Revering the Word
1 Cor. 11 Do women need to wear a head covering? And more…
Good morning, everyone. This morning, we're in 1 Corinthians, chapter 11, and a challenging teaching this morning for the pastor. Let's get started. Be imitators of me just as I also am of Christ. And Paul is saying that, you know, I'm trying to set a good example of what it means to be a follower of Christ. And when I do that, when I am being a good example and you follow my example, then you're going to be imitating Christ as well. Ultimately, we're not following man today, we're following Jesus Christ. And you know, my problem is to be an example of what that looks like to try to honor the Lord and our lives and in our behavior and in our speech, in our conduct, so that it's easier for man to learn how to also be an example. But ultimately, I'm not looking for you to ultimately imitate me. I'm looking for you to follow Jesus. And I hope to be a good example of that. But as humans, there's going to be imperfection in me, and in us, and even in Paul. And ultimately, the one that we really want to follow is Jesus. But hopefully, we as his people give a good example to people around us. No, I praise you, because you remember me and everything and hold firmly to the traditions just as I delivered them to you. And he's saying, Hey, I'm glad that you guys are trying to follow Jesus and the things that I've taught. Paul again spent a lot of time in this city. Recall before we get into the next set of passages that this city had a lot of pagan emphasis. They had a temple to Aphrodite. There was a lot of sexual immorality in this city, a lot of division. And some of that even sprinkled into the church. Paul often had to correct this church in regards to division in regards to sexual immorality because they had a very worldly culture that they were forming a church in in this city in Corinth. That's going to play into what we discuss next. But I want you to understand that Christ is the head of every man. And the man is the head of a woman. And God is the head of Christ. Now, this gets into the differences between men and women. And also, just the design that God has set up for male authority in the family and in the church. Now, before you go, you know, for the ladies in particular, tune out. And I know there's a lot of godly women who know the Bible and therefore wouldn't be tuning out. But I want you to hear me out. So, you know, God had Adam and then he took out of Adam his rib and then from Adam's rib form Eve. And Eve was a compliment to him. She perfectly fit him. Adam was alone and he really wanted partner and God wonderfully and beautifully made Eve complimentary to him. In some ways, it even says, if you go back to Genesis, that she made him opposite of him. And that's interesting, isn't it? A lot of times you will find in marriages, you will find opposites and husband and wife. You will find that they marry someone who has different strengths than them. And that is really helpful in a marriage because now you have strength where on your own, you would have been weak. And, you know, when Adam saw Eve, he's like, in my mind, he was like, wow, this is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh. And the two became one flesh. And, you know, it's a beautiful thing. But God has established that in the home that there would be a man who would follow Jesus and then that he would be the one ultimately that would be in charge in the home. And that woman would come alongside him, help him because he needed a helper. He needed a helper suitable for him and that they then together would work as a team for the glory of God. Today, there's a huge effort to take out any distinction between man and woman. And, you know, there's a Bible verse. Let me go there real quick to Galatians 3.28. It says, "For all who are baptized into Christ have clothed," this is verse 27 actually of chapter 3, "of Galatians, for all of you who are baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jun or Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus." And yes, there is an equality between man and woman in that we all can come to Jesus and we all can receive salvation and the promise of eternal life. And we all have wonderful value in God and in family and in the world and in serving God's kingdom. But that is not a verse to say that man and woman have no differences. And to do that gets into the whole gender problem that we have today and people think that, you know, even what they're born is not what they are and that they can just choose their gender. No, God has given us genders and there are differences. Adam needed a helper and he got someone that was suitable for him. And we are not the same, although we have equal value that doesn't mean that we have the same roles. And it doesn't mean that woman can't do amazing things and be powerfully used in God's kingdom. But it does mean that God has established it so that men would assume a leadership role in the home and in the world. And that doesn't mean that women can't have any leadership, but it does mean that God put man as the head. And that's just very clear scripturally. And I think there's a reason for it. You know, in today's day and age, there's so much emphasis on women's equality, even in leadership, or with man, that man many times is being relegated to a backseat. And we have a real problem in our culture of passive men, weak, passive men, who don't lead, who just take a backseat and who just always have the women lead. We have men leaving homes and not taking their roles in leadership in their homes and walking away from their families. And it's a problem when we don't