I'd like you to take the Word of God, please, and turn with me to the very first book in the Bible, the very first chapter, in the beginning, in Genesis chapter 1, and one verse we'll mark together, Genesis chapter 1 and verse 27. So this is chapter 1 and verse 27. I will speak to the subject of modesty and identity. Modesty and identity. The Bible says in Genesis chapter 1 and verse 27, so God created man in his own image. In the image of God created he him. Male and female created he them. Notice carefully the Bible says male and female. Male and female created he them. Modesty and identity. Not just modesty, but modesty and identity. Now I want you to turn with me in the New Testament if you would please. to the book of 1 Timothy chapter 2, and 1 Timothy chapter 2, we'll begin reading with verse 1. The Bible says, I exhort, therefore, that first of all supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men, for kings and for all that are in authority, that we may lead a quiet and peaceful life in all godliness and honesty. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior. who will have all men to be saved and come unto the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself a ransom for all to be testified in due time. Whereunto I am ordained a preacher, an apostle, I speak the truth in Christ and lie not, a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and verity. I will therefore that men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands without wrath and doubting. In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobriety, not with broided hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array, but which becometh women professing godliness with good works." Notice, please, if you're in the habit of marking things in your Bible, I want you to mark this expression, modest apparel. In verse 9, modest apparel. We talk about modesty and identity. Modesty and identity. I've written a definition for modesty in the margin of my Bible. I'd like to encourage you to do the same thing. Modesty is defined as behaving according to a standard of what is proper or decent and pure. Behaving according to a standard of what is proper or decent and pure. Especially not displaying one's body. Especially not displaying one's body. Behavior according to a standard of what is proper or decent and pure. Especially not displaying one's body. There's a whole idea of order here. That God has an order in things. Everything must be done decently and in order. Everything to be done decently and in order. I have a young lady seated here who is dressed modestly, whose hair looks like a lady. Modesty. I have a young man sitting here who is dressed like a young man, whose hair is cut like a young man. Identity. There's no question when we look at this person that this is a lady and no question when we look at this person, this is a man. There's modesty and identity. The Bible says that God created man, male and female. and that we are to behave ourselves in a certain fashion and to be clothed in modest apparel. I don't know if you're familiar with the name of Bork, but there was a man who was recommended to be a Supreme Court judge. He went through the hearings and did not pass the congressional hearings, and so his Supreme Court appointment was denied. And I understand he's a decent man, a God-fearing man. He's written a book called Slouching Toward Sodom, Slouching Toward Sodom. It's a book about the decline in America and our moving to the left and the moral decay, the loss of values, no fixed point of reference, all the kind of things you'd imagine you'd find in a book that's titled Slouching Toward Sodom. One chapter in that book is on the radical feminist movement. Now that's not women's rights, it's the radical feminist movement. And that's the whole idea that women do not need men. that you can have an autonomous woman, like the court case recently in Vermont, where two women had a baby. Of course, one of them had to provide the egg and have artificial assimilation take place, and then that egg from her body was planted in the other woman's body, and so now they've judged that both of them are parents, so both of them are mothers. And a whole different kind of idea. They said, we don't need a man. We don't, we can do this thing ourselves. We, we have the autonomous woman, girl power. And so in his book, in a chapter on the radical feminist movement, he says the feminists have redefined the sexes. They now do not talk about male and female sexes, but we're being taught in our public education systems and sex education courses that there are five genders. You may well remember what they say these are. You're either male, female, bisexual, homosexual, or lesbian. You're one of those genders. Or you may claim to be a woman, or you may claim to be a man, you may be male or female, but you have a gender preference. And sadly, in sex education programs at the elementary level, they're targeting the age of children that prefer the same sex playmates. For example, all of us who work with children and know anything about child development, understand that there's a time in the life of a child when boys hate girls. There's a time in the life of a child when girls hate boys. And you give them competition and you let all the girls compete against the boys and they will do everything they can to beat the boys. I mean, we've got to do everything we can to beat the boys. We've got to beat the boys because we want