Vessels of Honor

Is because it has so much to do with making a disciple of the Lord. We are made into his image and we'll we'll talk about that in a little bit. but I'm going to move very quickly especially in this first half of our session today. so we're going to hit a lot of scriptures, going to hit a lot of different references and passages. So, if you want to take a picture of something that piques your interest or if you're taking notes, all all good.

I want to begin with a couple of charts because teachers can get anointed over charts. I just need to tell you that teachers can get anointed over charts. So, this first chart, this actually comes from a wonderful teacher of mine in Bible college. His name was Allison Post, AW Post. And brother Post he was the father of Sister Linda Gleason who was our past international ladies president here in the US and Canada.

Great man of God. And he taught that phrase on the top. Salvation is the most elastic word in the Bible. And what he meant was our salvation experience. It stretches past, present, and future.

It's it's really quite amazing. So he would say, brother Post would say, "In the past I was saved, today I am being saved and someday I will be saved." The theologians always need a multi-llable word for everything. So they would say, "In the past, I experienced justification. In the present, I'm experiencing sanctification. And in the future, at the rapture, I will experience glorification." And that's true.

So here's why that's important. In the past, when I experienced the new birth, for me I was 12 years old. I was saved from the penalty of my sin. I was made just as if I had never sinned. I was saved from the penalty of sin.

Now, I was only 12. I I'd never murdered anybody or done anything terribly, but I was a sinner because see, you don't you don't commit enough sins to become a sinner. You're born a sinner. and that's why you commit sin. So, I needed to be saved just like everybody else.

So, the new birth experience saved me from the penalty of my sin. But God didn't stop working on me. Every day that I live now, I'm being saved from the power of sin over me. Meaning that the longer you live for Jesus, the more like him you should become in attitude, action, words, responses, all of that. your lifestyle, your habits, your media choices, everything is impacted when you live for Jesus.

And that's that middle process. So, if you're still breathing, God's still working on you. And we'll confess that we're still working on you, too, but mostly God and some of us. Okay? and then finally, at the rapture, whether you go by way of the grave and we meet you in the air or you go in the rapture with all those that are alive and remain, here's what's going to happen.

You're going to be saved forever out of the very presence of sin. And that's what Elder Post meant when he said salvation is the most elastic word in the Bible. It covers you from new birth to streets of gold. It's amazing. Now, the reason that chart is important is that center column under the word present.

In the present, I am experiencing sanctification. Sanctification is a synonym for the word holy or holiness. I would contend with you that the whole point of the Christian life is to be made in the image of Jesus and that includes being made holy. You be holy as I am holy. So, so that's what we're about when we talk about that chart.

So, that's the first chart that I like to get anointed about. Here's the second chart. this talks about the three holiness teachers that should be in your life. You have three of them whether you know it or not, whether you submit to it or not. You have three holiness teachers in your life.

The first holiness teacher is obviously the word of God, the Bible. And the Bible gives us something that we call Bible standards. And here's how that works. If the Bible says thou shalt not, guess what? We don't do it.

If the Bible says that's an abomination to God, we don't touch it. If the Bible looks down on a behavior, an attitude, doesn't matter if culture embraces it, we don't because it's a Bible standard of holiness. And so, we don't have any wiggle room on Bible standards. These are the precepts of the word of God. And we just begin when somebody gets saved, we begin teaching this to them immediately.

We don't hesitate. We don't wait for years. we'd begin teaching it immediately. Are we going to teach it with love and grace and patience? Of course.

But we don't have wiggle room. If somebody comes to your pastor or you are a pastor and they come to you and say, "This is my living arrangement or this is my lifestyle and it's against the word of God." You don't have any room on that. You best answer them in love and you best answer them with patience, but you best teach the word of God and say, "Well, the word of God has a problem." And here's why. Because we don't have wiggle room on Bible standards. The second kind of holiness teacher you have is your spiritual leadership.

And for saints, that's your pastor. For those of us that are pastors, I hope you've got somebody that you are accountable to. You're pastor and you are in accountability with spiritual leadership. our spiritual leadership has a job and that's to teach us the principles of the word of God. And here's why.

The word of God doesn't speak about everything we deal with today in 2026. There is no verse in the King James version that says, "Thou shalt not look at pornography on the internet." It's not there. I've checked because I'd like to preach the fire out of that verse because we get slaughtered out there with people messing around online, messing up online. That that commandment isn't there. There's no direct precept.

But what is there? There's a principle. I will set no evil thing before mine eyes. I've made a covenant with mine eyes. As a man thinks in his heart, so is he.

Whatsoever things are good and pure and true. If there be any virtue, if there be any praise, think on these things. So every pastor, you have a God-given responsibility to study not only the commandments of the word, but the principles of the word. And that's why you can teach those. And we call that a church standard.

The Bible may not say it, but the church is teaching it. Why? because it's based on a principle. Paul did this several times in the epistles. This speak I, not the Lord.

Jesus didn't say this. I said this. I'm your pastor. I speak this by permission, not a commandment. Jesus didn't tell me I had to say this, but I know you and I know the world and I know sin and here's what I'm going to put as a fence around you and your family so we don't mess up here.

Pastors, that's your job. Do it without fear or favor. do it with sincerity and all honesty, but for heaven's sake, do it because that's your job. Your spiritual leadership. You're the second holiness teacher.

The third holiness teacher in our lives is the Holy Spirit. The Holy Ghost that's within you. And the Holy Ghost, this gives you something that can be so twisted out of shape. It's called your personal standards. And people can have personal standards.

Quite frankly, it's just us today. people can have personal standards that are absolutely crazy. People can have a standard they don't believe in whatever. They don't believe in Christmas or Thanksgiving or they don't believe in fresh air or clean water. I don't know.

there years ago in New Brunswick, this supposedly happened. Some guy walked up to another guy at a meeting, a little church meeting where churches were fellowshipping. And he walked up to this other guy and he went, "I see you. wear deodorant. Now, obviously that brother had a conviction against deodorant.

If you have a conviction against deodorant, I have no problem with your conviction unless you sit beside me on an airplane and then I have a problem with your personal conviction. The other brother had a perfect response. He went, [snorts] "I see you don't believe in deodorant." And that's probably where I'd land on that. but personal standards are not a joke if they're taken right. Because the Holy Ghost doesn't teach you by precepts, direct commands of the word of God.

The Holy Ghost doesn't teach you by principles taught by your spiritual leadership to cope with modern issues. The Holy Ghost, he teaches you by prompting. And if you'll learn to listen to his voice, it was like he will tap you on the shoulder and say, "No, don't go there. Don't do that. Don't go back to that website.

You know what happened last time? Don't be in that atmosphere. And folks, we need the prompting of the Holy Ghost. So, we institute Bible standards immediately. We don't have wiggle room.

Church standards can vary from one church or one culture to another. That's okay. because they are dealing with contemporary issues that are not the same in every church or every culture. And so it's possible that even in this room there's a pastor that teaches a church standard that another pastor doesn't teach. That's okay because that's part of their job.

You're not responsible to submit to some Canadian guy that flew in for a couple of days. You're responsible to submit to your pastor, whoever that is. And thirdly, the Holy Ghost, he we implement these standards personally. If you have a standard against celebrating Thanksgiving, that doesn't give you the authority to go to your pastor and say, "You should be preaching against Thanksgiving." It's a personal standard. Everybody say personal.

