Why Don't Apostolic Pentecostals Wear Jewelry?
by David K. Bernard
Podcast recording (no venue stated in the delivered transcript)
Kind: teaching
Scripture: 1 Timothy 2:8-10, 1 John 2:15-17

Source: https://acts238.life/repository/sermons/david-k-bernard--why-dont-apostolic-pentecostals-wear-jewelry
Published by Acts 2:38 Life from the sermon transcript on that page.
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yes I let's um this is an important U point and for detailed description discussion I have two books in search of Holiness which lays out the Biblical teaching which would include ornamental jewelry and moderation of address and then practical Holiness which is a followup and it includes answers to objections a more detailed discussion of certain passage of scripture uh and also some interesting information of church history that this teaching actually is very common throughout church history especially when there were Revival groups so the early post-apostolic church um as well as the the Methodist the um actually the early Presbyterians as well um the um Holiness movement the Pentecostal movement so what we're talking about is really very common teaching among conservative Christians throughout history of various backgrounds although today it's not so common uh so let's talk about this but let me go to 1 Corinthians or you you mentioned 1 Timothy let me read it in the new King James 1 Timothy 2:8-10 now there's also a a related passage in 1 Peter 3 so I think it's interesting the two foremost Apostles of the New Testament both Paul and Peter inspired by the Holy Spirit felt specifically to address this for the New Testament Church you also have some teaching uh from the Old Testament which was not as comprehensive because the Old Testament people were not filled with the spirit they were not given the same guidelines of Holiness uh but we do find examples that are relevant uh I would also say when you talk about Holiness outward appearance is only one small P portion maybe 10% so I don't want to get off track of thinking this is the most important subject I really do feel the matters of the heart your spirit your attitude bearing the fruit of the spirit that's much more significant but because this is visible and countercultural and although common in Christian history now it's uncommon among Christian churches well then we stand out as different and so of course this subject gets a lot of attention because of that uh so let's read from the text um the Apostle Paul uh inspired by the spirit 1 Timothy 2:8 I desire therefore that the men pray everywhere lifting up holy hands without wrath and doubting in like manner also that the women Adorn themselves in modest appar 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 so he starts off by saying I want the men to worship God in Holiness I'm paraphrasing and then he mentions two uh potential Temptations or besetting sins of men uh and I think it is true it's a generalization it's not true of every individual but overall men would be more prone to skepticism uh about God and religion women seem to respond earlier in Revival movements and women seem to outnumber men in churches because men are slower to have faith and wrath violent rage 90% of partner or spousal of abuse cases men against women so yes if a woman has a Temptation with wrath and doubting this would apply to her but it's a generalization but very real men I want you to worship God in Holiness and let's make sure to deal with two besetting temptations that are very common to men violent rage and skepticism verse n in like manner also so just as I want the men to worship God in Holiness and to to remove besetting sins or temptations that could damage or undermine their Holiness so I want women to worship God in Holiness and pay attention to besetting Temptations or sins that could undermine their Holiness and I would say the same thing he talks about women but it to the extent that men have this issue then it applies to men as well and I would say in our culture men do have more issues here uh throughout history um us usually I would say the the emphasis men are more visually oriented and so they put pressure on women to conform to their expectations of beauty and extravagance and women try to outdo themselves in various cultures with makeup and jewelry and an extravagant dress more than men tend to do because of that disparity but and so Paul is in his culture that was the case uh it would be more prone for women to try to attract the maale through various forms of jewelry then vice versa so he he gives some proper things Adorn themselves in modest apparel notice the scripture is not saying be ugly be plain uh don't pay attention be unemp slovenly you know try to look um unattractive no actually adorn means to make yourself attractive so it's perfectly fine for a woman to want to be attractive but in a proper way with modest cloes clothing not clothing that immodestly exposes the body not clothing that explicitly appeals the lust of the flesh the lust of the eyes the pride of life and the problem with ornamental jewelry and I'm quoting there from first John chapter 2 the things of the world the problem with ornamental jewelry first of all it appeals to the lust of the flesh you're you're trying to entice with the eyes in a lustful way uh the lust of the flesh that is you know glorifying your own uh physical flesh and and again the appeal to the eyes but the appeal to sensuality and sexuality and then Pride ego uh you know exalting self I'm rich I'm look everybody look at me I'm Gody Etc so we're trying to guard against these besetting sins that are mentioned in 1 John 2:15 through 17 or these are these Avenues of Temptation the three main Avenues of Temptation are all implicated here uh so but the positive statement is yes you can decorate yourself so so having different colors or ribbons or bows or or various things like that it's not forbidden um Adorn yourself but under certain guidelines modest apparel uh with propriety what's appropriate to the occasion