The Inside and the Outside
1 Peter 3:3-4 3 Do not let your adornment be merely outward–arranging the hair, wearing gold, or putting on fine apparel–
4 rather let it be the hidden person of the heart, with the incorruptible beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is very precious in the sight of God.
Majoring on the outside
This verse has been abused by various Christian groups in the past to dictate what they could adorn their outsides with. The KJV does not have the word “merely”, or “fine”. So if you took it literally, women should not only not wear makeup, jewelry or elaborate hairstyles, but shouldn’t wear any apparel at all!
(KJV) 3Whose adorning let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel;
The women usually get picked on the most in this area, and I think there is a reason for that. Sexual attraction in a male is triggered by sight. That is part of the way God made us. And because of that, there is an instinct within the female that wants to make herself attractive.
But it’s not the women who are picked on exclusively. I went to a church years ago where the pastor was from Georgia. He tells the story of a church he pastored for a while that had a lot of rules about outward dress. One of them is that the men should not wear short sleeve shirts. He said that’s when he found out he had “sexy elbows”.
Is the outward appearance important? I think so. I think groups that put extreme restrictions on what a woman can wear – i.e., no makeup, no jewelry, hair in a bun, etc. – actually put a stumbling block in front of the gospel. Our lives should adorn the gospel of Christ – i.e., make it attractive to others. And who outside of your group – both male and female – is going to be attracted to the gospel with all the women looking like that?
The definition of what is proper attire, and of modesty, varies from culture to culture and generation to generation. Ladies, you can dress a certain way, and you will attract men – but it won’t be the type you’ll want to attract. You can be a stumbling block to the gospel on that side of the fence also.
Beauty on the Inside
The addition of the word “merely” as in the NKJV puts 1 Peter 3:3 in the proper perspective. These verses are not a prohibition against outward adornment, but an admonition not to neglect the inward, as we see in vs. 4. There is a beauty that comes from the inside that transcends physical appearance. You might not see it in a photograph, but when you get in their presence, it radiates. Similarly there are people who are beautiful on the outside, but ugly on the inside. They might be gorgeous to look at in a magazine or on the TV or in a movie, but you sure wouldn’t want to live with them.
Jesus was like this. Isaiah 53:2 says He had no form of comeliness or beauty that we should desire Him. Yet He had people following Him around by the thousands, because He was the image of the invisible God, and the expression of His nature.
There is a saying, “All brides are beautiful”. Why is that? Well, certainly that is a day when much attention is put into the outward adornment, and that is right and proper. But there is more to it than that – brides feel beautiful. And that inner confidence radiates and transforms the outward appearance. Of course when the groom first catches sight of her when she appears at the end of the aisle, he’s thinking that she is the most gorgeous creature that ever walked the face of the earth. And he’s right. His vision is colored by love and the fact that she is his gorgeous creature.
Women who dress in an overly revealing fashion are actually exhibiting low self esteem. They don’t have enough inner sense of self worth, so they substitute raw sexuality for inward beauty.
Clothes make the man
“Putting on”, and “being clothed with” can be used for both physical and spiritual garments. The Bible is full of this kind of imagery. So, what should the fashion conscious Christian wear, spiritually?
Isaiah 61:3 3 To console those who mourn in Zion, To give them beauty for ashes, The oil of joy for mourning, The garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; That they may be called trees of righteousness, The planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified.”
There’s a song, “Put on the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness”. That would be akin to saying, “when it’s raining outside, put on a raincoat”.
Isaiah 61:10 10 I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, My soul shall be joyful in my God; For He has clothed me with the garments of salvation, He has covered me with the robe of righteousness, As a bridegroom decks himself with ornaments, And as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.
(See, it’s scriptural to get all decked out for your wedding…)
Our main clothing
Romans 13:14 14 But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to fulfill its lusts.
Before anything else, we should put on Christ; He is the foundation. In that sense (please forgive the analogy), He is like underwear – He goes on first. But unlike physical underwear that is covered up and hidden by other garments, He should be displayed proudly. He gives strength and an aura or glow to the rest.
