Seducing your husband...(1 Peter 1:3-4)
“Your adornment must not be {merely} external--braiding the hair, and wearing gold jewelry, or putting on dresses; but {let it be} the hidden person of the heart, with the imperishable quality of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is precious in the sight of God.”We started off with the men, with the husband commanded to love his wife as Christ loves the church. That in order to do this, he must become her savior, sanctifier and satisfier. We then started in on the role of the wife, which is to respect her husband. And the first way was to submit to his headship.
One day a woman was trying to get her mule to move. But her mule was stubborn and ornery. So, she went into the barn, found a 2x4, came out and…BAM…hit the mule upside the head. The mule fell over, shook its head, and staggered back to its feet and then begin to follow the woman. Her daughter, who had watched all of this, asked her mom “Why did you hit the mule upside its head?” She said, “because you have to sometimes do something to get its attention.
Men are often stubborn, mule-headed, ornery, lazy, babies-instead-of-men. But God has given every woman a 2x4, one that most women are unwilling to use. It is called respect.
God has said that a wife’s role in the marriage is to hold her husband in high esteem. That does not mean agreeing with him. That does not mean she becomes a subordinate, meaning less than…no more than Christ was less than God. What it does mean is a functional term, in order to fulfill a program, which requires a willingness to yield to your husband’s headship. It is a recognition that God Himself has placed your husband as the head of the home. And your submission of his position…even if you are smarter, more educated, have more common sense…it is a 2x4 that God has given you that if swung hard enough and consistent enough, will get the mule moving. That is why He states that even if they are not obeying the Word, when they observe your chaste and respectful behavior, they can be won.
We are now going to continue on by discussing the second role…which is wives seducing their husbands. Now before you guys get too excited out there…
God wants you wives to be seductive for your husbands, but in a Christian sort of way. That is what verses 3-4 are about above. It says that respect for your husband is seductive.
He uses the word adornment. Let’s look at that word for a minute. The word used in the Bible comes from a Greek word pronounced cosmos. This word is also used in the NT as the word “world.” We get the English word from this “cosmetic.” The word literally means “to arrange or organize.” When the Bible talks about the world, it is talking about how Satan arranges things to leave God out… to forget God.
Knowing how women are normally oriented to how they look, Peter uses this to express how she should relate to her husband, how she adorns herself. So, ladies, when he talks about adornment, he is talking about how a woman makes herself attractive. He says that even if your husband isn’t all he ought to be, he wants to raise a question about how attractive you are.
You see, the reason he raises this question is twofold. First, women are into how they look. And secondly, men are into how they look. Men are seduced by what they see. Men don’t necessarily have to feel it, they just need to see it. That’s why your husband spends more time in your Victoria Secret catalog than you do. Because men are seduced by what they see. That’s why pornography is such a major problem, why the internet is such a problem with men. Because men are seduced by what they see. Men don’t need to feel it, they just need to see it.
Women are oriented toward how they look. They carry their compact cases, the tools to look good all of the time. They do this because it is important to them, and because this is what men see. He says that I want you to look a certain way, particularly to your husband. He wants you to look a a certain way for your husband, to be adorned a certain way for him.
He says that your respect for your husband is your compact case…carry it with you. Because it keeps you looking good.
Does anyone know the difference between a rebellious, unsubmissive, disrespectful wife and a pitbull? Lipstick! (joke…it is just a joke…don’t shoot me and no virtual 2x4s please!!)
He says I do want you to adorn yourself, to look and be arranged and ordered…to have your hair in place, jewelry in place…but He also wants you to adorn yourself with that which has deeper value.
Stores advertise their products in the windows using mannequins. Lifeless replicas. But recently, some stores have moved to live models in the window. They will stand there motionless, wearing the store’s fashions. Sometimes, the only way to tell they are real women is that they blink.
Many people will come by and knock on the window, or make faces, in order to get her to move. But she had something more important in sight that kept her motionless…it was in pleasing her employer.
Ladies, for you to live this life that God has ordained, you are going to have to ignore the folks on the other side of the glass. What the Bible talks about will go against what many of your friends will say, will go against what much you will read in popular magazines, will go against what you see on TV. But you aren’t here to please the onlookers…you are here to please the Lord.
So God wants you adorned, He wants you arranged, He wants you looking good. He wants you seductive, if you will, in the sense of attention getting. But, what is the content of this adornment, this look?
Verse 3 says “our adornment must not be {merely} external--braiding the hair, and wearing gold jewelry, or putting on dresses;” Please note, He is saying “I want you adorned in two ways, not just one.” When you get dressed, you try to look your best. God applauds that. But He is saying don’t let it just be how you look on the outside. He is not criticizing how you look on the outside. He is saying that if you can make yourself look good for your boss, you should definitely be making yourself look good for your husband. If you can look good for men you don’t know, you should be looking good for men you do know…mainly the man God has given you as your mate. The woman in Proverbs 31 is a beautiful woman. We are told how she dresses, how beautiful she is.