so what you're wearing in your home versus in public or what you're wearing when you go to sleep or you know when you take a shower or when you're swimming with same-sex friends or working out with same-sex friends you know there are different levels of propriety so what is appropriate to the occasion so we're particularly talking about in mixed company in public um and moderation not with braided hair or gold or pearls or costly clothing now braided hair I don't think it's meaning the simple arrangement of the hair uh if you study the culture and you study women in the the Mediterranean world and the Jewish World of the first century that Paul would have been directly addressing uh they they typically all had long hair as we see in 1 Corinthians 11 but some would uh make quite elaborate hair arrangements and often they would braid jewelry into the hair A String of Pearls or maybe a silk cord with gold coins strung along it uh elaborate headdresses or Tiaras so it's um and you look at bible dictionaries encyclopedias you'll see the pictures and you'll see the discussion it doesn't seem that Paul and Peter are opposing the neat arrangement of the hair by braiding it it's the elaborate extravagant Arrangement particularly with ornaments woven in or or uh put in onto the hair um and then he used example of gold or pearls I think this is an example of precious metal and a precious jewels now I don't think we should look at this legalistically well you can't wear gold jewelry but only silver jewelry you can't wear pearl jewelry but you can wear Diamond Jewelry I think he's given an example while these elements may have valid uses in other contexts on your person you should avoid uh ornamental jewelry and while other you know what we call jewelry like watches or maybe even uh cufflinks or maybe um for some people the wedding ring has great symbolic value so as far as the upci is concern we're not interpreting this to forbid everything that will be called Joy if it has a functional purpose that is more significant than any ornamental purpose and its moderation then there is some discretion I think there's some Christian Liberty for pastors and for individuals to for pastors to teach and for individuals to choose what is appropriate but the principle here of ornamental jewelry is clearly stated don't uh don't don't wear this and costly clothing but instead if you want to attract someone the foremost way is through good works and I think that is important to emphasize because our culture puts so much emphasis on physical appearance and even explicit sexual um Temptation and um or open sexuality and of course a youth culture and if if that's yes we are attracted to one another visually with beauty or handsomeness or uh physical attraction but if that is the main identification you're creating problems because first of all no one can measure up uh and second of all we all change over time and if your relationship is more physically oriented than over time you're going to run into trouble but if it's based on Godly character good works then through the changes of life and the changes of your body your relationship can be constant and even grow and so the scripture is trying to put the emphasis on that but if you wanted to extract some principles here and there other passages such as 1 Corinthians 11 and 1 Peter 3 that are relevant but I see several principles one a gender distinction so he's treating men and women differently and Adorn the women Adorn themselves in modest apparel and he uses the word apparel indicates clothing of a long flowing nature that was used by women in that time so first of all we see men and women should dress differently to represent uh their unique um gend or sex as created by God second uh modesty which modesty I think means decently covering the body the Torso the upper limbs to avoid uh lust of the flesh lust of the eyes uh open sexual appeal focus on an overall attractiveness not sexuality um and modest also has a secondary connotation of What's um not extravagant not you know and but that stated later so I think the primary reference here to modesty and it's con con connected with propriety um the the King James says shamefacedness which that's an oldfashioned word but it's a sense of Shame not not being ashamed of yourself but being ashamed to be immodest so yes we should be ashamed to say or do or some certain things or look in certain ways so that sense of what is proper and appropriate so that's the second principle modesty moderation that's a third principle uh and it connects with costly array so you can have nice clothing but not extravagant clothing and then the fourth principle is um ornamental jewelry and I also would put makeup in the same category it's trying to ornament yourself artificially to draw attention to the physical appearance and to sexuality so I see these four principles gender distinction uh modesty moderation and a voiding ornamental jewelry explicitly stated in the scripture now let's talk about costly clothing and let's talk about moderation I do believe our overall Christian Life should be in moderation so it's not just the clothes we wear and it's not just certain articles of jewelry um so let's say okay I'm not going to wear a nose ring um but if I wear $20,000 gold Rolex watch with jewels all over it am I primarily using that to tell time uh would that violate moderation so obviously I'm suggesting it would so we're not looking at legalistically at categories we're looking at the overall picture now moderation is subjective um so it's based to some extent on culture what I mean by that is if you're living in a very poor Society what might seem extravagant would be one thing where if you're living in an affluent society that might just be considered normal and average so I don't think we have to live at the lowest possible level I think you take into account what is considered normal and standard in your culture and so for a preacher I don't think the preacher should live at the very top of the congregation but what is considered