Let us not forget that submitting to Christ’s Lordship includes making Him Lord over our clothing. Therefore, the simple act of getting dressed should be an act of worship that seeks to elevate and obey Him rather than exalting and pleasing self.

Let me guess what is going through your head right now.

Women: “Oh, wonderful, a discussion on modesty. Give me a minute while I prepare myself for another legalistic diatribe that tells us we have to dress like old-fashioned grandmas and sends us to the store with a list and a tape measure.”

Men: “Yes, tell the women to start putting some clothes on! I’ll just tune out now since this has nothing to do with me.”

How close was I? Unfortunately, those reactions are the result of a world that mocks modesty and a church that does not properly teach a biblical theology of it to counteract society’s messaging. Carl Trueman aptly summarizes, “Whether the attack comes from the New Left, with its view of modesty as an ideological instrument of oppression, or from the hedonists, for whom the idea is simply a tool used by killjoys to stop others having fun and being who they want to be, the result is the same: modesty is immoral, and modest people are repressed, incomplete, and less fulfilled than they could or should be.”^[1]

Some professing Christians have adopted similar perspectives as their own. They may argue that Christian liberty gives them license to wear whatever they want without concern or responsibility for how others respond to their appearance. Modesty is outdated and no longer applicable. On the opposite end, modesty may evoke images of strict legalistic standards and inch-specific guidelines for what each person is allowed to wear. Church leaders make it a salvation issue and heap accusations of potentially causing another to stumble onto anyone who diverts from those rules. Those outside looking in may call them old-fashioned, fuddy-duddy, and strange.

Before we go any further, let me assure you that both of these perspectives are wrong. God created clothes for a reason as we have seen. Crying the Christian liberty argument only applies so far. Our salvation is not dependent on it, but it certainly plays a role in backing up our claim to faith as a practical application of the gospel and new life in Christ.

But this is the problem with the idea of modesty today. We know the word. We each react to it. But do we actually know what it means biblically?

Modesty Is More than External

Pull out a dictionary and flip to (or type in the search box) the word “modesty.”[2] You will find that definitions include two major categories, an external and an internal. The external relates to our clothing. Shocker. Modest attire is 1) proper, suitable, and acceptable to the social situation and 2) without sexual implications. What is the second major emphasis, you ask? These lexicons describe the internal manifestation of modesty as not having a prideful or boastful demeanor but rather expressing and carrying yourself with a proper and low estimation.

What single word could we use to describe this? Humility.

Now let’s take that word to the Bible. What does God say about humility? Though the word modesty appears only once in Scripture, humility or humble appears nearly 100 times. If modesty equals humility, studying those passages will help us develop a good idea of what biblical modesty should look like. When we do so, two significant observations stand out:

Read More