>> So personal standards are implemented personally, not any other way. But I will say this, your personal standards should be the highest standards in your life. Don't ever let it be said that your personal standards don't measure up to the standards of the word of God. Don't ever let it be said that your personal standards don't measure up to the standards that your pastor is teaching in your church. You should do what the Bible commands.

You should do what your spiritual leadership teaches. And then above that, the Holy Ghost will put restrictions on you. Why? because he knows you better than your pastor knows you. He knows you better than your spouse knows you or your parents know you or your siblings know you.

And he'll put those restrictions. So that's very important. So we're we're going to keep on going and we're going to motor in this first session. But I want to go let's go to 1 Timothy 2. let's go to that verse.

this is a really important verse when it comes to what we call holiness standards. the word standards has gotten some bad press in the Pentecostal movement over the last few years and maybe even a couple of decades and people criticize it. Oh, standards. That's standards. And I never thought much about it.

Standards is not the word I prefer. I prefer to call these things our lifestyle convictions. They are convictions that impact our lifestyle. They don't make us better than anybody else. We are doing them as unto the Lord, not as unto you.

We don't try to live holy so we can make other people feel unholy. That's not holiness. That's arrogance is what that is. So, so we're not living this unto people. We're living this as unto the Lord.

And so, we do have standards of holiness. they are our lifestyle convictions. And when everybody started bashing standards, I thought, I'm going to use that word more than I've ever used it before. So now I talk about it all the time. Standards.

Standards. Standards. Standards. Because everybody has standards. McDonald's has standards.

Not for the food, but for the restaurant and the uniforms and the counters and whatever. Everybody's got standards. So it's okay if we have standards of righteousness in a church that is called to be a holy people. It's okay. And so again, these things are are really important.

I direct [clears throat] your attention to this passage not because it's the only passage that does this, but because it's the most significant or complete passage that does this. It contrasts men's and women's holiness issues. And yes, they are different in the word of God. And so just like when we teach about the fruit of the spirit, we always go to one passage. When we teach the gifts of the spirit, always go to one passage.

When we want to teach about love, we go to first Corinthians 13. It's not that that's the only place it's mentioned, but it's the most complete place that it's mentioned. And so this is a very complete reference to what I want to tell you. and so Paul says to young Timothy who's pastoring in Ephesus, a mega city of the ancient world. He says,"I [clears throat] will therefore that men pray everywhere." Everyone say men lifting up holy hands without wrath and doubting.

He identifies right there three holiness issues for apostolic men. One is the appetites of the flesh that you should be able, brother, to come into the presence of God and lift up holy hands. That's a holiness issue and standard for you. Your you can't lift up holy hands if your hand was clicking on a mouse last night on a website that was inappropriate for your spirituality. men have to get the appetites of the flesh in control.

It is not only men, but it is primarily men. Secondly, he said, "Without wrath, the way men express anger is a holiness issue." ladies, a couple of sweet sisters right down here, they were just persecuting me for the way I talk about Beverly sometimes when I preach. They were telling me that they're on Beverly's side. They made that very clear. Well, I want to tell you something about Beverly since she's not here to defend herself and they don't have her phone number, so they can't call her right now.

Let me tell you something about Beverly. She is the woman. She's so sweet. She is the woman of a trillion moods. She's happy, giddy, silly, sad, moody, thoughtful, pensive, puzzled.

Like, she's got all kinds of moods. I've got two. Content or mad. And I'm like most men. I think men tend to either be like lapsed into a coma or they're frustrated about something.

They don't have that breadth of expression that women do. You can tell her about it later. I said that. [clears throat] So, here's where anger becomes sinful. Paul said in one of his epistles, "Be ye angry." And some people have those three words on their fridge.

Be ye angry. That's their life verse. But there's more to the verse. Be ye angry and sin not. Let not the sun go down upon your wrath.

So what Paul is teaching is that there's a holy way to express frustration and anger. And this idea that men can come to church and shake hands with everybody and then they go home and they're a tyrant. That's not apostolic. That's sinful. thirdly, Paul says without wrath and without doubting.

And that's a very particular word. I use the word apathy. It's basically a disconnected kind of attitude. It's an attitude that I don't care. I'm not involved.

I'm not passionate. And we have seen this throughout all kinds of churches in the modern century in which we live that that men tend to be disconnected. They're like pew potatoes. And that's especially true. Thank God for the apostolic church because we challenge our men.

We won't just let them sit there. They are supposed to be the priest of their home. They are supposed to lead their family in worship unto God. It sat on the front page of the website of Promisekeepers for years. I don't think it's there now, but it was a statistic that if a child leads the way in serving Jesus and joining the church, if a child leads the way, 3.5% of those families end up serving God and staying in church.

If a mother or a wife, if she leads the way in living for Jesus and serving God and being part of the church, if she leads the way, 17% of those families end up serving God and staying faithful to church. If a father, a dad, a man leads the way in serving Jesus and joining the church and being involved, 93% of those families end up serving God and being involved in the church. I would like to see it 100% for all of our families, but I have a hunch that it's going to take the involvement of our men, our husbands, our fathers, our dads to get involved and lead their families. And if you're here and you're not part of what they the sociologists call a nuclear family, if you're not part of that, and you're here, brother Ian said it last night or somebody did, that that God sets the solitary in families. You have a family now.

But I address every man in this place. Your job is not to let your wife do all the heavy lifting spiritually with your children or with the new converts in the church or with worship or with the altar. Your job is to get in there and lead. That's your job. So those are holiness standards for men.

As Paul explains them to Timothy, he said, "I want men to pray everywhere. I want men's faith, men's lifestyle to be so on display that their prayer, their devotion to God is seen everywhere." Notice with me that men's standards are basically standards of action. Now Paul says, "In like manner also that women adorn themselves in modest apparel with shamefacedness and sobriety, not with braided hair or gold or pearls or costly array, but which becometh women professing godliness, with good works." That's how apostolic women adorn themselves, not with all the outer stuff, but with good works. And notice that Paul has identified three things. And the words are very specific here.

The way they adorn themselves, that's adornment. Or the way we would say the way they decorate themselves, that's a holiness issue. the way they clothe themselves, apparel or in modest apparel, Paul says that's a holiness issue for women. And then their attitude of what he calls shamefacedness and sobriety, which in this context is their acceptance as a woman in God's plan. They have the role of a woman in God's plan.

They're not trying to be a man or usurp the role or position or authority of a man. They are content to be who God made them to be. And that is best expressed, as we'll see in a few minutes, that's best expressed by something unusual. It's best expressed by what they do with their hair. Now, notice with me that women's standards are basically standards of appearance.

Men's standards are standards of action. Women's standards are standards of appearance. Why? Because we're created differently. It doesn't date back to the founding of the Pentecostal movement or the holiness movements of the 1800s or the New Testament or the Old Testament.

It dates all the way back to creation. God created us. Male and female created he them. And so [clears throat] this is an important important distinction, excuse [clears throat] me, between men and women. And it's even in the ways we are tempted and the way we express holiness and separation unto God.

the principle is this. This gets mocked online now. Still true. people mock stuff. C can we get over the internet?

people mock everything all the time. If you want to find an opinion against something somebody believes, go online, Google it, chat GPT it. You can do it. You can get it a thousand ways. the old statement one of my elders taught me years ago was paper doesn't refuse ink.

In other words, you can publish any anything and you can write anything and somebody will believe it. Paper doesn't refuse ink. Well, the internet doesn't refuse posts. Oh my goodness, there's stuff everywhere. And so this is mocked online now, but it's still true.