to be with the girls. It's girls, girls, girls. That's a certain elementary age. And then there's a time when the boys want to gang up against the girls because they hate the girls. And they just want to beat the girls. They like to beat the girls. And then suddenly something happens. They don't want to fight against them anymore. And they start noticing the girls. The other day I saw one of the young boys who's grown up around here. His father works for us. He was in his dad's truck. And I've known him since he was born. And I know the age he was in when he was a girl hater. I mean, just a real girl hater. I mean, the boys against the girls. And so I thought I'd just do something cute. And I said he was driving his dad's truck. He's just a little guy driving his dad's truck just a short distance in the parking lot. And I said, hey, I didn't know you could do that. If you're old enough to do that, you're old enough to have a girlfriend. He said, yeah. I thought, uh-oh. He's gone from the girl hate stage to the girl like stage. But isn't it something that these people know, if they've studied child psychology enough to know, that there's a certain age where boys like the boys and girls like the girls, and they'll soon get out of it, but they're teaching these children at that age that they really have a gender preference, and the boys prefer boys, that means they're homosexuals, and the girls prefer girls, and that means they're lesbians. And believe it or not, they're sending these children home, telling their parents, little boys telling their parents, I'm a homosexual. And little girls going home, telling their mothers, I'm a lesbian. Now there are some people who have a problem with modesty. There are other people who have a problem with identity. There are people who do not dress the way they ought to dress. They do not dress in a modest way. They do not dress in an orderly way. They do not dress in a decent, pure way. They do not avoid lewdness. As a matter of fact, America is a nation that's undressing in public. Not long while I was on a plane with a man from Europe. And I just happened to sit down beside him. And of course, I'd made a promise to the Lord. I witnessed the folks on the plane do the best I can to try to win him to Christ. And as we started the conversation, I found out this is a government employee. He's visiting from Europe. He's employed by a European government. And he was visiting America. And so just to start the conversation, I said to him, what are your observations on our country? And here's a man who's not a Christian, who's a visitor to our land. And this is the first thing out of his mouth. Well, to tell you the truth, he said, I don't know what you do for a living either, but I will tell you, I've never seen as much nakedness as I've seen in this country. Now, here's a man from, from somewhere other than our country who makes an observation that we are living in a land where there's so much nakedness. And somebody said, well, I don't have that problem with modesty. I don't have that problem with lewdness. I don't have that problem with being indecent. Well, what about all this big push going on with identity? Young men should look like young men. They should dress like young men. They should behave like young men. Their hair should look like young men's hair. Their ears should not have earrings in them. They should not be adorned like women. Women should look like ladies. Their hair shouldn't be all removed and some butch kind of cut. So they say it's easier to take care of. That's nothing ladylike. The problem may not be, as they might say, modesty, but it is identity. So we must deal with modesty and identity. You must keep your identity and clothe yourself modestly. And that's God's way of protection in your life. Modesty and identity. These are issues that must be faced, especially this generation. As a matter of fact, One of the great issues facing this generation is this issue of identity. The line's broken down. Men being men, and the absence of manhood is so noticeable today that did you know that the number of children without a father in the home, when you consider all of conception in this country, every child conceived in this country, One-third of the children conceived will be aborted. One-third of the children conceived will be born out of wedlock. And one-third of the children conceived, only one-third will have a mother and father in the home. Something has happened to bandhood. It's the effeminizing of the man and then trying to make a role change in the life of a woman. Did you know that God will never give a lady any greater thing to do than to be a wife and a mother. Nothing greater. I read not long ago about the CEO of one of the bottling companies, one of the two major bottling companies in the world, beverage bottling companies in the world, happened to be a woman. And one day she walked out and said, I'm through, I'm finished with the whole thing. I found out that this career does not bring the satisfaction I thought it would bring. I'm going home, I'm trading my computer for a vacuum cleaner, I'm trading my office for a living room, and I'm going to have a family again. Now, there's someone who tried a way that was sold and pitched to her with a promise of satisfaction, who came to the top as far as her economic level could be, who rose to the very top of the whole thing, but said, in my heart, I'm not satisfied. Modesty and identity. I want us to just walk