Clothe Yourselves

Series: The Well-Dressed Christian Woman

Leslie Basham: Think about your favorite outfit. How do you look in it? What messages do you send when you wear it? Who do you hope will notice you when you wear it? Scripture provides us with a list of several important things for us to wear on our hearts. If we wear these garments, we send a message of who God is in our lives.

This is Revive Our Hearts, with Nancy Leigh DeMoss. It's Friday, February 6.

We're studying "The Well-Dressed Christian Woman" this week. Yesterday, we learned about the spiritual garments God wants to clothe us with. Today, Nancy will help us to study the articles of spiritual clothing that the well-dressed Christian woman has put on. Here's Nancy.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss: I remember going to a conference one day and a huge gathering of people, and I went and sat in my seat and looked down at my feet and realized that I had one navy shoe on and one black shoe on. They were the same style of shoes; I'd reached in my closet and pulled out one of the black ones and one of the navy ones. And I was mortified! I mean I was just so embarrassed that I was sure that all of those hundreds of people were going to be looking at my feet.

I'm sure, really, no one was going to notice; but I just felt so uncomfortable and so improperly dressed. And you've probably had that or something like that happen to you, where you go out and you find that, "I didn't get dressed properly."

We're talking about the well-dressed Christian woman. Not what we wear outwardly so much as the items that God wants us to be clothed with in our hearts--our spiritual wardrobe.

We talked yesterday about how God wants to clothe us with certain items--how God clothes us with the garment of salvation and the robe of righteousness and praise and gladness and honor. But when we come to the New Testament, we find that there are some things we're supposed to clothe ourselves with.

Now, it's one thing for you to be dressing your 18-month-old child. Nothing wrong with that, but it would be sad if that child turned 18 years old and still couldn't dress herself. And you know, some of us are 18 years old spiritually and have never learned to dress ourselves spiritually.

So, I want to talk today about some of the items of clothing that the New Testament talks about that are important for us to put on. I want to just share with you, I'm sure there are others, but several items that we need to make sure we are clothing ourselves with, and just as I want to be careful not to leave my house with one navy shoe and one black shoe on, I also want to be careful not to leave my house without making sure that I have put on these articles of clothing.

In fact, these are articles of clothing you want to make sure you put on, even if you're not leaving your house in the morning. In fact, that's one of the most important places we need to have these articles of clothing, is when we're with the people who know us the best.

The first article of clothing that we're to put on is humility. 1 Peter 5:5 says, "Clothe yourself, all of you, with humility toward one another. For God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble."

That word, "humility" comes from a Greek word that means lowliness of mind. It has to do with the way that you think about yourself and, therefore, the way that you think about others. And all of that is the fruit of the way we think about God.

If we think about God as great, then we're going to realize that we are small. And lowliness of mind, humility, is esteeming ourselves to be little.

Now, we don't like that way of thinking today or talking, when so much of the emphasis is on having good self-esteem. But, you know, I think most of us, our problem is that we've got too much self-esteem. We think highly of ourselves and God wants us to have a proper estimation of ourselves, to see ourselves as we really are and to see our sin as it really is and then to have a sense of absolute dependence upon God--the fact that apart from Him, we have nothing, we are nothing, we can do nothing.

You see, when we put on humility toward one another that means we're going to lift up others. We're going to think highly of them. We're going to esteem all others as better than ourselves. Do you esteem your husband more highly than you esteem yourself?

Now, your husband may not be a believer; he may not be walking with God but if you're clothed with humility, you will lift him up, you will reverence him, you will esteem him highly. The same is true with your children and others. So, we're to put on humility.

Secondly, we're to put on the inner beauty of a meek and a quiet spirit. The inner beauty of a meek and a quiet spirit. 1 Peter 3:4, "Let your adorning" your ornamentation, your jewelry, "be the hidden person of the heart, with the imperishable beauty of a gentle" or a meek "and quiet spirit, which is in God's sight, very precious."

This is what causes God to look at a woman and say, "She's beautiful!" It's that inner beauty of a meek and a quiet spirit. And, really, when we talk about meekness, we're talking about putting on the Spirit of Christ. Because He said, "I am meek and lowly in heart."

I was reading this morning from Vine's Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words which, by the way, is a very helpful tool for Bible study. And here's what that author has to say about what meekness is.

"It is that temper or spirit in which we accept God's dealings with us as good and, therefore, without disputing or resisting. This word is closely related to humility. It's only the humble heart which is also meek and which, as such, does not fight against God or struggle or contend with Him.