Years ago, there was a dude, I can't remember his name now. he wrote the book, Men Are from Mars, Women are from Venus. Anybody ever heard of it? you know, I wanted to write my own book, Men Are Clams, Women Are Like Crowbars. But I didn't.

so, I'm sorry that just popped in my head because I get home from a trip and Beverly says, "How was your trip?" And I give her a complete description. Good. That's not what she wanted. Anyway, I digress. That was counseling.

I'm so sorry. so, so here here we go. This is not a marriage seminar. Let's get over it. Here, here's the thing.

It's still true. John Gray, that was his name. I think he wrote that book, Men Are from Mars, Women are from Venus. He made a gazillion dollars. All he did was said things that are common sense that everybody knows, but they're no longer politically correct to say.

Well, it's no longer politically correct to say this. Men are tempted primarily when women appear unholy. And women are tempted primarily when men act unholy. It is a distinction from creation. If I could be I know we've got a mixed audience, but it's a mature mixed audience.

If I could be just a little crude here. We're not just different in anatomy or plumbing. We are different from creation to the root of our DNA. We are created to be male and female. This current assault on the order of God's creation is not accidental.

It is a last days full-frontal all-out assault on human identity. But here's what a lot of Pentecostals miss. It started with clothing and separation years ago and we bought the devil's lie on some of that and now we are facing the reaping of that harvest. So women's holiness issues, adornment, apparel, attitude and these distinctions. This is not the only place it's talked about, but it is one of the major places.

now I want to skip a whole bunch here and the wonderful media folks at the back are are going to help me. I'm doing my best to drive them absolutely around the bend in this first session and then I'll give them a break in the next session. let's talk about adornment. Adornment is not bad in and of itself. somebody I will not say who, but somebody made a crack about their brother wearing vibrant colors.

I will not say who that was. so without meddling, but I'm a Canadian. We do it by nature. color is not wrong. Scripturally speaking, I'm really glad that God didn't say we all had to wear black all the time or we all had to wear blue all the time.

God likes color. If you look at the supermarket, there's there's yellow bananas and there's orange oranges and there's red and green apples and there's purple grapes. And God loves color. He didn't choose to make everything that we eat green. Although Beverly would do that if he had done that because she loves to eat green stuff.

My grandkids swear that she blends up stuff that she picks off our lawn and eats it. But you didn't hear that from me. So, so color is not wrong and even decoration is not wrong, but scripture makes it crystal clear that sometimes the way culture encourages women to decorate themselves, it goes outside the bounds of the word of God. Now, I don't have time for a big long history lesson. Let's just do it real quick.

In the beginning of the Bible, way back in the book of Genesis and Exodus, jewelry was originally a blessing from God. Why? Because they used jewelry, silver and gold, and precious stones. They used it as currency. And so it was basically like God giving them money.

the night they left Egypt in the Exodus, they spoiled the Egyptians. They carried out of that place wagons loaded with gold and silver and precious jewels. and it was money. And then we run into a problem and it comes to a head around Exodus 32 and 33. And you can read that later.

But but here's here's the thing. It comes to a head because God's people start using the jewelry he's given them for currency to adorn their bodies with like all the pagan nations around them. And so pop up that Exodus 33 reference if you would for me. in this passage, God and Moses have it out because God says, "Moses, I am not going with these people to the promised land. I will send my angel.

I'll make sure they get there, but I am not going with them because they keep wearing this jewelry and I will wipe them out if they do this again." And Moses basically, you got to admire Moses. He stands toe-to-toe with God and says, "God, if you don't go, we're not moving." And so God commands them to do something. They mourned. They repented. And no man did put on him his ornaments.

God said, "Put off your ornaments from you." And so they stripped themselves of their ornaments. That was God's command to them. If you want to go to the promised land, you've got to strip off these ornaments. God never changes his opinion on excess adornment. you can go through all kinds of scriptures.

let's go to Deuteronomy 7. when you conquer another people and they've got idols and they're decked with gold and silver and stones, the graven images of their god, you burn them with fire. Do not desire the silver or gold that's on them. Don't take it to you, lest you be snared therein. it it's it's amazing.

When God commanded for an offering to be taken to build the tabernacle, the top building supply was gold. He wanted it. He said, "You give that to me. You don't wear that like the pagan. So all the way through the scripture in the Old Testament, a serious Bible student will see this.

When Israel backslides, God often associates her with pagan women decked with gold and jewels and makeup and everything else. put up Hosea chapter 2. there's three verses there. It's all through the prophets. he says, you decked yourself with earrings and jewels.

You went after your lovers, you forgot me. you clothe yourself with crimson. You deck yourself with ornaments of gold. You rent your face with painting. Everywhere you look in the Old Testament, it's very clear.

And then we get to this gal. U, she is associated with worldly adornment more than anybody else in scripture. Anybody know her name? Yeah. Jezebel.

Well, Sister Jezi is so wicked and so worldly that her spirit is seen clear over in the New Testament, like 3,000 years later, her spirit is still trying to attack the New Testament church. Revelation 2. Notwithstanding, I have a few things against you, because you let that woman Jezebel, which calls herself a prophet, prophetess to teach and seduce my servants to commit fornication and to eat things sacrificed unto idols. That's not the literal Jezebel from the Old Testament. Of course, it is her spirit.

Her spirit was one of sensuality and worldliness achieved through inappropriate adornment. And if you read in scripture, a serious Bible student will understand that godly women stand in direct opposition to that. Like Esther, when a girl went in before a Persian monarch, she could choose anything she wanted, any garment, any jewelry, any decoration that she wanted. Esther refused. She used only what the king's eunuch selected.

And the Bible only records that she used oil of myrrh, perfume, and preparations to purify the skin. She didn't deck herself out like all the other women. And guess who got the job? And people say, "Well, yeah, but she used perfume." Well, that's because there's no such sin as the lust of the nose. But there is a sin called the lust of the eyes.

So it's the decoration of the body, not how you smell. you. I don't know that you can be a temptation in how you smell. I know that you can be an offense in how you smell, but that's another subject and I'm trying not to meddle. Now, in the modern apostolic movement, your pastor and those of you that are pastors, we try to maintain a balanced position.

U extreme positions are always easy. Either we don't wear anything jewelry or we allow everything jewelry. It's easy to do extremes. The difficulty is balance. And here's the balance.

We allow for functional jewelry. A wristwatch, a hair clasp. But if your hair clasp is three feet tall and it has ostrich feathers and rhinestones and flashing neon lights, probably you need to go back to the altar or at least back to the store and return that thing. So, so the principle is moderation. And so we try to have moderation and different pastors understand this differently.

and you're not responsible to submit to me in my opinion. You're supposed to submit to your spiritual leadership. And but but the point is this that all through scripture there are people that use jewelry. There's signet rings and there's the high priest breastplate and there's the crown that belongs to the king and there's there's functional uses for jewelry. What God's against is what culture does.

I'm decorating myself to call attention to myself. let me just show you one more chart because teachers can get anointed over charts. U, this is the end of the of the New Testament. I know some of you thought, well, we're just in the Old Testament. Well, here's the New Testament.

the New Testament culminates in the revelation of two women. One is the great harlot, the apostate church. She is decked in purple and scarlet and gold and jewels. And she has a name on her forehead like the Old Testament prostitutes, mother of harlots. She is contrasted intentionally in John's vision with the bride of Christ, the apostolic church.

She is clothed in fine white linen, pure and clean, which represents the righteousness of the saints. And by the way, she also has a name on her forehead. It's the name of Jesus into which she has been baptized. So that's the culmination of the New Testament. And the question is begged by the text.