follow God's ways. Now, before we get into so much else that's going to come up in this chapter, I would encourage you to read, you know, one of the sources that I think largely is a very good source is a source called got questions.org. You can go online, you can even get an app for your phone for it, got questions. And they have over the years, home to answers, biblical answers to just about every question there is in the Bible. And, you know, most of the time, I'm, I agree with them, doesn't mean that I'm going to agree with them all the time. But they have a couple articles. In fact, maybe I'll link them in the message. Like, when you look up the podcast, there's usually a little paragraph that I described the podcast. And I'll try to put this link in. And it says, what is complementarianism, complementarianism? And that's what I believe in that concept of complementarianism. And that is that there is supposed to be male leadership, but that we all are still one in Christ. The opposing view of complementarianism is egalitarianism, egalitarianism. Briefly, it teaches that in Christ, there are no gender distinctions anymore. That comes from Galatians 328, which I just read. And that I don't believe, I believe that's a false view that there's no differences between male and female. The final summation paragraph of complementarianism in Got Questions, the last paragraph says, a difference in world is not equate to a difference in quality, importance, or value. Men and women are equally valued in God's sight and in his plan. Complementarianism seeks to preserve the biblical differences between men's and women's roles, while valuing the quality and importance of both genders. The result of true complementarianism is honor to Christ and harmony in the church and in the home. You know, there is so much that could be said. But you know, the word that is used for submission is a word that can be used in the military as well. And imagine that probably isn't bringing on positive thoughts by many right now. But imagine this for a moment that you have an army and you have a commander of the army. And I'm not trying to say that I view myself as a commander of my bride. That is not at all how I treat my bride. But just go with me for a second with this, is that if you have the army not following the commander usurping his authority, you have chaos. And really what you have is a weak army. And that's what happens if you don't have proper leadership and proper followership at all, you're going to have disharmony and dysfunction. Have you ever had, you know, many times it doesn't work when there's co-leaders. Someone needs to be the head coach. Otherwise, there's there's dysfunction in a team. And now do I think that someone should be unruly? Oh, you know, I seek my wife's input and I honor her input. There are times when I make a decision or I have the final decision in something and she's good about following that. But at the same time, we seek to be one. It says in the Bible that you should try to be of one flesh and we seek my wife and I to be one and I value her input. I value her opinion. I care about what she thinks. I ask her and we discuss things together. And I think my wife is a wonderful woman who, you know, she's a school teacher and she, you know, teaches well and honorably and, you know, she brings in money for the home. But in some ways, we have a little bit more of a traditional aspect. I mean, my wife does more of the inside stuff. I do more of the outside stuff. But that doesn't mean that that is the way it has to be. You know, I mean, you gotta, you want to be one with your wife and you guys working out in your family what works for the two of you. But ultimately, I believe that God has a reason for man to be the leader of the home and I'm going to move on now. But I encourage you to read those articles now or that article. Now, moving on, this gets even into a more difficult topic in some ways. It says every man who has something verse four on his head while praying or prophesying just graces his head. Now, there's in the the midrash, which the midrash is the oral tradition of the Jewish people that eventually got put in writing around the time of Jesus day and even after Jesus day. And one of the things in the midrash, again, it's an extra biblical document, not not part of the Christian Bible, but something that the Jews follow. And it's not the Torah, the first five books of the Old Testament, but another document that was oral that they put the writing, it talks about men wearing a covering. Now, what appears to be, you know, how the Jews wear that skull cap, they do that to honor God, but it really wasn't in the Old Testament. It's something that they added later. However, it appears that in Corinth, that men may have been wearing skull caps. So now they were Jewish, some are Jewish, and now they're becoming Christian. Do they need to wear skull caps? And no, Paul saying they don't need to wear that. Also, it appears that it was a tradition in Corinth for Jewish women and ultimately Christian women to wear a covering on their head, to wear, you know, like what you might see today over in the Middle East with women wearing a covering. And it's not talked about in a lot of other cities of Scripture, but it was talked about in this one. And Paul's going to honor that culturally as a sign of respect that woman would wear a covering on their head. That's what's going to be talked about here. Now, sometimes we interject context. I talked about this at church yesterday, into passages that were not 100% sure of the context, meaning sometimes what's created is a context we're not familiar, totally