through the Word of God and look at some things. Currently be pleased to what the Bible says in the book of Leviticus, the 18th chapter. In Leviticus chapter 18. And we'll take this approach and go through the Bible this way so it's a little easier to follow. But I want you to recognize these things. You ought to be able to recognize when you see someone, you ought to be able to recognize someone in public when you see that person, to recognize if that person is a man or a woman. If there's a problem recognizing this person for their identity, in other words, you're driving down the road and you guys see some beautiful blonde in a car and you hurry up to try to get up beside her and then she turns around and she's got a beard, you know, there's something wrong with identity here. The hair said she's a woman. It betrayed her identity. You know, or you go out to a softball game. You see some slugger knocked the thing over the fence. And by the way, there's such an over emphasis on athletics with girls today and be careful here because there's a role reversal taking place. There's an identity problem here. So much of this, I wish I could read everything that I have found. to make some of these points, but there's a certain article that I found in U.S. News & World Report about how women are having knee damage so often in the sport of softball. And they've actually had so much of this, they've examined so many women and the physical makeup of their bodies, and they found that there is a degree in the slant of their body that's not in a man's body, which causes undue pressure on the knee in that kind of sport. And evidently there's something in their physiology, there's something about their physical makeup that was not designed for that particular sport. I think God is trying to tell us something. that there's an undue emphasis about girls being as good as boys and knocking the ball as far as a boy can knock a ball and throwing the ball as far as a boy can throw the ball and, you know, let's get an arm wrestling contest and I can beat any man. You know, the truth of the matter is there's something wrong here with modesty and identity. There's nothing on a lady more beautiful than to see her in a dress looking like a lady. And to be able to recognize wherever you see her, that is a lady. And there's nothing more becoming on a man than to see this man looks manly and to be able to recognize him as a man. The immodest person calls attention to the sexual zones of his or her body. And there are sexual zones in the body. We should not wear clothing that calls attention to the sexual zones in our body. That's immodest. It leads to a lewdness. It is not decent and pure. You may find a young lady who is dressed and even has a type of dress on, but what she has on calls attention to the sexual zones in her body. That's immodesty. But some folks say, well, I don't have a problem with immodesty. Well, wait a minute. What about the other crowd having a problem with identity? I want you to write some things down. Number one, there's a high, holy standard God has set for his people. There's a high, holy standard that God has set for his people. When you come to the book of Leviticus in the 18th chapter, you find what the Lord says about his people being identified as his people. And so identified so they can have a testimony and witness to other people. And he lays down certain things. standards, high, holy standards for his people. I'm going to take time to read a large portion of this chapter, beginning with verse 1, Leviticus chapter 18. The Bible says, And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speaking of the children of Israel, saying to them, I am the Lord your God. After the doings of the land of Egypt wherein you dwelt, shall ye not do? And after the doings of the land of Canaan, whither I bring you, shall you not do? Neither shall you walk in their ordinances. He shall do my judgments and keep my ordinance to walk therein. I am the Lord, your God. You shall therefore keep my statutes and my judgment, which the man do. He shall live in them. I am the Lord. None of you shall approach to any that is near akin to him to uncover their nakedness. I am the Lord. The nakedness of thy father or the nakedness of thy mother shalt thou not uncover. She is thy mother, and thou shalt not uncover her nakedness. The nakedness of thy father's wife shalt thou not uncover. It is thy father's nakedness. The nakedness of thy sister, the daughter of thy father or daughter of thy mother, with her she be born at home or born abroad, even their nakedness thou shalt not uncover. The nakedness of thy son's daughter, of thy daughter's daughter, even their nakedness thou shalt not uncover. For theirs is thine own nakedness. The nakedness of thy father's wife, begotten of thy father. She is thy sister. Thou shalt not uncover her nakedness. Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy father's sister. She is thy father's near kin's woman. Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy mother's sister. For she is my mother's near kinsman. Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy father's brother. Thou shalt not approach to his wife. She is thine aunt. Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy daughter-in-law. She is thy son's wife. Thou shalt not uncover her nakedness. Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy brother's wife. It is thy brother's nakedness. Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of a woman and her daughter. Neither shalt thou take her son's daughter or her daughter's daughter to uncover her nakedness for they are her near kin's woman. It is wickedness. Neither shall thou take a wife to her sister to vex her, to uncover her nakedness beside the other in her lifetime. Also thou shalt not approach under a woman to uncover her nakedness as long as she is put apart for uncleanness. Moreover, thou shalt not lie carnally with thy neighbor's wife to defile thyself with her. Thou shalt not let any of thy seed pass through the fire to mullet. Neither shalt thou Profane the name of my God. I am the Lord thou shalt not lie with mankind as with womankind. It is an abomination Neither shall thou lie with any beast to defile thyself therewith, neither shall any woman stand before a beast to lie down thereunto." It is confusion. Defile not yourselves, ye yourselves, in any of these things, for in all these the nations are defiled which I cast out before you. And the land is defiled, therefore I do visit the iniquity thereof upon it. And the land itself vomiteth out her inhabitants. In chapter 19 verse one, and the Lord spake unto Moses saying, speak into all the congregation of children of Israel and say unto them, ye shall be holy for the Lord your God am holy. A holy God demands a holy people. Now you think about that. God has a high, holy standard for his people. So here we are, we say, well, the world dress a certain way. I don't dress as badly as they dress. Our standard is not the world standard. Our standard is what God has said. We're the Christian people going to learn that we don't set a standard by what the world has drawn as a standard for themselves. Some people have the idea, if I just live a little better than they live, I'm living like a Christian ought to live. Wrong. Wrong. Notice how many times in the 18th chapter of Leviticus, God talks about nakedness, nakedness, nakedness, and breaking down every sexual barrier. So anything goes with anybody. Madonna said not long ago, and I think everybody knows who Madonna happens to be, she said, we've broken all the rules. There are no rules left to break. All that's left for us to do is to start over, make new rules, and then break them. You think about who the heroes are. The unworthy heroes are for this generation and the standards that are being set. There must be a generation who says, we are God's children. We are God's people. We've been redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ. God has set a high, holy standard for us. And the standard God has set for us is not the world standard. And we won't think we're pleasing God just because we're just a step better than the world. Modesty and identity. And God says, mankind shall not lie with mankind and womankind lying with womankind, it is an abomination, an abomination. As Christian people, if you say, I'm a Christian, if you say you've asked God to forgive your sin and by faith receive Christ as Savior, the same principle applies to us as it did to these Old Testament saints. God has placed us in this world so that we live by a high holy standard so that when we live We're different from the world and this separation to God, get it right, separation to God and from the world is not the enemy of evangelism, it's the essential of evangelism. There must be a difference. And by the way, make sure you know this. Everything I do outwardly should be out of a desire to live a holy life. Nothing I do on the outside makes me a spiritual person. No activity makes me a spiritual person. Dressing any kind of way does not make me a spiritual person. The desire to live a modest life, to dress modestly and to be identified as a man, for me, and to hold God's standard as the standard for my life comes out of a desire to live a holy life and walk with God. Not long ago, I heard a man preaching on the radio, and it's a fellow I enjoy hearing, and he had a certain sermon series, and the series was entitled Disciplines That Produce Godliness. And I'm thinking to myself, it sounds very good, but the more I thought about it, it is not discipline that produced godliness. It's godliness following after God that produces discipline. And the reason so many people have no discipline life is because they're not pursuing the Lord Jesus Christ. And if all we're going to do is start on the outside, try to straighten everybody out, we're still failing because this has to start in the heart with our own devotion to Jesus Christ. A heart for God. But let's mark it well that God has a high holy standard for his people. Turn please with me to the book of Deuteronomy, chapter 22. God makes a separation for the sexes. God makes a separation for the sexes. The Bible says in a verse that's not used often today, not referred to often because people are almost afraid to use it. In chapter 22 of Deuteronomy, verse 5, the woman shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man. Neither shall a man put on a woman's garment, for all that do so are abomination unto the Lord thy God." In other words, there's a difference here. There's a difference. I've had the privilege of traveling around the world, Asia, Africa, Europe, South America, Central America, different islands of the sea. And I find that when you're going to a bathroom to use the restroom or a water closet, as they call it in certain parts of the world, when you go to try to find a place to use the restroom, if you're trying to find a men's