Which woman do you want to be associated with? And so God wasn't caught off guard by modern culture or by ancient cultures that told women, you need a lot of help to be beautiful. I don't understand this, by the way. I don't understand why our culture says to men, you're fine the way you are. And this dude walks in and he really needs help.

U I'm one of them. I know. And then these ladies, we put on all these false expectations. You're not pretty. You're not beautiful.

You're not valuable unless you do it this way. Let me tell you, you're beautiful the way God made you, and you don't have to worry about all that worldly stuff. my my friend Elder John Min a precious pioneer elder of the apostolic faith in Eastern Canada. John and Nyla Men's fingerprints are literally on every single church in the Nova Scotia district. Even the ones that have been started since they retired and s since men went on to glory they had a hand in everything.

They've mentored leaders all over that province. And John Men, this reporter thought she was going to get one over on an elderly minister a few years ago. She stuck a microphone under his face and there was something going on in the city of Halifax. She was picking on the Pentecostals and she said, "Your church," and she had her face all messed up, you know, your church teaches that women shouldn't wear makeup. What in the world's about?

She was really antagonistic. and elder. He just reached out as only he could get away with. He's so He's so priceless. He reached out.

He patted her hand. He said, "Oh, pretty pretty young lady. We wouldn't paint something like you. We paint barn doors and fences and walls. You don't need paint.

We wouldn't paint some." She had no words. The interview was over. let's go back to that scripture. I think it's coming up on a slide right after Malachi. go to whatever that is.

so here's yeah here's that reference again. So let's talk very briefly about apparel. the way we clothe ourselves. Now men can sin in matters of apparel. Let's be very clear.

Men can also sin in matters of adornment but it's not their tendency. But our culture puts such a weird expectation on women that it becomes their tendency. And so apparel is specifically a holiness standard, a lifestyle conviction for women. And again, this has nothing to do with the Pentecostals. This goes all the way back to creation.

In fact, part of it goes back before sin entered the world. So So there's two principles that apply to your clothing. and this applies specifically to women, not because it doesn't apply to men, but because it's your temptation zone because of the pressure you get from culture. after sin entered the world, God instituted a principle that we call modesty. The principle of modesty is that your garment should cover at least a certain amount of your body so that flesh is not accentuated.

But there's an earlier principle that affects your clothing and it was instituted by God even before sin entered the world. It is the principle of distinction between the sexes. So that happens before sin enters the world. Male and female created he them. But it impacts clothing once clothing is introduced because there are male and female ways to utilize clothing biblically speaking.

And so let's go all the way to let's go to 1st Samuel. That's fun. Let's go to 1st Samuel 16. people say, "Well, God looks on my heart, so it doesn't matter what I wear." Well, you're absolutely right. And you take that principle from this verse where Samuel is about ready to anoint the king of Israel, and he's impressed by all of Jesse's sons.

And the Lord says to Samuel, "Don't look on his countenance. Don't look on the height of his stature. I've refused this guy because the Lord seeth not as man seeth. For man lookth on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart. So that's where they get that.

God looks at my heart. It doesn't matter what I wear. Back up. Man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart. So holiness is not a favor to God.

God is seeing you in the shower. it's not helping God, it's helping everybody else because your holiness is before man, before humanity. so that was fun. Let's go back. let's go back to the beginning.

Genesis chapter 2 verse 25. The Bible tells us that in the beginning in Eden, they were both naked, the man and his wife, and they were not ashamed. It was a state of innocence. Some theologians believe that originally man and women w man and woman they were clothed in the glory of God. A literal manifestation of glory.

We're not sure about that. But we do know this. They were both naked because sin had not entered the world. Lust had not made its appearance in the world. And so nakedness was not a danger or a shame or a temptation.

But then sin enters the world. Eve takes of the fruit. Adam partakes with her. they fall into sin. And here's what happens next.

Genesis 3:7. And the eyes of them both were opened and they knew that they were naked. Now nakedness has become a sin, a shame, and a danger to them. And so here's their solution. They sewed fig leaves together and they made themselves aprons.

They tried to cover their nakedness by sewing leaves together. The Hebrew word is hagorah. It means a girdle or a belt or a loin covering. it just covers the sexual organs. That's basically what it is.

That is man's idea of modest apparel. As long as your sexual parts are covered, you're modest. Leave me alone. That's man's idea of modest apparel. Here's the thing, though.

Adam and Eve were less than 24 hours removed from walking with the presence of God in the cool of the evening in that beautiful garden. So when God shows up, look at this. Genesis 3:10, Adam said, "God, I heard your voice in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked and I hid myself." Wait, wait a minute. You just made clothing to cover yourself. What do you mean you're naked?

Adam knows that although he is clothed according to man's idea, he is not clothed according to what would please a holy God. He knows that instinctively. And so we don't have to guess what God considers to be modest apparel. Genesis 3:21, God comes down into that garden. unto Adam also, and to his wife did the Lord God make coats of skins and clothe them.

God came down and made them a modest garment. We don't have to guess. God did that because he wanted mankind not to be put in the position of displeasing God's sense of holiness. Now that sin had entered the world, nakedness, exposing too much of the body was a sin, a shame, and a danger. so God uses animal skins to make them a coat.

The Hebrew word is kethoneth. And a kethoneth is a tunic. We'd say a robe. it covers from the neck to the knees. It's loose fitting and it has some kind of sleeve.

Sometimes it can go down to the ankles, but that's not required. It needs to cover from the neck to the knees. It needs to be loose fitting and have sleeves. Apostolic brothers and sisters, this is why our ladies dress the way they do. It's not because it's been decreed by the Pentecostal church.

It's because this is what God provided for them in the very beginning in the Garden of Eden. He said, "I want at least this much of the body covered in this way." And so, that's why we do what we do. We don't do that because we think we're better than other people or we're holier than other people. we don't do it that reason. We do it to please God because he's the one who instituted this.

Now, I told you already there are two principles that impact your clothing. One is the principle of modesty that was instituted by God right here after sin entered the world. But there's a second principle and it was created and instituted by God before sin entered the world and then it carries on and that is the principle of distinction that there are ways to be male and ways to be female and there are ways to wear clothing that are male in God's understanding and ways that are female. so let let's go to a couple scriptures here just to make this case and we'll we'll hit it and move on because we're not just belaboring the point here. So, gender distinction is not just in what they wear, but how they wear it.

And it's still that way today. firstly, in the Bible, priests wore something in Bible times under their robes. It was called breaches. Breaches. Now, I know Connecticut's not real far south, but it's far south enough.

What does breaches sound like to you people? Breaches. And that's what God invented and commanded the priest. you wear this pair of pants under your robe. Why?

Because sometimes the priest's duties took them up on the altar in the sight of all Israel and sometimes it was a windy day. And in the eye in the words of a great American theologian who was standing outside a burning apartment building in Texas somewhere, ain't nobody got time for that. That's that's basically what that's all about. So God was protecting the modesty of his priests. And so here's the scripture.

this word breaches doesn't occur very often in scripture, but every time it does, it's associated with men's apparel, never with women's apparel. and thou shalt make the priest linen breeches to cover their nakedness from the loins even to the thighs, or we would say from the waist to the knees. In other words, it covers the whole thigh bone. That's how long they shall reach. And if you think about the early invention of pants for men way way back, even in old Europe, England, it was pants.

