Quote:
Originally Posted by good samaritan
Any sin was considered and abomination to God. Some sins such as dietary laws was mostly mentioned to be and abomination to us, but the act of breaking those laws made them an abomination to God. Certain animals weren't an abomination to God, but the act of disobedience was what made it an abomination.
I personally believe we must rightly divide the word of God to discern what is a timeless principle and what is a ceremonial law specific to Israel. In the subject of De. 22:5 I do believe that it was in regards to cross dressing. The intent of the person has little to with the act of cross dressing. If you put on an article of clothing that is distinctively identified to the opposite gender then it is crossdressing regardless of the motivation.
Most men would be ashamed to walk out in public wearing a dress. Why? Dresses are culturally a woman's garment. If we are honest we will agree to that fact. Even our children would not want anyone to know about the silly things that kids do: put on their mothers high heals and the like. It is nature that we don't want our gender confused. I used to get mad at people when I was boy who mistakened my voice for a ladies over the phnoe. why? It is nature.
The grey area in regards to ladies wearing pants is the fact that the majority of culture no longer identifies pants as male only. Although, I 100% believe that the change that has gotten us where we are today has been immoral and a abomination to God. The big question is where do we go from here?
I think that cross dressing is a timeless violation of what is right in the eyes of God. The complication is that I don't see where the Bible prescribes exact male and female clothing. Clothing has be shaped by culture, climate, resources,etc. Whereas, clothing may be cultural, the roles of male and female are not. We have seen pants on women come into fashion during a time of gender equality that says, "if the men can do it so can we". I think this is a red flag.
We must first get the inward part clean before we can straighten the outward part. Get people back in line with God on male and female roles and then I wonder how they we feel about this pants issue. Crossdressing seems to be a timeless abomination to God, but what is gray to me is if pants are viewed by God as male only. Although my family practices a traditional pants on men and dresses on women, I am not 100% sure. Because of this I choose to teach the reasons why our family dresses the way we do, but we also allow people to decide for themselves without judging them.
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I think this is wise. At FPC Palm Bay (my current church), outward standards are taught but not enforced with the exception of being involved in a ministry. So you can come to church and warm a pew till the Lord comes, but if you want to teach Sunday School, or be in the Choir you abide by the church standards.
I originally came from a church where standards were a heaven/hell issue, and when the church dropped the standards I did also for a time. I have two memories that I want to share even though I'm not sure how relevant they are but here goes:
first memory was years ago on bus ministry in the projects, walking through a group of men with my long skirt and hair and having them nod to me and hide their bottles of booze in the bushes out of respect, knowing who I was because of how I was dressed.
Second memory, many years later, wearing a pair of pants to work and passing by one of the cafeteria workers who commented "I would so do that." I can't tell you how ashamed I still feel even at the thought of it. Of course that is more a modesty issue then a cross dressing issue, but still.
Yeah, that was pretty much the last time I wore a pair of pants