WARNING: This article may cause you to think. It may cause you to be offended.
Disclaimer: I am a Conservative Evangelical. I do not believe the purity culture is inherently toxic. I believe it fell victim to cancel culture in its early form. Yes I recognize that some extreme portions of the purity culture became legalistic in its attempts to sequester behavior, even when abstinence from said behavior is based solely in scripture. Yet I believe the ultimate goal of the purity culture was in fact righteousness. I still believe as Christians, Followers of Jesus, we are called to be a purity culture. I believe the Bible is wholly authoritative, without error and completely infallible in all it speaks to (Everything) and as such is the ultimate authority in the standard of purity.
For those of you who continued reading this article, I applaud your choice. You may have chosen simply to have something to be offended by, or you may have chosen because you wonder about this topic, either way here you are.
This last week Mattew West released a new single: “Modest is Hottest”. My family loved it, including both my teenaged daughters. Why did we love it? Because it was a hyperbolic, humorous shot at the call to be cognizant of the clothing we wear and to live our lives in modesty. The song was written as a “light-hearted take on an age-old struggle,” West said in a Tweet that has since been deleted. It was satirical in nature, bearing in humor a truth that needs to be discussed. It took less than 3
days for the cancel culture to bring its full weight down on Matthew West and the song was “scrubbed from all platforms” and is no longer available.
The secular media jumped on the song, getting a spot on the Today Show and an article in Newsweek magazine. The tikTok nation blasted it. One Pastor from Oklahoma parodied the song in his own way on TikTok and said this:
“Well if I catch you doing dances on the TikTok, wear what you want, girl just go off.”
“Hold your head up so your crown doesn’t fall off. You’re a queen if you forgot. So just wear what you want. The latest fashion trends, I probably won’t get it, but it’s not for me to understand.” (Emphasis mine)
The song even warranted negative articles in the Christian publications “Church Leaders” and “The Baptist Standard” and Several YouTube videos were posted debunking the song, and the Purity Culture. At least the Baptist Standard article made an attempt to include, and exegete scripture to debunk the song, and the concept of modesty, albeit in my opinion (and the opinion of more famous scholars than I) short of the fullness of the text and in that woefully inadequate. In it, the author takes a look at the familiar passage of scripture in 1 Timothy 2:9-10 “in like manner also, that the women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with propriety and moderation, not with braided hair or gold or pearls or costly clothing, but, which is proper for women professing godliness, with good works.” In the article, the author interprets the modesty language here to refer to “Elaborate hairstyles, jewelry and fancy clothes were the hallmarks of wealthy women and served as status symbols.” This is partially true, what it lacks is the other side of the historical and cultural genre of the day: This type of adornment was firstly the adornment of those who were involved in the sex labor field (Modern language used here) which in those days were termed, harlots and prostitutes. 
John Calvin (one of those more famous scholars I mentioned earlier) Likens this passage of scripture as relating to the adornments of strumpets, a word my daughters thought hilarious when we discussed this, saying the term sounded to them more like a character from a Dr Suess book than a harlot. John Calvin comments on this passage this way: “we must always begin with the dispositions; for where debauchery reigns within, there will be no chastity; and where ambition reigns within, there will be no modesty.” He continues to conclude with a rather bold statement: “Undoubtedly the dress of a virtuous and godly woman must differ from that of a strumpet.” (not a character from a Dr. Suess book).