God does, however, want your beauty to be tempered by modesty. 1st Timothy 2:9 says: “Likewise, {I want} women to adorn themselves with proper clothing, modestly and discreetly, not with braided hair and gold or pearls or costly garments…” He says look beautiful, but don’t leave modesty. What do we mean by modesty? Immodesty is when something is “too.” It is when something is too low, too high, or too tight. If it is too low, too tight, or too high…suggesting an intent to seduce… The reason it says this in 1st Timothy is because that women should watch how they dress at church because in prayer, the people should not miss God in the prayer. But this also applies outside of the church.
He says “not merely external…” You ladies need to understand that a lot of your beauty is store bought. I don’t care how pretty you are, it is store bought. If you took off the make-up, if you threw away the curling iron, if you didn’t wear the clothes that you normally wear…most of you wouldn’t look like you do now…we might not even recognize you. That’s why you ladies say “I have to go put on a face” … because the one you have is not your own. It’s store bought. The jewelry you wear that everyone compliments you on, that hairdo you got at the beautician…it’s all store bought.
Now God isn’t saying there is anything wrong with that. This isn’t a criticism of that. But He is saying that you have to understand…that’s not you. You are looking good and a girlfriend says “Girl, that’s you.” No it’s not. That’s Neiman Marcus, that’s Nordstroms, that’s Bloomingdales. That’s not you.
So, He says not to get enamored by this external beauty. Don’t think because you have all of these things that can make you stunning, that that is the sum total of the beauty of you. That is just one side. He wants to give you the rest of the story.
1st Peter 3:4: “But let it be the hidden person of the heart, with an imperishable quality of a gentle and quiet spirit.” God wants to know are you as pretty on the inside as you are trying to be on the outside. He wants to know that your internal beauty is taking precedence over your external beauty. That He compliment you on how you look on the inside, like you are trying to get compliments from others on how you look on the outside.
The external fools you. It can give the impression that how you look is how you are. That just because people say you are pretty, it can make you think you are pretty. Why? Because external beauty is not being supported by internal beauty…or the hidden person of the heart.
He is talking in this passage on how you look to your husband. He says that your husband ought to see your respectful behavior. And so, if you dishonor him…I’m not talking about disagreeing with him…if you dishonor him, then that shows an ugly attire, it is showing poor adornment…it is showing a poor style. It means that you are not properly attired. What people see must also be supported by who you are. That’s why He calls it the hidden person of the heart…the person not readily observable.
What is God is concerned about is that you are as pretty on the inside as you try to be thru all of your efforts on the outside. He calls it the inner person of the heart…the inner man…the core of you. Don’t tell me when you look good on the outside, but your every word to your husband cuts, you pick up the phone and run him down to your girlfriends…where you do not seek to embellish him in front of your children…don’t tell me that you look good before God when you look ugly before your husband and about him.
How do you get pretty on the inside? There’s only one way, and that is to be transformed by His glory. In other words you have to be a woman of God, you have to be in hot pursuit of God. And He will give you a gentle and quiet spirit. That doesn’t mean you don’t talk…it has to do with how you talk. It isn’t talking about the times when you get frustrated 9everyone gets frustrated). What I am talking about is your overall demeanor. Your overall demeanor should be kindness. It says about the woman in Proverbs 31 that kindness is under her tongue. I am sure she got upset and frustrated, I’m sure she had bad days, PMS days. I’m sure she went thru menopause. These are facts of life. But it says that when you look at her overall demeanor, kindness was under her tongue.
When is the last time you said something kind to your husband? That it wasn’t smart aleck, it wasn’t a put down? When was the last time you used a meek spirit, a gentle spirit…not a tearing down, demasculating one?
God wants the woman that even though you are getting older, or wrinkles are starting to show, or you are putting on a few pounds…because of God’s glory on the inside, you are getting prettier all the time. You ladies know what I am talking about. We all know that average looking lady at church who has that almost mystical beauty to her, something radiating from her that takes her ordinary external look and makes her into something beautiful.
Look at how much time you spend on your look. You make an investment. The Bible has a term for this. It calls this a woman’s glory. It says that a woman’s hair is her glory, and isn’t that so? It is when you step out and gone thru all of the time and energy to look glorious.
A lot of guys out there are married to women like my wife. When we have to go somewhere at 7pm, at 6pm…she goeth before the mirror of her glory. She goes to work. She pulls out eye highlighter, and curling iron, and make up, and stuff I cant pronounce…and in an hour is transformed before my very eyes. Then she heads out to the car, and checks the glory that she just put on.
If you have a woman like that, men, and she seeks to be glorious…the Bible says that the woman is the glory of the man…so go ahead baby, make me look good!!
Now, you wives are saying: “Okay, I’ve got it. I am supposed to be respectful to my husband. I’m supposed to be intimate with God so He can give me that respect that I don’t have. I am to lay myself before God and ask God to help me with all of this…to help me become what I am not. But you do not understand…he irks me. He gets on my last nerve.”
That’s why the last line is so important. He says because it is precious in His sight. We would probably be tempted to disregard that statement, but it is probably the most important phrase we have gone over.