You got all these old pictures of a guy. He's standing posed beside this big, it looks like a tricycle. One big wheel, one little wheel, and he's got a pair of britches on. They go down just past his knee. And that was the first invention of pants.

pants were worn exclusively by men for the first 5900 years of human history. So really it's only in the last century and a bit that that we've seen a change. so that's one thing is that God commanded men to wear pants never women. Secondly, men in Bible times were permitted to do something called girding their loins. a man could because men did wear robes back in Bible times.

It's not unbiblical. If we do a Christmas drama and the boys and the girls have on robes. Now, there'll probably not be an authentic biblical robe. There probably be a bathrobe, but we'll make the point. It's not unbiblical for a man to wear a robe.

but a man could gird up his loins. He could reach between his legs, take the back hem of his robe, tuck it in his waistband, and by impact, he was making a loose- fitting pair of pants. That is a distinctively masculine apparel. Back up to Job for me, would you? Job 38.

Gird up now thy loins. Look at this. Like a man. Girding the loins is a masculine apparel. Now, the next picture, this is not from a Bible website.

This is from a secular website called the art of manliness. It's got articles on everything shaving and whatever. but that is how the art of manliness website explains what they call a bifurcated garment or girding the loins. And you can see it illustrated there. and they say this is a secular website.

It says to tell someone to gird up their loins was to tell them to get ready for hard work or battle. Girding the loins was the ancient way of saying man up. So this is why we do what we do. And we don't criticize anybody else. We don't look down on anybody else.

My goodness, I looked around that beautiful service last night. And I saw some of our precious new believers from all kinds of different churches gathered in. I'm so thrilled that they're serving Jesus. And I'm so thrilled that they're growing in their faith. And if they don't know this yet and they don't do this yet and they haven't submitted to this yet and they don't understand this yet.

Your job is not to criticize them. Your job is to love them and pray for them and encourage them and let them get it at their own pace. And I don't want to meddle with that now because I want to meddle with that major in just a few minutes. so so this ancient idea there's one area of the body that God requests and commands not just requests he wants it to be different between men and women he wants this their garments to be different and it is the place of the body between here and here waist to knees the thigh and god says that men can gird up their loins so they can their garment can show a separation of the legs in the garment itself above the knee. Our women do not do that because that is not a feminine appearance.

That is a masculine appearance. Now, next picture. you've seen this appearance probably right here in this church campus. those symbols are modern, but that concept is ancient that there should be a distinction even in the clothing of a man or woman. Now, right now, you know, all this crazy stuff that's going on, some of the symbols that they now put on restroom doors are ridiculous.

I'm thinking, is that the octopus restaurant? What is that? Like, I don't know. this is ancient. The symbols are modern.

The concept is ancient. And it comes from scriptures like this. Deuteronomy 22:5. The woman shall not wear that which pertainth unto a man, neither shall a man put on a woman's garment. Now, please notice that the commandments are different there.

Here's the commandment for all you men here. Don't wear women's clothes. We good, brethren? Because that's not your primary temptation area, right? But for the women, the commandment is different intentionally.

So the woman shall not that wear that which pertainth unto a man. She shouldn't wear anything that relates to a man, has reference to a man, resembles a man, is appropriate for a man. That's what that word means. So her command is different. God foresaw that there would be a push in culture to have ladies do this and take on the garment of a man.

but there's an important word. Oh, there's two important words there. First of all, he says, "All that do so are abomination unto the Lord thy God." We see that as a very serious thing because scripture does and so that's why we don't do it. But secondly, the woman shall not wear that which pertainth unto a man, neither shall a man put on a woman's garment. The Hebrew word is simlah from which we get the concept of silhouette.

Simla, silhouette, shadow. God says that the shadow of a man, his garment, should be different than the shadow of a woman. Back up to those restroom signs. That's what God's talking about. The shadow, the silhouette, the simlaha of a man should be different than that of a woman.

Well, why does God do that? And why is it specific to that area of the body? I don't know, but I'll make an educated guess. That is the sexual area of the body, the childbirth area of the body, the intimate area of the body, the covenant area of the body. And I think that's why God wants us to be male and female even in the way we wear apparel.

One last scripture. so pastor Raymond, you just quoted a whole bunch of Old Testament scriptures. Do you realize that? Thank you for bringing that up. Let's go to the New Testament.

1 Timothy chapter 2 verse 8-10. Again, Paul says that the woman should wear modest apparel. And the Greek word is katastolē means a tunic or robe, a garment that covers from the neck to the knees. It is loose fitting and it has sleeves. That's a katastolē in the Greek language.

you look at at diagrams and drawings of Roman times and you'll see that quite easily. That is a modest garment. Please Notice this with me that what 3,000 years for more than that after Eden, Paul is teaching Timothy, you tell the ladies to wear the exact same kind of garment that God made for Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. The standard didn't ever change. And so 2,000 years after Paul wrote those words in the apostolic church, we still teach the very same thing.

that the garment that was modest and distinctive, we teach that if God created it in Eden and Paul taught it in the New Testament and it was practiced all through Bible times, we still teach it today. We don't do it to put other people down or to say we're better. We just do it out of honor and reverence to the word of God. so, let's go to the very last holiness standard for women. we're going to talk about her attitude of sobriety.

shame faciveness or or let me just combine it her attitude of submission. very very important for for our ladies. the Bible teaches godly women to have an attitude of submission. This is not because a woman is inferior to men. It is just because of God's order of creation.

Let me say something to all of you sisters that are here this morning that's very important. Nowhere in scripture are you commanded to be submitted to men. It's not there. You are commanded to be submitted to your father if you're unmarried, to your husband if you are married. We're all submitted to spiritual authority such as our pastors and those that are have the rule over us, the Bible says.

But nowhere are you commanded to submit to every random guy that walks into your life. Stop that. That's spiritually dangerous. Now, I know there's a bunch of male chauvinists. Some of them stand in pulpits and they basically give the implication that women are to be submitted to men.

that's wrong. That's not scripturally correct. And here's their rationale. Well, she was created after the man was created. Buddy, you were created after the hippopotamus.

What are you talking about? Has nothing to do with anything. We don't honor that. We honor God's order of creation, what he sets in place, and what he says is important. so I'm having fun.

I hope you're enduring this. so an apostolic woman, and I'm not talking about every woman on the street, and I'm not talking about every precious lady that God ever created. He loves them all. I'm talking about our apostolic women who make an effort to please God even in these areas of holiness. An apostolic woman willingly and cheerfully chooses to be marked in her own body by her covenant of submission.

And it's through what she does with her hair. Again, we're going to go to a passage. we're not going here because it's the only place this is mentioned. We're going here because it's the most complete place that it is mentioned. 1 Corinthians chap 11 verse one.

And we're going to walk down through several verses here. so we'll go rapidly and then we're going to take a break. Everybody thought hallelujah even if he didn't say it. so Paul starts be ye followers of me even as I also am of Christ. I praise you brethren that you remember me in all things and keep the ordinances as I delivered them to you.

Paul is talking about things that he has taught the Corinthians. It's what I called church standards a little while ago. Paul is about ready to teach the Corinthians. I need you to do this because it helps our church and it helps our witness in the city of Corinth. He's about ready to give them not a Bible command.

He's about ready to give them a Bible principle. And so that's why he starts out that way. I praise you that you follow me in the ordinances that I delivered to you. And then in verse number three, I would have you know, he's about ready to talk about something that the Bible calls headship. I would have you know the head of every man is Christ.

The head of the woman is the man. The head of Christ is God. So remember, we're in New Testament times. Every man praying or prophesying having his head covered dishonors his head, God. But every woman that prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors her head.

