 1 Corinthians 7, 2 through 5. So it's clear, we don't run around naked. And other places in Scripture, it's associated with sexual sin and things like that. It's, you know, to make that argument, well, why would you wear clothes at all if you don't have any specific standard? Well, a biblical, you know, list. No, the Bible is clear. We don't run around naked. And there are certain things that are reserved for the husband and wife relationship. I think that it just exposes maybe a faulty, I can't think of the right word right now, but a problem that we have that we have to have everything black and white, cut and dry. You know, we have to have that law. If we have that law, then we know what to do and this type of thing. And the interesting thing is, yes, the Bible is specific in several areas, but in God's grace, He didn't give us that. Right. Right. And, you know, I think a lot of times legalism, people who get involved in legalism, they really do have good intentions a lot of the time. I would say that they are trying to protect themselves from worldliness and trying to protect themselves from sin. You know, I think of the Pharisees, they were on it. Maybe they considered themselves on a noble mission to protect the law, but they created an extra tradition. They were following these extra things to protect from disobeying. But that can put you under unnecessary bondage. And so, yeah. You know, and we also are not saying that we are against somebody having an individual preference in where they draw a line as far as their clothing. Yes. You know, I'm not maybe struggling with this a little bit, but I would even maybe say that if a lady felt more comfortable never wearing pants at all, if that was her personal preference, and, you know, as we were talking about the heart issues here, and that was more concerning to her than the external, then yes. Where I have a major issue is any man whatsoever telling or having some type of standard. And I've heard somebody say, well, what about somebody in their own home? I said, I don't care if it's the dad or the father. If he's putting that type of dress standard on the women in that household, to me that's legalism. Because he is imposing something. He's imposing a law that he himself doesn't have to follow. Right. Well, and John, when we went to Idaho, it was cold there. We had six months of cold weather. Okay. And, you know, we came out of the independent. It was a loose independent Baptist church. It wasn't stuck on the standards and stuff. And my wife, for the summer and going into the winter, she said, I just, she'd never wore a pair of pants before in her life. She'd always had shirts on. And she said, James, it's starting to get cold. Can I wear pants? I said, Allison, I don't care what you wear. It's your body. It's, you know what you're going to wear best. You, whatever you want. So she wore leggings and a skirt, but it just got so cold. She said, James, I just can't do it anymore. I said, I don't care. Do what you, I mean, dress appropriately. And so she put on pants and she told me, she said, the first time I walked out of the house with pants on, I just felt so guilty because I had been told I can't wear pants. Pants is immodest. Pants is wrong. Pants is bad. It's of the devil. I'm going to be sinning. And she said, over time, I realized it's just a piece of clothing. And even today, as I have a daughter, I don't tell my daughter what to wear. I don't know what length and all that. She's five years old. I don't know what looks right. What doesn't look right. And then she'll come in sometimes and she'll have clothes on. I'll say, okay, whatever. And now I said, go change. Your shorts are too short. She's growing. She's five years old. You guys have experienced this and your shorts are too tight. Your shorts are. Okay. Even at five, my wife, she handles all that. I'm not going to tell my daughter to change something. My son walks in wearing a gray suit, all gray. I don't know why, but he does. It looks fine to me. I don't care. Ali's like, your son, he's not matching. He's wearing all gray. It looks fine to me. It's clothes. So I don't care about those things. But I can see where someone would get caught up and someone would want to say, okay, you have to wear this. You have to wear that. But it simply gets back to the heart. And I think that's where Amy said a lot of it is, where is your heart in this issue? You made a good point. And I'd like you to speak to Amy. And because my wife has experienced this too and dealt with this. And that is those, maybe speak to any of the ladies that might be listening to this that are on this other side of it. That those that have come from this background, that now that they're out of this background, still find themselves with those guilt feelings. Right. With dressing differently. They, you know, a woman puts on a pair of pants and she feels immodest, guilty, shameful, and all the things like you just said. And I really think it comes from having an unhealthy conscience about the issue. You know, the pastor or maybe other ladies in the church. It's been beat into their heads repeatedly. Women shouldn't wear pants. Women shouldn't do this. And they've developed an emotional reaction to how they feel in certain clothes. And if they stepped outside of the house in a pair of pants or went to church in a pair of pants, well, they would feel completely ashamed of themselves. And standards cannot be defined by feelings. They have to be defined by the word of God, like what we said. And so really it's, I would want them to really look at what the source is of what's caused that feeling. You know, has it really just been your preacher that's really just beat that into your head through the years? And, and I'm not saying to just, you know, throw out all your skirts and wear pants. Like if you really do prefer wearing skirts, that's perfectly fine. And some women just like wearing them because they make them feel more feminine. And that's fine. I love wearing dresses and stuff. So there's nothing wrong with that. But I think that developing maybe a healthier conscience on the issue about that it's between you and the Lord and not necessarily, you know, just what the preacher says. Because if it, like we discussed, it's not in the Bible as explicitly as we talked about. And so that's, that's what I would say to her. And I just, I find it so sad that these women really have shame over their clothes and legalism just really, legalism in any area just really binds people up in chains. But when we really get back to following what scripture actually says and maybe strip some of that down a little bit, we actually find so much freedom. And, and that might, that might still be wearing skirts for a lady. Like I said, that might be what she prefers. But there is freedom when you can just take all of those laws and all those standards and just kind of deconstruct it and just get back