Secondly, “make no provision for the flesh”. Underwear are the garments that are closet to our flesh to keep it hidden where it should be.
But what does it mean to “put on Christ”? It means to act like Him. First, it is required to be born again. That provides you with the garments. But it is possible to be born again, and to be “in Christ” but not to have put on Christ. This would be a born again Christian still living like the world.
Making provision means to make plans for. For example, when I go to work I might take an umbrella if the forecast says it might rain, even if it’s not raining when I leave. I’ve made provision in case it rains.
We are to make no provision for the flesh – we should make no plans to fulfill its lusts. Another example, if you are on a diet, would you go out and buy a bunch of sweets? “Oh, I’m on a diet and I have no plans on eating them”. Then why did you buy them? You’ve just made provision for your flesh to be tempted. That’s what making provision for the flesh is – it’s providing an opportunity for temptations.
Put off the old man and put on the new
Ephesians 4:22-24 22 that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts,
23 and be renewed in the spirit of your mind,
24 and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness.
The old man is our old unregenerate nature, before we were born again. The new man is the new nature we receive.
2 Corinthians 5:17 17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.
Just as our physical clothing is what shows on the outside to those around us, what we put on spiritually is what is visible to others.
When we are born again, we get our new set of spiritual garments, Christ. But we can hide Christ with our old man clothing! If you are outside working and get all sweaty and dirty and smelly, then come inside and take a shower and wash all that dirt away, doesn’t it feel good? And wouldn’t it be silly to put the old dirty clothes on again? You need to put something on the outside that that matches the clean you are on the inside.
So how do we do this spiritually? Vs. 23 tells us: “and be renewed in the spirit of your mind”. There is another verse that explains this more fully.
Romans 12:2 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.
The word transformed in the Greek is metamorpho, from which we get our word metamorphosis. Metamorphosis describes a process where the physical being is completely transformed – like a tadpole turning into a frog or a caterpillar into a butterfly. A key point is that the nature of that frog or butterfly is already inside the tadpole and the caterpillar – it just needs to be released.
Kenneth Wuest, one of the translators of the Amplified Bible, has authored what he calls the Expanded Translation – he uses as many words as he needs to get across what the Greek is really saying. He translates Romans 12:2 like this:
Romans 12:2 Wuest’s Expanded Translation And stop assuming an outward expression that does not come from within you and is not representative of what you are in your inner being, but is patterned after this age; but change your outward expression to one that comes from within and is representative of your inner being, by the renewing of your mind.
Renewing the Mind
So what is renewing the mind, and how do we do it? We are made up of three parts, spirit, soul, and body (1 Thessalonians 5:23).
Our spirit is the real core of our being. Originally it was created in the image of God, but became corrupted by sin. And it is the part of us that is re-created in the image of God – sinless, holy, and blameless – when we are born again.
Our soul is our psychological part and consists of the mind, will, and emotions. In fact, the Greek word for soul is psuche, from which comes the word psychology. It is the seat of our personality, and where our consciousness dwells.
The body is our earth suit that enables our spirit and soul to contact and interact with this physical world (otherwise we would be like ghosts).
(For more on this see Man in 3D.)
I’ve mentioned that the soul is the seat of our personality and where our consciousness lives. It is also what governs our behavior, and this is a key point. I am a computer programmer by profession, and I like to use the analogy that the soul is like our computer program – the set of instructions that tells the computer what to do. When we are born again, our spirit is changed instantly, but our soul and body are not. That is akin to taking a program that has bugs in it, and putting it on a brand new, state of the art computer. Because the old, buggy instructions are there in the program, the new computer will make the same mistakes as the old – it will just do it faster.
To really fix the problem, you have to debug the program and correct the instructions that cause the wrong behavior – i.e., you have to reprogram the computer. And that is what renewing the mind is all about: reprogramming our soul to have new instructions.