restroom, there's a certain symbol on the door, international symbol on the door. And if you're going to find a lady's restroom for my wife, there's a certain international symbol on the door. Interestingly enough, on the lady's door, there's a figure with a skirt. On the men's door, there is a figure with a pair of pants. Now, the truth of the matter is, there's a difference. There's a difference. I remember about 15 years ago, I was in Israel, and we had a guide who wanted us to go by Tel Aviv and say hello to his family. And while we were on our tour, we happened to be near there, and his wife came out to meet him. She was a very lovely girl, and he was a fine fellow, no problem there. But they had a conversation I thought was a little different. When he, when she saw him, she said, George, you have on my pants. And he said, I didn't mean to wear them today. Well, they're mine. He said, those are my pants. And when he got back on the bus, he sort of laughed and said, you know, we interchange our clothes. Some days she wears these, some days I wear them. And we just buy the kind of clothes that we can all just interchange. And he thought it was fine because they're saving money, buying fewer clothes and both wearing the same thing. I honestly, I saw his humor, but I don't think it's a humorous thing. Now I can rant and rave and get loud here, but I'm trying to tell you something. God draws lines. God makes differences. We should not be trying to erase the lines God has drawn, change the differences God has made. There's modesty and there's identity. Modesty. I read something the other day that just staggers me. I don't believe it's true, but it staggers me. Nonetheless, from a survey done on thousands of teenagers, 18 year old teenagers, 7 out of every 10 18 year old girls says that she's not a virgin. 7 out of 10, 18 years old. 8 out of every 10 boys age 18 say they're not virgins. I don't believe that's true. Maybe you do. But it's a staggering thing to think about, isn't it? Something has happened to a nation undressing in public. Something is wrong in a world where you cannot identify men from women. Who is going to set the standard? God has already set the standard. He expects his people to be obedient. I want you to know in a church like the church I pastor, everyone is welcome. I often think that when I'm preaching, I'm preaching to families who have children who have caught up in what they call an alternative lifestyle that God calls vile affection or abomination. I often think about how heartbroken they are. I spoke with a woman this week who's been in the ministry 41 years, who has a son in his thirties, and by her description, he's a flaming homosexual. She wept over the phone, she cried and talked about the bondage this boy is in and how he needed deliverance, identity, modesty. I never shall forget going out to my car. I'd been on a subject like this a few days earlier in one of the church services. When I got in my car, there was a large envelope in the front seat of my car. I had no idea of knowing what was in it, so I opened it. And when I opened it, there was all kinds of homosexual literature. magazines, all kinds of graphic things, articles about how to seduce the boy who mows your yard and all kinds of things like that. And there was a letter inside and the letter said, Pastor, I love you. And I've grown up in this church. I've been reading these kinds of things and been involved in this kind of pornographic material for quite a while. I'm still a virgin, but I don't plan to be one long. This lifestyle is pulling me in. I never knew who that was. I don't know who that particular person happens to be to this day. But I'm telling you, it's everywhere. Everywhere we go. God's people need to realize that the Lord has made a separation in the sexes. I want you to turn with me, please, to what the Bible says in the book of 1 Kings, chapter And the third thing I want you to write down is that we must use Bible language when dealing with this issue. We must use Bible language when dealing with this issue. The Bible says in 1 Kings chapter 15, verses 11 and 12, And Asa did that which was right in the eyes of the Lord, as did David his father. And he took away the Sodomites out of the land, and removed all the idols that his fathers had made. Notice the word Sodomites. It is not gay, it's sad. But it's more than sad, God calls it vile affection. In this particular passage, they removed all the sodomites from the land. It is not being a lesbian, it's being a practitioner of what God says is vile affection and an abomination. I understand there's a law in Canada now, in the hate crimes laws in Canada, where you can be arrested for saying certain things, certain derogatory things they say, certain hateful things. People who are these homophobiacs, as they call them, saying things they should not say. And this is not a message intended to bash on the people who call themselves homosexuals. This is a message intended to show you what the Bible says. And that we ought to stop using, excuse the expressions, we ought to stop using the words like queer and that type of thing. We should use the very language of the Bible. God says that's sodomy. God says you're a sodomite. God says that's vile affection. God says that's an abomination. The strong, clear language of the Bible is the language we ought to use. The strong, clear language of the Bible. Now, in that particular passage in the book of Kings, they were going to remove all the sodomites from the land. That's not going to happen. Not going to happen in our land, not going to happen in our world. You can joke about things like that if you want to. It's not going to happen. But we must train our own people and train ourselves from God's word about how to deal with these issues. I want you to turn to the book of Romans just for a moment. In the book of Romans, the Bible says in chapter 1, verse 18, for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. who hold the truth and unrighteousness, because that which may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has showed it unto them. For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made in his eternal power and Godhead, so they are without excuse. Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful, but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. professing themselves to be wise, they became fools and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible men and to birds and four-footed beasts and creepy things. Wherefore, also, God gave them up to uncleanness." Now, I want to show you something. This is not a picture of a God who's a weak old man, incapable of dealing with the problems of this world. God said, if you're going to live that way and go that way, there comes a time when God says, all right, I'm going to give you up to that. And He says it's uncleanness. Mark that word uncleanness. Through the loss of their own hearts, to dishonor their own bodies. It's dishonoring to your body. God gave you a body. God designed a body, the Bible says, which is fearfully and wonderfully made. And that type of living is dishonoring to your body. We're finding out with what we call this AIDS pandemic. All over the world, people are frightened. We don't go to the bathroom the way we used to go to a public restroom. I know how you go and you know how I go. We go inside, we don't like to touch the door because we think someone else who's got germs, perhaps deadly germs, or some deadly disease has touched the thing. And we go over to look at the sink, we find out where the towels are. We try to run the towels out from the paper towel dispenser before we ever wash our hands because we don't want to touch the dirty thing after we wash our hands. We don't want to handle the thing to go into the restroom. We don't want to flush the utility we use because we don't want to touch it with our hands. And then when we go in like that, cautiously everywhere, we finally try to wash our hands. And if the wastebasket isn't where it ought to be, we're going to take that paper towel we've used near the door and open the door because if we have to, we'll throw that towel across the room to keep that door open because we're not going to touch anything else after we washed our hands. Why is this routine going on? Because we're frightened. And so the world says youth are at risk. And the real risk, they say, are these risks of disease. So let's talk to them about how to have safe sex. There is no such thing as safe sex. I don't want to go into all the medical things. I'm not capable of that except for the things I've read, the charts I've looked at, and the statistical information I could quote to you. But let me just give you one little common sense thing. How many times have you heard a parent talk about children that they had that they didn't plan to have? They tried to prevent from having, but yet the mother became expectant. There is no such thing as safe sex. God's standard is abstinence from that type of behavior outside of marriage. That's God's standard. And by the way, when we practice what God says about modesty and we practice what God says about dignity, that's God's standard for us. That's God's, if you will, that's God's method of keeping people the way they ought to be. That's the Lord's way in the thing. The Bible says here, who changed the truth of God into a lie and worshiped and served the creature more than the creator, who is blessed forever. For this cause, God gave them up unto vile affection. It's uncleanness. It is dishonor in their body. It is vile affection. For even their women did change the natural use of that which is against nature. And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another, men with men, working that which is unseemly, and receiving themselves that recompense of their error, which was me." And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind. Now, what kind of mind is that? It's a mind that says black is right, white is black, right is wrong, wrong is right. It's a mind that stands toe-to-toe with those who take a Bible standard and say, you're wrong, I'm right, and they're convinced they are right. They cannot judge between what is good and evil. They cannot judge between what is right and wrong. Their mind is now reprobate. They cannot have a right thought, a pure thought, a holy thought, because they've given over to this. And you argue with them all you want to argue with. They're as convinced that they're right as you're convinced you're right. Because they've made themselves gods in their own eyes. And may I say something as discreetly as I know how to say it. There's quite a charge in sexual experience. If you have that charge, that exhilaration, That feeling that God has designed the body to have with the same sex, you're going to identify that same sex with that feeling. Those type of experiences. But if you give yourself to God and save yourself