Who's her head? Her husband or her father if she's unmarried. He says it's even all one. It's it's it would be the same as if she just shaved her head. So some background here and you can check this out in all kinds of references and resources.

And if you go on Google, you can find things that will contradict everything I'm saying. Enjoy. but but here's the truth. Okay. the problem in ancient Corinth is not that women are cutting their hair.

moral women, not just godly women, just moral women of that time. Nobody did that. The only women in Corinth and several other pagan Roman cities, the only women that cut their hair were the women who worked at the temples, the temple of Aphrodite and Apollo and all of those pagan temples. and so they were temple prostitutes. they advertised that they were temple prostitutes by sometimes cutting off their hair and literally offering their hair on the altar in those temples.

They would shave their head and offer their hair. And so they were the only women that walked around ancient Corinth bareheaded. You could tell them not only because they didn't wear a veil, but because they sometimes shaved off their hair and they went around with their head shaved and everybody knew that's a temple prostitute. The temple of Aphrodite, the Temple of Apollo, the Delphian oracles, that's that's a prostitute. meanwhile, every other lady, I'm not talking about Christians or apostolics or Jews.

I'm talking about every lady in ancient Corinth. They wore a veil, a cloth covering over their head. think about a Muslim country today. Muslim countries, moral women still wear a covering over their head. Now, I'm not talking about the face covering.

In ancient times, that wasn't correct in the New Testament. It's a head covering. So, Paul has just told them something. We don't want the apostolic church to be associated with temple prostitutes from these pagan temples. So ladies, I need you to wear your veil.

Next picture for me. why? This is the very same epistle where he says there is neither I'm sorry. We're getting to the same epistle. Galatians.

He says there's neither Jew nor Greek. There's neither bond nor free. There's neither male nor female. You're all one in Christ. Women aren't down here and men up here.

You're all one. And in the same epistle 1 Corinthians, he says in chapter 10, all things are lawful for me. I could do anything I wanted, but all things are not expedient. All things are lawful, but all things edify not. So Paul, he's teaching these women something.

You are equal in value before the sight of God to every man in the church. However, in our city, in our culture, moral women wear a head covering. What had happened in Corinth was when these women came into the apostolic church, they're like, "Woohoo! I'm free and they threw out their head coverings and they're walking to First Apostolic Church of Corinth and they're scandalizing their city." We know what they do at that church. Look at that.

That's a bare-headed woman. That's a woman without her veil. So, she was dishonoring her head. She was dishonoring her husband or if she was unmarried, she was dishonoring her father. So Paul is going to give them what I called earlier a church standard.

You need to wear your veil, ladies, when you're out in public because in our city, if you don't, you're a disgrace to the church. The very same thing happens in Muslim countries today. I've been in the nation of Pakistan multiple times and when we go, our missionary ladies there and all the women that go with us on any of those trips, they all put a veil on. Why? Because God demands it?

No. Because culture expects it and we don't want to offend the culture before we even have a chance to preach Jesus to them. So that's why our ladies today in a setting like that would choose to wear a veil. And it's why Paul is teaching them to wear a veil. And so I think this is out of order, bro.

But let's go to that chart that I gave you. so so here's what Paul's asking for. He says, "Ladies, I'm asking you to wear a veil, a cloth veil. This is just a temporary thing, but it's based on an eternal principle. I I'm asking you to wear a veil because in our culture in Corinth, that's done in honor to man, but it's based on another principle that's done in honor to God." And so what what Paul's saying all the way through this, he said the veil, the cloth veil that I'm asking you to wear, that just comes from culture.

But the other thing I'm going to talk about in a minute, it comes from the church. It impacts the church. So the cloth veil, this is very important for us today. The cloth veil applies only to Corinth. But the other principle that we're going to talk about, it applies to the church because the cloth veil comes from their culture.

But God's principle comes all the way back from creation. And so that's that's very important. You've got to be a little bit of a detective in 1 Corinthians 11 because you're looking at two parallel issues. Wear the cloth veil. Wear the cloth head covering.

But then there's another principle that dates back to creation. so let's let's proceed. and we'll get there. 1 Corinthians 11:6. For if the woman be not covered, if she's not going to wear the veil, let her also be shorn.

She might as well go and cut her hair because they associate her with a temple prostitute anyway. But if it is a shame for a woman to be shorn or shaven, then let her be covered. If you know, and they did, if you know it would be a disgrace for you to cut off your hair and shave your head like those temple prostitutes, then just wear the veil. next picture has a couple of definitions. and so this is a this is a very troubling thing to Paul.

The word shame it means something that is a disgrace. The word shaven means to use a razor. The word shorn just means to cut and it doesn't tell us how much to cut. So So Paul's basically saying, ladies, don't associate yourself with those temple prostitutes if you're not going to submit. Remember, he started by thanking them for submitting to him in these commandments.

He said, "If you're not going to submit, you might as well cut your hair or shave your head because rebellion in a minor area is still rebellion." 1 Corinthians 11:7, we're moving as rapidly as we can because you have a break in your near future. I prophesy. Verse seven, for a man indeed ought not to cover his head. he shouldn't wear a veil because he is the image and glory of man. So when he goes to worship, he shouldn't wear a veil on his head.

We do the same thing today. I know there's all kinds of people that don't now, but when we come into a sanctuary, there's nothing wrong with our men wearing a ball cap, but when we come into the presence of God, guess what happens? Anybody with respect for that environment, they'll take their hat off. It's an instinctive response. It comes back to this principle.

A man indeed ought not to cover his head as far for as much as he's the image and glory of God, but the woman is the glory of the man. The man is not of the woman, but the woman of the man. She was taken out of his side in creation. Neither was the man created for the woman, but the woman for the man. And so the Greek word here is doxa or glory.

Man in his redeemed state reflects the glory of God. Woman in her redeemed state reflects the glory of her husband or her father. She's a help meat. That is not to disgrace her or put her down that she's a help meat. That's a compliment, ladies.

The only person called helper more than a woman in the Bible is God. So, you're in pretty good neighborhood. It's okay. so Paul's saying that when a woman comes to prayer and she comes without a covering, she's breaking the order of creation because she's saying, "I'm not submitted." So he asked them again the veil versus the hair. He asked them to wear a cloth covering, but he's about ready to base his temporary request for a cloth veil.

He's about ready to base that on an eternal principle that goes all the way back to creation. And so in creation, God gave man and woman, many unchangeable physical characteristics. I know today people mutilate their bodies with surgeries and hormones and treatments and whatever, but short of surgery, you as a man or woman, you have certain unchangeable characteristics. But God gave both genders one physical characteristic that they can manipulate. Men can grow their hair long.

Women can cut their hair off. But when we conform to God's standards, we are saying I submit to his authority and his order of creation. let me just insert a couple things here. One because I need to. One because I just want to meddle.

One more time. our men cut their hair short. They cut it along the hairline. Why? Ezekiel 44.

It was God's standards for his priests. They polled their heads. That means to cut their hair along the head the hairline. And that's why our men do that. There's all always somebody that says something like this.

There are so many people. They're amazing. well, Jesus was a Nazerite because they've read about the Nazarite vow where men had long hair. first of all, a Nazarite vow was only 30 days. I've gone that long.

I've done many Nazarite vows in my lifetime. gone that long between haircuts. a double Nazarite vow was 60 days. A triple Nazarite vow was 100 days. But the point of a Nazarite vow was that they didn't care for their hair either.