"This meekness is first of all a meekness before God but it's also such in the faith of men, even of evil men, out of a sense that these men, with the insults and injuries which they may inflict are permitted and employed by God for the chastening and the purifying of His elect, that people who hurt us or harm us in some way that they wrong us, that even these are instruments in the hand of God."

So I can receive God's dealings with me with a spirit of meekness, and I can even receive the wrongs that may be inflicted on me by others with a spirit of meekness. Now, it's not weakness but it's the fruit of power, the power of the Holy Spirit within us.

Have you put on meekness and a quiet spirit? And then, there's another piece of clothing we're to put on and that is authority. That is, we're to be under authority, the God-ordained authority that He has placed in our lives. In fact, I like to think of this as the Christian woman's hat.

Sometimes, we get asked questions about head coverings. And 1 Corinthians 11 is a passage that talks about women wearing head coverings. Now, I'm not going to address that subject on this program, but it is clear in that passage that the one head covering a woman must have, must wear, is being in submission to the authorities that God has placed in her life.

If you are a married woman, you are to be under the spiritual covering and protection of your husband and to have it be clear to others that you are under his authority, that you are not operating independently of your husband.

And even as single women, I find it so important to make sure that we're under the spiritual counsel and influence of godly men. And I sometimes will go to the men in our ministry and say, "Would you pray for me? I need the spiritual covering of your leadership. Would you give me counsel about this decision that I'm needing to make?"

And then, we see in Ephesians 6 something else that we're to put on and that is the whole armor of God. And so, Paul says, "Finally, be strong in the Lord, and in the strength of His might. Put on the whole armor of God so that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil."

Ladies, think about your, what goes on inside your home, in your workplace, in your church. We're in a spiritual battle. And if you're not clothed with the armor of God, you're going to end up defeated, overwhelmed, distraught, destroyed. Your life is going to be falling apart and attacked by the evil one, if you're not putting on the whole armor of God.

And then, also in the Book of Ephesians, we read that we're to put on a new self. Now, let me read the passage. Ephesians 4:22, says first there's something we're supposed to put off. We're supposed to put off the old self and to put that off because that belongs to my former manner of life and it's corrupt through deceitful desires.

And instead, verse 24; I'm to put on the new self, the new person. If any person is in Christ, he's a new creature. I'm to put on a whole new way of thinking and living--it's Christ's way--to be conscious that if you're a child of God, you're not the same person you were, you're a new person and be new in all you think and do.

And then, we come to a whole collection of items of clothing that we find in Colossians 3. "Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves" now listen to this list. "Clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience." He says, bear with each other, forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another, forgive as the Lord forgave you and over all these virtues, put on love.

You know, everything we do down here on earth is really just a dress rehearsal, where we are to practice putting on that which we will wear for eternity in heaven. Preparation for heaven is what this life is all about.

So, we come to the last book of the Bible, Revelation 19 [:7] and the Scripture says, "Let us rejoice and be glad, and give Him glory for the wedding of the Lamb has come, and His bride has made herself ready. Fine linen, bright and clean, was given her to wear."

Are you ready for that wedding? Are you a well-dressed Christian woman? I want to challenge you, before you leave your house in the morning, take this list and put on these items of clothing.

Put on humility and meekness and a quiet spirit and put on submission to authority as your head covering and put on the whole armor of God. Put on that new self and put on love.

And when you put all that on, do you know what you're really doing? You're putting on Christ. For the Scripture says to put on the Lord Jesus Christ (Romans 13:14). Be clothed in Him and you can know that you will be a well-dressed, a really well-dressed Christian woman.

Leslie Basham: Nancy Leigh DeMoss has been helping us understand what spiritual garments Scripture says we're to wear as Christian women. Nancy read a verse today from Colossians that lists articles of spiritual clothing.

We'd like to offer you a beautiful decorative ceramic magnet with this verse on it that you can use as a daily reminder of what a well-dressed Christian woman should wear. Give us a call at 1-800-569-5959 and ask for the Colossians 3:12 magnet. Or visit us on-line at ReviveOurHearts.com.

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Next week, Nancy will look to the Book of Proverbs and present a comparison of a wise woman with a foolish woman. We hope you can be here for Revive Our Hearts.

Revive Our Hearts with Nancy Leigh DeMoss is a ministry partnership of Life Action Ministry.

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