
Here it is. Summer is here in all its glory. The heat, the sunburns (ouch), the barbeque, the heat, the picnics, getting away with wearing only a tad bit of makeup, the heat, swimming, baseball season, Independence Day, the heat.
And it’s when the ugly monster rears its head.
Because with all the heat comes this strange and weird desire of everyone around to peel off layer after layer of clothing.
Yikes! And the worst part is, we’re not just talking the world here.
Waaaay back I believe, I posted some on modesty. The reasons. And I want to present an idea, a strange, revolutionary idea.
The standards don’t change just because the temperature does. Gasp! It’s true.
Men do not suddenly become more “calloused”, less suseptable to temptation just because it climbs up to the ninties (or 100’s, if you live in Mexico…the one part I do NOT miss!
). Women are not licenced to wear, as someone so aptly put it, “colored underwear” outside!
In the book What in the World Should I Wear by Cathy Carle, she talks about a sermon that her pastor preached, where he pointed out,
“If a lady were scheduled to sing a special up here on the platform, and she came up dressed only in underclothing, everyone here would be outraged. But suppose she was going to come up on the platform of the church to sing a special in only underclothing, but she decided that first she’d paint some flowers or stripes on it to make it acceptable. Would that make it right/ But what if we shipped in a truck load of sand, and a palm tree, and some beautiful water that she could be surrounded by while she sang an old hymn of the faith dressed in only underclothing that was decorated with flowers? Now it would be all right, wouldn’t it? What if we transferred her out to the beach with the sand and the palm trees and the ocean, would it be any more right for her to represent the Lord and sing about Him dressed in only underclothing that was decorated with flowers? If it would not be right to sing hymns dressed in that fashion, then it is not right to do anything dressed–or undressed–in that fashion. Our job is to represent the Lord all the time.”
We are responsible for leading our brothers in Christ astray–and for preventing them being lead astray. This includes our REAL brothers, too! Just because you’re “family” doesn’t mean the temptation goes away.
What do I do? There are modest swimwear sites like this one. Or this one. But I don’t have the money to get one of those. I wear long shorts and a t-shirt. It works. Stylish? No. But swimming is swimming, not a “fashion show” contest. Who said that you have to look “stylish” (or what the world deems stylish) to swim? To play on the sand? TO TAN????? As someone once put it, “Why tan all that skin that you’re not planning to show?” Good question.
I have tan lines (when my burns turn to tans
) that look like little cap sleeves.
And that’s ok, because I don’t wear less than that anyway. Knee-length tan lines? That’s ok, I’m not going to be flaunting any more anyway. Tan lines that act as “three finger from collarbone” measuring marks? Yup. Very convenient way of finding out if that shirt’s too low.
There’s really no excuse for immodesty. We need to reevaluate what we wear when the weather get hot. I’m not just talking about swimwear, either. Summertime’s not the excuse for hemlines to go up and necklines go down.
Let’s think about this extra hole in the head. Modesty is modesty. Whether or not it’s hot. No pun or rhyming intended there.
Let’s protect our brother’s eyes. They have enough to deal with when it comes to the world, the supermarket, the magazine rack. Do they need help from CHRISTIANS?