familiar with in Corinth. And as a result of the context that we believe existed, then we make our doctrine, our teaching based on that. And what am I trying to say? There is some theories that because of Aphrodite and because of the sexual immorality and in Corinth, that there were even women who were prostitutes, who shaved their heads, meaning had no hair on their head at all, and they were prostitutes. And that may figure into this. And that women in Corinth, just to seem more godly, wanted to wear head coverings in Paul, or women did wear head coverings in Paul, thought that was a good idea to distance themselves from the culture that existed in Corinth and to show greater honor because it appears that Corinth was more of an honorless culture. And therefore, in the church, this would display greater honor for God and even for male leadership by women wearing a covering. Now, this gets into a lot of interesting things. Like, for instance, I have pants on right now in a collared shirt, short sleeve, like a golf shirt, and then I have a pullover sweatshirt on. Well, Jesus didn't wear what I have on right now. I have, you know, shoes on with rubber soles. Jesus didn't have those things. There's music that we listen to today, could be Christian music, and we have electric guitars, and we have all sorts of things that are different today than are in Jesus' day. That doesn't necessarily make them wrong. This is one of the challenges of interpreting Scripture. And sometimes, honestly, it's hard to do because we have planes, we have trains, we have automobiles, we don't ride on horseback. Like, there's a lot of things that have changed today that aren't covered in the Scripture. So there are at times things that are culturally normative that took place, you know, and now we're talking about something that was over 2,000 years ago, and does the culture need to stay exactly the same? Do men need to wear the clothes that men wore back then? Do women need to wear the clothes that women wore back then? Sometimes, there is cultural things that culturally have changed, but what we have to ask ourselves is, what is the principle? What is the principle, and does that principle still exist? Now, some would say, as we talk about women head coverings, Paul's going to encourage it here in this city in Corinth as a sign of respect in that city that was a very pagan city. Now, some would say, you know what, this is a rule for all time. Women should still wear their head covers because it says it here in Scripture. And I would say that we, as a church, I'm talking about really not just my church, but like the larger church of God has largely decided that this is not something that we need to do today, that this is something that was done culturally back then. And I agree with that. However, we are, it is a testy issue in the sense that we are saying in this particular case, we're not going to be literal, culturally literal, to follow what they did exactly back then. Sometimes that can open the door then, where we say, oh, we're not going to follow that. What else are we not going to follow in the church today that they followed back then? And so yes, that is something that could be held against us today that we are not holding to something that Paul says here. And what else are we going to do that also is going to be not strictly according to the Word of God? That's a, it's an interesting question, but I do side with the fact that this was a cultural thing that we no longer have to do today. Now, what's the principle though? The principle here was that women were, first of all, not trying to covering themselves, not trying to show off their beauty in the church. And there was just more of a conservative nature to the way that women presented themselves in public back in that day. And today, look at the way that women dress. I mean, a lot of it's not in the church that I lead, but like just on TV, in the public today, the way that women dress. And if you didn't know it, men are very attracted to women. And men's eyes are very attracted to women. That's the way God made us. He made us to be fruitful and multiply. And when women lay themselves more bare and show off their beauty, that's a real challenge for men. And I do believe that the principle of being conservative in our dress is very much still does apply that God would want us to not encourage loss to not encourage sexual immorality. It's okay to look nice and have yourself look nice, but to be conservative about it, I think is a general principle. That's a good thing. And even more so in the church would be good to be conservative. All right, let's move on. Verse five, but every woman who has her head uncovered while praying or prophesying disgraces her head for she is one and the same as the woman whose head is shaved. So Paul is saying that there was women who had shaved heads and that was a disgrace back then. And he is saying that it'd be better for a woman to have her head covered. If not, it's like she's has her has shaved. He takes a pretty strong stance. Again, I believe that we can be conservative in our nature today and that women today culturally don't need to wear something over the top of their hair. For if a woman does not cover her head, let her also have her head haircut off. But if it is disgraceful for a woman to have her hair cut off or her head shaved, let her cover her head. So again, he's comparing it to someone who has her head shaved to not have a woman have her head covered with a head covering in the church. But I've already discussed this for a man ought not to have his head covered. Since he is the image in the glory of