strum•pet \ˈstrəm-pət\ noun
[Middle English] 14th century: PROSTITUTE 1a
Clearly from Calvin’s remarks and the definition of the word he used here, there is a correlation beyond flaunting wealth and riches. It denotes a historical and cultural genre in which Paul is writing to Timothy that is beyond the idea of wealthy adornment, but rather the syncretist way in which culture embraced the adornment of those sex workers (Strumpets) and blended it with normative culture and that syncretism carried over to the faith to which Paul was providing instruction to avoid. It is this syncretism we too warn of today as we see the model of what is accepted by the world as normative becoming increasingly normative in the community of Faith. In many much-debated passages of scripture, we are instructed to be careful of this slippery slope of syncretism. Passages such as: 1 John 2:15-17 “Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—is not of the Father but is of the world. And the world is passing away, and the lust of it; but he who does the will of God abides forever.” (emphasis mine). Romans 12:2 “And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.” (emphasis mine)
Yes, I know the flames will come with their “Don’t Judge me” language and the “what right do you have to judge me”. These might even come with poorly contextualized scripture references like “how can you remove the speck out of your brother’s eyes while you have a plank in your own”, or “Judge not lest ye be judged” (see Matthew 7). How dare we as leaders call the community of faith to a higher standard than the standards of the world? I mean the scripture, which should be wholly authoritative in our lives which is profitable for: “doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16 emphasis mine) should be the measure. It is the bar we are called to rise to.
Scripture beckons us to a higher standard of holiness. It is not legalism to call the body of Christ to a standard. Nor is it fundamentalism. It is obedience to the commands of scripture. And we all fall woefully short in many areas of this standard, in word and deed, in faith and praxis. This topic of modesty in apparel is not the only area, it is not even the greatest area we fall short in. It’s a byproduct of a seemingly steady drift away from the authority of scripture to govern our lives and towards the anthropocentric leanings of me-centeredness, away from the rule of scripture.
C.H. Spurgeon likens our propensity to drift towards this anthropocentric lifestyle like this, as seen in this image produced by the cartoonist Paul Cox, author of the cartoon series reftoons: “The fact is, we often times read scripture, thinking of what it ought to say, rather than what it does say.” – C.H. Spurgeon
We tend to minimalize or even ignore the passages we don’t like. Passages like these are some that we tend to marginalize in their application to our lives.
I believe in modesty, whether that is richly adorned attire or the more sensual lack of covering that draws the eyes. I believe we should at the same time as raising the bar on modesty we need to set a barbican in front of our eye gate lest we fall prey to the enemy’s devices that gain access through our eyes. (see Matthew 6:22-24). Young men should follow Job’s example found in Job 31 and covenant against looking at young women with lust.
To Matthew West, I say sing it again. Do not let cancel culture force you to silence your voice. We may not agree on all things but that does not give me the right to shame you to silence. To the body of Christ, I call us once again to the high calling of Christ and honoring Him, that He be glorified through modesty, however, you define that, either in modest, non-sensual covered attire or in rightly adorned not flashy, hey look at me attire. Chose wisely.
Lastly, I will reiterate that behavior is not identity, our call to holiness is a call to respond from our heart out of identity in Christ, not some legalistic rule of law. In my book “Parenting Holiness in a World of Compromise” I discuss no behaviors at all, but define four key aspects of obedience out of the heart that I challenge us to lead our children into, and today I challenge us all to view our obedience in this topic and many others found in scripture through these four paradigms:
- I love my Father, and I know He loves me (Resting in Identity as son or daughter)
- My Father is for my good (Recognizing God is not withholding pleasure but guarding for our gain)
- I love my Father and I don’t want to disappoint him (not because of how He will look at me, but rather because of how I value Him)
- I love my Father and I know He loves me and because of that we want to be in the presence of each other (I don’t want anything to hinder or impede His presence in my life)
We are called to obedience, not in a legalistic fashion but rather in a relational one. Obedience in modesty is no different. I pray when I have these modesty conversations with my own daughters (and we have had them and continue having them) that they choose to be obedient because of these four reasons and not simply because I said so. At the beginning of the day in raising children, the “I said so” model works to conform their behavior in present tense but has no lasting effect. This is where the purity culture of days gone by fell short. Today we can do better. We get to have this great relationship with a holy God and we get to set our hearts on who He is and who He says we are and it is out of this paradigm we obey to the glory of God.