moderate in your surrounding Culture Your City your country and what is even considered moderate in your church and especially a pastor who is uh of a large successful Church the people don't want him to be to live at a low level where he because that's an embarrassment in the community we we you can't even support your pastor or as he meets prominent members of the community if he is not dress well and doesn't live well and he's inviting people his home or he's taking people in his car and if he's living in very low beat up circumstances well then he's a poor representative of the church the church wants him to be a good representative so I would say the pastor should not live at the top of of what the richest people of the congregation can afford but he shouldn't live at the bottom bottom but probably somewhere in the upper half uh it would should probably be less than what he can make in a secular career that's part of ministry where you're serving others and you're deliberately choosing to be more moderate not extravagant because if the pastor's living at the very top uh then I think that is drawing undue attention to himself and that seems to be saying well I'm in Ministry because I can make more money with this than anything else or I'm in Ministry because of all the perks and that's not a good example uh so that's subjective but you know maybe take U the average of the 10 top tithe payers and maybe you'll see what a a reasonable salary might be I don't know uh or you can compare yourself to other nonprofits there are studies that that of churches Across America nonprofits Across America um I I'll just give a personal example just to be candidate okay so I was trained as a lawyer I was going to be a lawyer I graduated from one of the top law schools in the nation and at the top 3% of the class and so forth so I was headed for a career and I felt like I I would would make a lot of money but I'd be generous in tiing and offering support the church instead I went into the ministry so I'm making a good salary so for someone who's living in a poverty level they would might say I'm rich and extravagant but compared to um what I could be making in secular world I'm making a whole lot less and even compared to what a pastor could make I think I'm making a good amount but I'm not taking advantage okay with my wife and I started Church in our home in Austin Texas and we grew it to about a thousand people of constituents 956 were on the regular attendance role plus others of course coming and we 16 daughter works so probably 2,000 people all total associated with our original effort today there are 23 churches associated with the new life Network either we started the church as a daughter work or we sent a pastor take a small group of people and and they started built up the church so you know if it were a business I could be making lots of money but for the first we did set up a partial salary because I felt that was right the church needed that in its budget but actually because of money we'd saved and I worked to support myself I wrote books I worked on Ministry jobs but it was still jobs that I worked on I was basically holding down two jobs all my time as a pastor uh so for the first 10 years we actually gave more money to the church than what we took from the church and then for the next four years we only took a partial salary for that size and it was only the last four years that we really took a full salary for that size of a church now I'm not saying this to bring any glory to myself we live in a very nice car we live in a very nice home but the home was basically built from uh outside in income not from church income um and we have a nice salary uh but we have given and we still give uh generously to missions and and so forth so I I guess I'm just try and I I'll give a simple example um uh you know I have a car that's was given to me in Austin is given to me by a businessman so you know so when you if you AV valuate a pastor well he's driving a nice car well maybe it was given to him maybe he had has a business on the side and he's worked double time to do that maybe he's supporting the church and we know a lot of pastors that that yes in fact that I would say the majority of our pastors are bivocational and many of them uh they support the church without them the church couldn't survive or be severely hindered in many cases they're the biggest contributor to the church instead of getting money through the church so when you try to evaluate a VI situations you better be careful I would say all Christians including pastors we should live moderate lives so we shouldn't dress so extravagantly everybody looks at us say oh look at them they're making a fashion statement uh but just because they have some nice clothes or nice cars or nice accessories or take a nice vacation or have a nice home we there there should be a principle of moderation in all those things but we shouldn't demand that they live at the lowest level and we should be very careful in judgment because as I've just said there are so many factors of people giving to them of them working sacrificially to support the church and support what they're doing or them actually foregoing a career where they could have excelled in that area uh so uh I do but I having said all that I do believe every Christian should take a serious look at your life clothing and your overall lifestyle and we're thankful for God's blessing so there there's plenty of scripture to say Enjoy the blessings of God you don't have to live in poverty you don't have to try to prove that you're humble or prove that you're aesthetic but on the other hand in the eyes of the world and the eyes of the church people that you're trying to lead or be an example to there is this principle of moderation so four principles I see here uh gender distinction of outward appearance and dress Mo uh modesty of dress uh moderation in dress and lifestyle hair and dress and avoiding ornamental jewelry I do believe these are scriptural principles that are for the church today