God, but the woman is the glory of man for a man does not originate from woman, but woman from man for indeed man was not created for woman's sake, but a woman for the man's sake. Therefore, the woman ought to have a symbol of authority on her head because of the angels. However, in the Lord neither is woman independent of man nor is man independent of woman. So here, you know, in verse 11, he begins to get to that complimentary and approach that we're not independent of one another, we're for one another for as the woman originates from the man. So also the man has his birth through the woman and all things originate from God. And we are all equal in God in the sense that we all have salvation in him. We all are important for him. I've already discussed all this, but here's where you have Paul saying that the head, hair covering, head covering over the hair of a woman is a sign of respect in this culture in this day. And I do believe that there should be, you know, women should dress honorably today. And I do believe that women should look at their husband as the leader, as we've already discussed. Verse 13, judge for yourselves, is it proper for a woman to pray to God with her head uncovered does not even nature itself teach you that if a man has long hair, is it is a dishonor to him? But if a woman has long hair, it is a glory to her for her hair is given to her for a covering. But if one is inclined to be contentious, we have no other practice nor have the churches of God. And, you know, here, sometimes people will interpret that to mean that her hair is recovering because it does talk about her hair is given to her for a covering. Does that mean that she doesn't need to wear a covering over her hair because her hair is her covering? I have heard that interpretation. I do believe it's good and right for a woman to have hair on her head. But I do believe Paul was encouraging a hair covering over a woman's hair in particularly in this culture. But again, I don't see that we need to do that today. Now, think about this. They struggled in that day with legalism. They struggled in that day with law. And this seems to be, to me, perhaps a situation where the early Christian church was still struggling to get away from following Old Testament principles, even though this is not really clearly in the New Old Testament. Traditionally, it was in the Old Testament for a woman to be uncovered or to be covered with her with her hair. So anyways, listen, we're saved by faith through grace in Jesus Christ or by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. And if we add to that that you have to do this, now we're adding law. And I don't think we need to do that in this instance. Verse 17, but in giving this instruction, I do not praise you because you come together not for the better, but for the worse. For in the first place when you come together as a church, I hear that divisions exist among you, and I in part believe it. And here, we're really switching topics now, and he's talking about sadly that this church in Corinth, there seem to be often where they had divisions and God's not desiring that there would be division in the church. Verse 19, further must also be factions among you so that those who are approved may become evident among you. And sometimes I guess when there are arguments, you know, hopefully they get resolved and leadership develops out of that. But you know, we need to try not to be contentious and argumentative in the church, but seek to be one handled differences with respect. That's what should be done. Therefore, when you meet together, it is not to eat the Lord's supper, for in your eating, each one takes his own supper first, and one is hungry and another is drunk. What? Paul is saying that, you know, now they used to a lot of times when they got together for church, they would have meals too. So sometimes it's not just communion that they're talking about, but also a meal that accompanied they're getting together for church. But he's saying some are eating and some are being left without food and another is getting drunk. What's going on here? And Paul's talking about the kind of, you know, challenges they had in the Corinthian church with paganism and just not honoring the Lord. And you can see this may be why Paul went through the extra effort in this letter to talk about women wearing a sign of respect. And again, not that it's an all-consuming principle for the future, but just that there was so much disrespect in the way that they operated in Corinth, so much pagan, so much sexual immorality, drunkenness even in the church that Paul was trying to instill principles that would display honor. And you can see why with all this difficulty they had, do you not have houses in which you to eat and drink? He's like, if you're going to do that stuff, do it at home, don't bring it to the church. Or do you despise the church of God and shame those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I praise you in this? I will not praise you. Paul's coming down pretty hard in their dysfunction, in their operation as a church and their sinfulness even in the body. For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus in the night which he was betrayed by Judas Iscariot took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, "This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me." And this is a wonderful thing to do communion to remember the fact that Jesus Christ died for our sins, that he shed his blood for our forgiveness. Jesus did it on that night, that night a Passover, and we are to do it in remembrance of the great sacrifice that Jesus made for us. In the