They let it grow and they didn't care for it. They didn't comb it. So if you're going to talk about Nazarite vow, go all the way. do bed head for 30 or 60 or 100 days. It it's it's it's a ridiculous argument.

Nazerites. there are only three lifelong Nazerites that we know because it was a vow of humiliation and humility. Samson, Samuel and John the Baptist. We think all of those three were lifelong Nazarites but very unique situation over the thousands of years of scripture. Typically a Nazarite vow was very very temporary.

And so somebody made a comment to me, well Jesus was a Nazarite. I said no ma'am. Jesus was a Nazarene, meaning he was from Nazareth. He was not a Nazerite. Get your suffixes right.

so, so here here's here's the thing. U, Jesus couldn't have been a Nazerite. A Nazerite was not allowed to drink of the fruit of the vine. Jesus did that. A Nazerite was not allowed to touch dead bodies.

Jesus ruined every funeral he ever went to. It's like, we're not having cookies today. Nope. Up. Funeral's over.

Go home. Nobody got their snacks. And Jesus couldn't have been a Nazarite because Jesus didn't have long hair. I know. I've seen pictures of Jesus.

No, you haven't. Wake up and smell the 13th century effeminate artist. it's just not true. Somebody's created a picture of Jesus. And you've probably watched one too many episodes of The Chosen.

And so it's all that's going on there. Jesus had short hair. The hairstyle in Jesus day was Julian for men, as in Julius Caesar. Go check out a bust of Julius Caesar in the library, and you'll find out what Jesus hair looked like. so, men are commanded in scripture to have short hair, pull their heads, cut along the hairline.

and women have long hair. here's another principle, and this is this doesn't have to be said, but it's just so much fun to say. so I'll say it because I'm a Canadian, and we meddle. we're very polite about it, and we're very subtle, but we do meddle. there's a principle in scripture that applies to both men and women, and it flies in the face of culture because today there's pressure on our ladies especially to be forever 21.

Oh, you've shoed there. Okay, good. Okay, so here's what the Bible says. Matthew 5:36. This is just meddling, but it's Bible, so it's Bible meddling.

Neither shalt thou swear by thy head, Jesus said, because you cannot make one hair white or black. I know that some people think mistakenly, well, that's because they didn't have hair dye in Jesus' day. Yes, they did. The Romans had it. And in fact, their favorite color was blonde.

Jesus wasn't saying you can't technically do it. He was saying you can't naturally do it. But even stronger than Jesus statement are these verses from Proverbs. The glory of young men is their strength and the beauty of old men is the gray head. The hoary head, the gray head is a crown of glory if it be found in the way of righteousness.

Ladies, don't yield to the pressure of the world. Somebody said to me, "Well, that's just my natural color." You're 95. That is not your natural color. Somebody said, "But my gray hair makes me look old." No, that's your face that makes you look old. Don't tell Beverly I said that.

Okay, ladies. I'm just saying who created this that ladies need all this help and men they just show up. It's like what kind of a double standard is that? Ladies, you are beautiful the way God created you. And to me, my precious mom, she's totally gray.

She's beautiful. She's sweet. She's in her mid 80s. She's starting to have a few little struggles with her memory. That's kind of our latest little challenge.

And she's so sweet. And her favorite sport is watching me preach. my sister Natalie, they live there and she'll just put her in front of the big screen and put on YouTube. And she'll say, mom will say, I'll call her and she'll say, "I'm listening to you preach right now." I say, "Well, good, Mom. That's great." One night she called and she said, "Oh my goodness, they worked you hard tonight." I said, "What do you mean?" She said, "You preached five times." I said, "No, Mom.

That's YouTube. It just goes." She said, she said, "Well, I was just going to stay up and support you." She was up till midnight. There's nothing more precious than a praying godly mom. And furthermore, culture, there's nothing more beautiful than a gray-headed little old grandma that knows Jesus and loves him. So, that was me.

But stop taking your cues from culture. Okay. Now, let's hit a verse. we're going to take a little bit longer session in the beginning and a shorter session. So, we'll get out of here on time.

Don't worry. let's hit a verse, skip over it, and come back to it. 1 Corinthians 11:10. For this cause ought the woman to have power on her head because of the angels. It is one of the strongest, most powerful verses in all of Paul's epistles.

It's an amazing verse. verse 11, we'll come back. Nevertheless, neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man in the Lord. No man ever was born without the help of a woman. But the woman didn't get here without the man because she was taken out of his side.

For as the woman is of the man, even so the man also by the woman, but all things are of God. So Paul's again, watch this. He does this more in these few verses than he does anywhere else in the scripture. He reaches back to the order of creation over and over and over and over again. And he says the man and the woman, they have distinct roles.

They were created different in God's order of creation. So here's his punchline. Judge in yourselves after everything I've told you Corinthians. I told you I would prefer that you wear the cloth veil to church so you don't humiliate and scandalize our church in the eyes of the city. I've asked you for that.

Are you going to submit? Judge in yourselves. Is it comely? Is it becoming that a woman would pray unto God uncovered in Corinth? Of course it's not.

she needs to wear her veil or she scandalizes the church and she scandalizes her husband or her father. Now then he says this, this is amazing. verse 14, do not even nature itself teach you that if a man has long hair, it is a shame unto him. But if a woman have long hair, it is a glory to her, for her hair is given her for a covering. There's a lot to unpack there, but let's start here.

How does nature teach us that men should have short hair and women should have long hair? There are several men in this sanctuary right now who are a shining example of this principle. And when they walk into the sanctuary, you don't go, "Oh my goodness, what happened, brother?" No. It's called male pattern baldness. It happens.

It's natural. Nature teaches us that God clears off the head of a man over time. Nature teaches that if a sister walks into the very same sanctuary and she's in the same condition, we would we would feel sorry for her. That poor lady, she's undergoing some treatment. She's got a genetic disorder, whatever.

We would feel sorry for her. We don't even think about it with a man. It's a natural condition. Nature teaches us this that men should have but here's the point that men should have short hair. They should not have long hair and women should have long hair.

What is long? Long is the Greek word komao. I think we got a picture there. komao means let the hair grow or we would simply say it's uncut. And so our men should consistently, regularly cut their hair.

So God doesn't make your barbershop appointments for you. He just says, "Men, you should not have komao hair. You should not allow your hair to consistently, constantly grow. It is a shame to you." But ladies, you should have komao hair. Your sh hair hair should be allowed to grow.

It should be uncut because that is your acceptance of your God-given role in his order of creation. And so ladies, you should do this. Let your hair grow. Let your hair be uncut. Why?

Because it is a glory to you. But then he inserts this. For her hair is given her for a covering. That literally means anti peribolaiou. It literally means that her hair is given her to serve as a covering in the place of a covering in thestead of a covering.

So Paul says that for one reason only. He wants us to remember that although he is asking these women to respect the order of their culture by wearing a cloth veil. He doesn't want anybody to think that your cloth veil is your covering. Your cloth veil is not your covering. If you want to wear a veil today, go ahead.

If you want to wear a hat, ladies, go ahead. It's not a problem, but it's not required. Your hair is given you to serve as a covering in the place of a covering. So, do Christian women need to wear a veil today? No.

Unless there's a unique circumstance like a missions trip to a Muslim nation. we got time. We'll just shorten up the next one. so somebody said, "Well, but but but but but there's no command that says, "Thou shalt not cut thy hair." Well, no, there's not. But there is this 1 Corinthians 11:16.