He says for you to look like this on the inside, to make it a goal…just like you spend time looking good on the outside…if you take the time to invest in God’s presence or sight (sight means face-to-face)…where you are looking at the face of God…the Bible says in 2nd Corinthians 3, that when you look long enough at the face of God, you will be transformed by His glory. His glory begins to make you up…you get your own private make-up artist. Like the movie stars that get made up, God becomes your own private make-up artist and He calls the making-you-up-on-the-inside as precious. This is the word used for the woman who brought Jesus the alabaster box. It says it was priceless…precious.
Not what makes something priceless, precious? Simple. Because it is rare. The rarer it is, the more valuable. Stuff that is every where is a dime-a-dozen. Stuff you only can find in certain places has more value. God says the woman He is talking about is hard to find. You can find pretty women on the outside all day long!! Because you can buy that. But He says this woman I am talking about is rare. The Bible says about the proverbs 31 woman “an excellent woman who can find, for her price is far above rubies.”
You single ladies, you have to understand your value. You are not a piece of meat. You are not something to be used and discarded…you have more value than that. You are not here to be used by men that have no respect for you. If they don’t have respect for you…you have respect for yourself. They can’t talk to you anyway…they can’t touch you in any way. Why? Because I am precious in His sight! I’m one of those rare kind of women.
It is precious. In other words, God pays attention to this kind of woman…God works on behalf of this kind of woman. Women who just look good on the outside…all the men go crazy over them. But God goes crazy over this lady.
Like the lady who broke the alabaster box…everyone else was wondering why she was getting all of this attention from Jesus. Simple…she was rare. Unique. Different. Not like the rest.
God hates external beauty not supported by internal beauty. He hates external beauty on top of internal ugly. In Isaiah Chapter 3:16, God says to the pretty women:
Isa 3:16 Moreover, the LORD said, "Because the daughters of Zion are proud And walk with heads held high and seductive eyes, And go along with mincing steps And tinkle the bangles on their feet,
Isa 3:17 Therefore the Lord will afflict the scalp of the daughters of Zion with scabs, And the LORD will make their foreheads bare."
Isa 3:18 In that day the Lord will take away the beauty of {their} anklets, headbands, crescent ornaments,
Isa 3:19 dangling earrings, bracelets, veils,
Isa 3:20 headdresses, ankle chains, sashes, perfume boxes, amulets,
Isa 3:21 finger rings, nose rings,
Isa 3:22 festal robes, outer tunics, cloaks, money purses,
Isa 3:23 hand mirrors, undergarments, turbans and veils.
Isa 3:24 Now it will come about that instead of sweet perfume there will be putrefaction; Instead of a belt, a rope; Instead of well-set hair, a plucked-out scalp; Instead of fine clothes, a donning of sackcloth; And branding instead of beauty.
You know what God is saying here? He is going to make your outsides look like your insides. Because your heart is not for Him. You only get adorned for yourself and for the attraction you bring your way. You do not spend the time to look good to Me.
God says that when you become this kind of woman on the inside (the one we are talking about), it will be rare and precious…and He will get out His make-up kit…and He will start polishing you off. And then He is going to do a number on your husband…He’s gonna say “Hokus-pokus.” He’s going to hypnotize him, so that he’s not thinking like he used to think or seeing like he used to see.
You’ve been trying to change your husband for years and it hasn’t changed anything…how about giving God a shot. By becoming a woman who’s inner beauty is so rare to God, it’s so seductive to God, it’s so attention getting to God, that God works on your husband for you. You have been trying to change him without becoming the inner woman that God wants you to be…and then you wonder why he’s not changing.
Maybe you aren’t rare enough yet. Maybe you are just like the run-of-the-mill. Your external beauty may have gotten him…but it is your internal beauty that will change him. Your external beauty may have gotten him because men respond to what they see. It played a part. But it is your internal beauty that will change him.
Now you might be saying “My husband wont see that internal beauty.” He wont have to…because it is precious in the sight of God. God will see you…and then God will do what you can’t. God will work where you can’t.
Now this might take some time. Now I am not talking about someone that is beating his wife or anything like that. I am talking about a husband that just isn’t up to snuff…isn’t doing what we told the men to do early on in this series (savior, sanctifier, satisfier). Yes, he does have a responsibility. Yes, it would be easier if he did his part and led the way. But that does not exonerate you because He says that even if he is without the Word, you will be precious in the sight of God.
That’s why He says in the beginning of verse one…”in the same way.” In the same way connects you to the verses in chapter 2:21-25, which states:
1Pe 2:21 For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps,
1Pe 2:22 WHO COMMITTED NO SIN, NOR WAS ANY DECEIT FOUND IN HIS MOUTH;
1Pe 2:23 and while being reviled, He did not revile in return; while suffering, He uttered no threats, but kept entrusting {Himself} to Him who judges righteously;
1Pe 2:24 and He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed.
1Pe 2:25 For you were continually straying like sheep, but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Guardian of your souls.
Just like Jesus had to trust God in a bad situation, ladies…you are going to have to trust God in a bad situation. Not by paying back with your tongue. Not by paying back with your lips. Not by using your position to disregard him. But by your respectful, honoring behavior you will get God’s attention even if you don’t think you are getting your husband’s.
May God raise up a crop of women that look good in and out for His glory!!