to what the Bible says. You'll find liberty there. Galatians 5.1, for freedom Christ has set you free. Therefore, do not be entangled in a yoke of bondage. Yes. Yes. That's it. Well, I think we're going to wrap it up. Amy, do you have any final comments today on this subject of modesty? Like I said, there, I can't, I can't give a specific list. And like I said, I know a lot of ladies that have come from the IFB world, that's what they're used to. And I know a lot of this probably sounds foreign. I do want to speak just for a second on maybe how the modesty would play out practically. Obviously, we talked about we don't run around naked. So I would just, you know, say that obviously women or anyone shouldn't be wearing clothes that would draw attention to what should be covered up. So that would be playing in modesty and just a couple of practical tips on that would be, you know, it is good to have standards based on, you know, what your body type is, your job or what activity you're participating in, you know, anything like that. And then for any lady that's really questioning whether or not something is modest, it's really just a common sense thing. You know, she has a question about it. She can ask her husband or a friend just to say, is this too revealing? Is this showing too much? Or something like that. And just really examining her clothes and examining why she wears them and what her heart is behind that. Is she trying to draw attention to maybe the more liberal idea of I'm just going to show it all off? Or is she wearing them more, you know, to show off how holy she is? So that would be just some practical ideas as to how this would play out. Wonderful. Wonderful. James, you got any closing comments? I think Amy said plenty, and it was great, and I appreciate all of your guys' input. Yeah. There was one thing that she had said early on that spurred a comment that I thought of. And I'd heard this in Bible college, too, that a lot of times you hear somebody say that they dress the way they do because somebody knows that they're a Christian. And I heard that in a Bible college class. A guy was actually up there and said, my wife would wear skirts to her secular job because people would know that she's a believer. And I would just encourage you to think about this, that do they know that you're a believer or do they think you're part of a cult? Well, that's always my response. My husband had told me that somebody had said that, and I was like, well, typically they associate you with the holiness movement. And so they – I'm not trying to make fun of anybody, but, you know, that's – I don't – it's really reflected in your attitude and your spirit, not your clothes. That's right. That's right. Well, Amy, before we finish up, we do something with all of our guests, and we call it the lightning round. And so we are going to ask you seven questions so people can know you a little bit better. And so are you ready for this? I guess so. Okay. All right. So number one, what is your favorite food? Oh, anything Mexican. Come on. Yes. All right. Favorite snack? Reese's cups. Do you do Reese's pieces? No. They're different. I can't do the Reese's pieces. Not enough chocolate? No. James is a connoisseur. All right. Number three, favorite book of the Bible? I'd say right now, Galatians. Awesome. Yep. That's mine. That's mine. All right. Number four, favorite movie? Oh, man. I've got so many favorites. That's a hard one. What you doing? I don't know. Off the top of my head, I really don't know. There's so many. What's the best movie you've seen lately? I haven't watched a movie in a while. I did watch We Were Soldiers with my husband. I really enjoy anything that has to do with war and military. I know that sounds weird, but yeah. I enjoy stuff like that. Awesome. It's been a while since I've seen that one. That one's been several years since I watched that one. I don't remember if I liked it or not. It's gory. Gore doesn't bother me, but I really enjoyed the storyline and stuff. It's good. All right. Let's go a little bit more spiritual on this one. What is your favorite Bible story? Favorite Bible story? Oh, no. I hate being put on the spot, man. I'm one of those people that could answer this any other time, like just on my own. Well, I'm trying to think of what I've read recently because I've been in the book of Luke. Okay. So I was teaching this recently in Sunday school. We were talking about the birth of Jesus. And I really enjoyed the story of Anna the prophetess because it's very just like a little snippet. And she was a widow. And she'd been praying in the temple all of those years. And a lot of people probably thought that her life was meaningless. You know, she was just kind of one of those hidden ladies in the corner, you know. And she was one of the first people to see the Savior as a baby. And, you know, so in spite of all the loss and grief and maybe barrenness she had experienced in her life, she got to see the Savior. So I really enjoyed discovering that little piece there. That is pretty awesome. I like it. The normal answer we get is either the life of Christ, which, I mean, how can you critique that? Or Joseph, the story of Joseph and his brother. That's one. I actually just, we just went over that one too. That's a good one too. Yeah. All right. So number six, the last book you finished. The last book I finished. I guess it was the one that you had sent me, the Grace, about the clothes, Modesty, clothes. Yes. You finished that? Well, okay. Maybe not all the way through. Okay. I was going to say, good night. You're a fast reader. I am a fast reader. Honestly, I do have a really bad habit of starting books and then not finishing them and be like, oh, you've actually, because then I see another one. But I, yeah, that would be the closest. All right. Here's our last one. Favorite activity to do with your family. Favorite activity. Really, we love to watch movies together. And my husband would say go and fishing together, but that I do not enjoy. I think it's terribly boring. But we enjoy movies and we like to eat. Eating is a family event. You have to do that to live. So I enjoy eating too. Well, yeah, but I'm just saying like we, we enjoy like cooking together and, um, and just enjoying food. It's good. It's my love language. Awesome. Awesome. Amy, thank you so much for taking the time to join us today. And I think that, uh, I think that was, it was enriching. I think people will be helped by it and I really appreciate it. I'm glad. I'm, I'm happy to have been here. I've had a good time with y'all. All right. Thanks everybody for, uh, listening to the For Freedom podcast today. We appreciate, uh, all of the support and, um, and, uh, the comments that, uh, we get, the love, the feedback we get for the podcast. Um, and, uh, until next time to God, not the standards be the glory. Thank you. Thank you.

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