Right at the end of this passage, Paul says, "If any man seems to be contentious, if anybody wants to argue about this, we have no such custom, neither the churches of God." The churches in Corinth do this. The churches in Ephesus do this. The churches in Thessalonica do this. All of the churches do this. There's no argument here.

We have no other custom than that our ladies understand that their KO hair, their uncut hair is given them for a covering. And then he does say this in the very same epistle that we just were reading from. If any man thinks himself to be a prophet or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things that I write unto you where in first Corinthians are the commandments of the Lord, including what he wrote in chapter 11. Now, let's go back to our very last scripture and we'll get you headed toward your break. which is going to be lovely because you don't need to listen to Woodward Drone for a few minutes.

1 Corinthians 11:10. For this cause ought the woman to have power on her head because of the angels. This concept again like so many apostolic biblical truths had been has been maligned, misunderstood and viciously mocked online that robs it of none of its power. Those people don't have the perspective that some of us have. I've traveled around the apostolic movement, including overseas, and in any church where this is practiced in honor to God.

There's an unmistakable dimension of power because God promised it would be there. For this cause ought the woman to have power on her head because of the angels. There are two major words for power in the New Testament. There is dunamis. This is doing power.

You shall receive power after the Holy Ghost is come upon you and you will do something. You will become witnesses. You shall be witnesses unto me. So that's doing power. the gifts of the spirit operate out of dunamis power.

It is power to do things that you can't do in your own flesh. But there's a second kind of power. Another major word for power in the New Testament. It is exusia. And exusia is what I would call restraining power.

Restraining power. Jesus is the greatest example by far of exusia power. He said I have the power exusia to lay my life down and I have the power to take it back up again. Jesus said to his disciples, "When I am hanging on the cross and every fiber, tendon, muscle, bone of my body is crying out in agony, I have the restraining power to stay on the cross until the work of redemption is finished. And I have the power to restrain the hold of the grave and come up out of the grave.

I have the power to take my life back up again." That's restraining power. It's not wimpy power or weak power. It's strong power. And in relation to you and me, it is the power, the restraining power over our flesh. You already have the power to do a lot of things that will get you in trouble.

But restraining power keeps you. The gifts of the spirit grow out of this kind of power. They restrain the works of the flesh and they allow the gifts of the spirit to grow in our lives. I'm not making a doctrine of this, but I'll give you my opinion. When men live out their holiness standards, which are primarily standards of action, it brings much, if not most, of the dunamis power, the doing power to the body of Christ.

But when our godly women live out their holiness standards, which are standards mostly of appearance, it brings much, if not most, of the exusia power to the church. The old statement is true. The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world. Our godly moms and grandmas, they have so much impact over the next generation of apostolic young people. And they do that through something God gave them for this cause.

But the woman to have power on her head because of the angels. You see, the fallen angels and the holy angels were both there at creation. They both know what rebellion is. They both know what submission is. They both know what God's will is.

And they both know what covering is. And so when a godly apostolic woman walks into a room like this, willingly and cheerfully marked in her own body by her covenant of submission through what she does with her hair. The Bible says there is exusia. There is restraining power on her head because of the angels. The holy angels recognize that power and they are attracted to it.

And the fallen angels recognize that power and they are repelled by it. All of our godly apostolic ladies, you do something for this great church around the world that all these great men with all their biceps, they can't even touch it. You have restraining power on your head. When you walk in the room, before you've sung a song, joined the praise team, played an instrument, given an exertation, got up and given a testimony, before you've done any of that, the angels recognize your presence. Why?

because of your follicles of your hair. That's the mockery that's online. It's not magic hair. Grow up. It is a covenant of willing, cheerful submission to God's order of creation.

And when the angels see it, they recognize it. An angelic activity surrounds that. It's unmistakable. It is a posture of restraint. Ladies, you have restraining power on your head.

And the posture of restraint. There are many word pictures in scripture. there are word pictures in modern language. I favor this one, I think, a little bit. You know, I travel down south.

I'm headed from here to Mississippi in the morning. down there, they don't have a sweet clue about this word. If I say blizzard, they all head to Dairy Queen. I live in New Brunswick, Canada. If I say blizzard, I mean backbreaking, snow shoveling work.

That's what I mean. My word picture is different. There's a word picture here. exousia is a picture of a godly apostolic woman willingly and cheerfully marked in her own body by her covenant of submission through what she does with her hair. She has komao hair, uncut hair that is allowed to grow to the glory of God.

When she walks into the room, she carries restraining power. It's a picture of a godly woman like this. No, that's your posture, devil. You can't have my husband. You can't have my children.

You can't touch my grandkids. Get away from my pastor. Get out of my church. Get out of my Bible study. Get out of my living room.

Get out of my home. Get out of my prayer group. She carries in her a posture of restraint. And ladies, I honor you today. Now, if you haven't understood this and you've never even done this, I'm not here to condemn you or criticize you.

In fact, I would say this to you that the moment it's not about length, it's about komao. The moment you decide, I'm gonna honor God with this covenant, your hair is komao. If you don't cut it, it's komao hair. You can make that covenant in an instant. It doesn't take years and you don't have to achieve a certain length.

It's about a covenant of separation unto God. And I stand here and I will conclude right here and we will shorten the next session so we don't belabor you to death today. But I just want to say that ladies, I stand here representing our apostolic movement. And I say as one of our hundreds and thousands of ministers, we thank God for you and the power that you bring to our families, to our churches, to our prayer meetings, and to our worship services. I've been in the alternate.

It's not even close to the same. But I've been in this in different nations all around the world. It is unmistakable. So, we'll close with prayer right now. I'd like all of our ladies to stand.

If you would, whether you do this or don't do this or understand this or don't understand. That's not I'd like all of our ladies to stand. And I'd like you to lift your hands. And now, I'd like you to lift that feminine voice. It's an octave or two higher than your husband's voice.

I'd like you to lift that beautiful feminine voice, but not in this gentle little thing. I'd like you to lift it and take authority like you're shouting to your child who's about ready to run out into a busy street. That kind of authority. You have power on your head. When you pray over your husband, hell knows about it.

When you pray over your children, hell knows about it. But not only that, heaven knows about it. Heaven recognizes it. And heaven honors your covenant of submission. Now, I'd like all you men to join us because the Bible says, "I would that men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands without wrath and doubting." When we are together in this, male and female, brother and sister, husband and wife, WHEN WE'RE TOGETHER, THERE'S NO STOPPING THIS KIND OF ANOINTING and power.

AND MUCH OF IT COMES FROM HOLINESS. Oh yaha. If you're standing beside your husband, lady, I'd like you to reach over, put your hand on him. I know that might feel a little strange. I want you to PUT YOUR HAND ON HIM AND PRAY OVER HIM.

Pray a prayer of protection over him. You have restraining power on your head. It's because of the angels. I NEED SOMEBODY TO LIFT UP YOUR VOICE AND PRAY IN the Holy Ghost right now. You're apostolic.

Pray in tongues. HOLINESS IS NOT BONDAGE. HOLINESS IS NOT be burden. Oh, WORSHIP THE LORD IN THE BEAUTY OF HOLINESS. HOLINESS IS BEAUTIFUL AND IT'S POWERFUL.

>> YES. YES. YES. YES. >> YES.

YES. YES. YES. YES. YES.

YES. YES. Brother [[Vaskski]], come and give them any instructions they need for break. Oh my goodness. The power of God is in this room right now.

Oh, clap your hands all ye people and shout unto God. Use your voice. Shout unto God with a voice of triumph.