same way he took the cup also after supper, saying, "This cup is the new covenant Hallelujah, where I will forgive their iniquity and remember their sins no more. This is the cup of the new covenant in my blood, the one promised by Jeremiah. Do this as often as you drink it and remembrance of me. For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes. And we are to remember the sacrifice of Jesus all the way until he comes again. Hallelujah. Therefore whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner shall be guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord. And what he's saying here is, you guys shouldn't be bringing sinfulness into the church, and then celebrating such a holy ceremony as communion, remembering what Jesus Christ did for you, and doing it in an inappropriate way, in a way you're bringing judgment on yourself when you guys as a church come together and you're eating and drinking as though you're having a party and someone's getting drunk and then you're celebrating communion. That's just wrong. And he's saying what you really should be doing in communion is, but a man must examine himself and a woman, examine yourself and turn away from your sin and confess your sin to the Lord. And in doing so, he is to eat of the bread and drink of the cup. And it's good to have a time of confession when you partake of communion and to remember them the grace and mercy and forgiveness of our Lord, Hallelujah. For he who eats and drinks eats and drinks judgment to himself if he does not judge the body rightly. So if we're just willy-nilly about communion and we're living this sinful lifestyle and we're even bringing dysfunction into the church, drunkenness into the church and celebrating communion, you're bringing judgment on yourself in that way and it's good and right to confess and just to come clean before God and to to receive his grace and forgiveness and remember what he's done for you in communion. For this reason, many among you are weak and sick and a number sleep. And I think what he's saying is in general, your sinfulness and you're in the midst of the church too, but just your general sinfulness is why you're weak and sick and a number of you sleep. And sometimes that can be true that we're bringing negativity upon ourselves in the way that we're conducting ourselves as Christian men and women. And it says, if we judged ourselves rightly, we would not be judged. We would realize our own sinfulness, confess of our sinfulness, then we wouldn't come under this judgment. But when we are judged, we are disciplined by the Lord so that we will not be condemned along with the world. And you know what? By coming to Jesus, by confessing our sin, remembering what the Lord did for us, we're forgiven Hallelujah and we're not condemned along with the world because there is condemnation for those who die in sin, apart from faith in Jesus Christ, they're condemned already, as it says in John chapter 3 verse 18, because they have not believed in the name of God's one and only Son. But through faith in Him, He came to save us from our sin and He does give us grace through faith in Jesus Christ. So it's good to assess our own lives and to realize our sinfulness, to confess our sinfulness and receive His forgiveness Hallelujah. "So then, my brethren, when you come together to eat, wait for one another, show respect for one another. If anyone is hungry, let them eat at home so that you will not come together for judgment." And perhaps their love feasts that they would have sometimes in conjunction with church were getting so out of whack that, you know, now today when we get together for church, because it was common that they did eat a meal together back in the early days of the church, but that's been removed. And maybe because people would eat and drink and partake of alcohol, you know, as part of their church service. And he's like, you know what, eat and drink at home, and then you will not come together for judgment. The remaining matters I will arrange when I come. And yeah, I don't think alcohol is good to have a part of any church function. I discourage, you know, Bible studies where people are partaking of alcohol. I don't think that's a good idea. I think when you when you come together to study the Lord and and focus on him, whether that be in church or in a home study, I think it's good to not have alcohol be a part. I will say, excuse me, I will say I have a lead a home group at our house and we've been meeting as a home group for about a year. And we don't partake of alcohol. But one night, I said, all right, this is going to be just a gathering night. We're not coming together to study Bible. We're just coming together to celebrate our friendships and, you know, just hang out. We did talk about the Lord, but we it was not a formal Bible study night. And we did partake of a beer or wine at that gathering that we had. But when we meet and we're just having a normal Bible study night, we don't we don't have alcohol be a part of it. I think that's a good principle. And I think that would be echoed in what we just read in verse Corinthians chapter 11. So I would encourage you to read the link about complimenting terrorism and ego egalitarianism. And I trust and hope that you saw God's wisdom in what he is guiding us towards and just being conservative in our in our dress and that God does desire that that male would be the ultimate leader. But at the same time, we are one in Christ and husbands ought to value their wives and their wives opinions because we needed a helper and God gave us a great one suitable for us in our hallelujah. Praise the Lord. God bless you all.