Almost all computer programs take input of some type, be it a user clicking on things or typing things, taking data from a database, etc. Even when the program is perfect, if it gets bad data, it will not produce desired results (the best programs will recognize and reject bad input). We call that “garbage in, garbage out”.
Our soul was programmed by our upbringing, the circumstances of our life, decisions we have made in the past, and by things inherent in our individual personalities. To reprogram our soul, it is going to have to have new input.
We need to expose ourselves consistently to the Word of God, spending time in God’s presence praying and praising and worshipping, listening to God (prayer should be a two-way conversation), fellowshipping with other Christians – all these things will give our soul the new input it needs to be reprogrammed. And that is how you grow spiritually.
The Armor of God
Often you can tell a person’s profession by what they wear. A fireman, policeman, soldier, doctor, etc. are recognizable because their clothing is not just ornamentation, but contains special gear to help them do their job.
Ephesians 6:10-20 10 Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might.
11 Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.
12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.
13 Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.
14 Stand therefore, having girded your waist with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness,
15 and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace;
16 above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one.
17 And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God;
18 praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints–
19 and for me, that utterance may be given to me, that I may open my mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the gospel,
20 for which I am an ambassador in chains; that in it I may speak boldly, as I ought to speak.
Going through the armor of God and examining each piece and what it’s for is a whole subject by itself that I cover in detail in The Armor of God . But we will look at a couple of key points about the armor in general.
Vs 11 tells what it’s for – it enables us to stand against all the wiles/schemes/tricks of the devil. What is armor for? It is for protection. And vs. 12 explains that the devil and his minions are who our real enemy is. But notice that vs. 11 contains a command – put on the whole armor of God. God will provide the armor, but He won’t dress you. You put it on. And when you have it on, then you will be “strong in the Lord and the strength of His might”.
Vs. 17 is our only offensive weapon, the sword – which is the Word of God. The other pieces – the helmet of salvation, breastplate of righteousness, belt of truth, shoes of the gospel, and the shield of faith – will protect us, but they won’t chase the devil away. He can sit there behind a tree and keep shooting fiery darts at you all day. But when you come after him with the Word, and like Jesus say “It is written!” Then he’ll run away.
James 4:7 7 Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.
Notice the order here – first, we have to submit to God. Submit to His Lordship, His Word, and His guidance. Then when we resist the devil, he will run as if in terror (the literal meaning of “flee”).
The Well Dressed Christian
Colossians 3:12-14 12 Therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, put on tender mercies, kindness, humility, meekness, longsuffering;
13 bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if anyone has a complaint against another; even as Christ forgave you, so you also must do.
14 But above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfection.
Tender mercies – God tells us to be merciful to others or He will not be merciful to us (Matthew 6:14-15). Tender mercies flows from compassion.
Kindness, meekness, longsuffering. These are fruit of the spirit from Galatians 5:22.
Meekness – being teachable and able to receive instruction. It is related to humility and should not be taken as weakness. The meek shall inherit the earth.
Longsuffering – patience; suffering abuse without resorting to bitterness or retaliation.
Humility –
Philippians 2:3-4 3 Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself.
4 Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others.
Esteeming others better than yourself: it doesn’t mean that we have to believe that other people are better than us, but that we should treat them that way. For example, when Jesus washed the feet of the disciples, He was not putting Himself in the position of a servant to show that they were better than Him; on the contrary, He was their Master and Lord. He was giving us an example to follow.
So the way to esteem others better than yourself is not by putting yourself down, but by following vs. 4, and looking out for interests of others. It is not wrong to look out for your own interests, but we should consider other’s interests hold an equal or even greater weight than our own.
Bearing one another and forgiving. This is related to longsuffering, and should be our reaction to people who do us wrong. As Paul said in Ephesians 6, our battle is not with people, but spiritual forces of wickedness.
But above all, put on love.
Another fruit of the spirit, and the most important of all. Putting on love, more than anything else, will cause us to reflect God’s character. God is love!
Love is the fulfillment of the law (Romans 13:10 ). I.e., when you walk in love, you will automatically be doing the other things.