and don't dishonor your body, enter into uncleanness, vile affection, and practice this type of thing, which is against God and God's word, and save yourself from marriage, I promise you something. Every wonderful thing God ever promised you could have is yours in the holy bond of marriage. And girls, you should not dress in a certain way to try to turn somebody's head. No, no. Ladies, when you're married in the privacy of your own home, you and your husband can enjoy those types of things. But to wear no more clothes in public than you would wear as underclothes in your home is something we know that a Christian woman should not do. Hear me. Hear me, please. Check it for yourself. This is the first generation of Christians, the first generation of Christians that will dress this way so immodestly, and yet still dare to call themselves Christians. This is the first generation to do that. May God help us. Use Bible language. Turn with me again in your Bibles, if you would, please, the book of Psalms, the closing part of the 90th Psalm. The fourth thing I want to tell you is there's a difference between attraction and sexuality. And people so often confuse this. In the 90th Psalm, the Bible says in verse 17, and let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us. Let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us. Think of that. and establish the work of our hands upon us, yea, the work of our hands establish thou it. Now let's look, please, in 1 Peter chapter 3. Would you turn there? 1 Peter chapter 3. The beauty of the inner man, verse 3 of 1 Peter chapter 3, whose adorning, let it not be that outward adorning, plaiting the hair and wearing of gold or putting on of apparel, but let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit. which is in the sight of God of great price. The beauty of the inner man. Hear me, please. There's a world of difference between what you are identifying as sexual attraction and real attraction. Sexuality and real attraction. If you turn their heads with something sexual, daring to be immodest, lewd, and you know it turns their head, and by the way, gentlemen, We don't need our heads turned like that all the time. We need to ask God to help us not to be turning our heads all the time. That's a great hurt to a woman, to a wife. Any woman can dress immodestly. Any woman can dress in such a way that she takes enough of her clothes off to cause attention to her body. Any woman can do that. It takes nothing decent and right and pure Nothing of character and decency to do that. But if we consider that attractiveness, then we miss the whole picture. Real attractiveness is the inner beauty in the inner man. And many a man has been attracted to something physical only to find out in a matter of days, weeks, or months that that's not an enduring attractiveness. There ought to be a beauty inside, the beauty of the Lord upon us, the beauty of the inner man. My wife and I have been married for 34 years. She's a beautiful girl. I think she was the most beautiful girl in our high school, inwardly and outwardly. Beautiful. And I'm attracted to her. She's gorgeous. And as beautiful as she is on the outside, she is more beautiful to me on the inside. But many people have tried to make themselves attractive on the outside and use sexuality to do so, but have never developed the inner man. And they violate the principle of identity and modesty and what is in order in God's Word. And it will not work. The foundation that you think you're building on is not a foundation at all. It'll crumble like sand will crumble, and your heart will be broken because of it. It's staggering. that more than half the people in this country, in the country that leads the world in divorce. Think of that. The country that leads the world in divorce rate. More than half the people in this country who get married have a marriage and divorce. A marriage that ends in divorce. Know the difference between what is attractive and sexuality. Turn again with me please to the book of Jeremiah. Let's take down a fifth thing. Jeremiah chapter six, the blush is gone for many in this generation. The blush is gone. Look at chapter six, please. The Bible says in verse 15 of Jeremiah, were they ashamed when they had committed abomination? No, they were not at all ashamed. Neither could they blush. Therefore they shall fall among them that fall. At the time that I visit them, they shall be cast down, saith the Lord. Thus, saith the Lord, stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest of your souls." But they said, we will not walk therein. And we have a choice to make. The blush is gone. They could not blush, verse 15 says. Look at chapter 8 of Jeremiah. And verse 12, the Bible says, were they ashamed when they had committed abomination? Nay, they were not at all ashamed, neither could they blush. Therefore, shall they fall among them that fall in time of their visitation, they shall be cast down, saith the Lord. They couldn't blush anymore. There's no blush left. I was reading an article about two weeks ago on USA Today about Melissa Etheridge, the singer. who says she's a lesbian. That's the title she gives herself. And she had a woman, and they decided they would have a relationship like a marriage, a woman to a woman, instead of a woman to a man, as God has ordained, and that they would have children. So they enlisted one of their friends, David Crosby, to provide what was needed from a man so that they could have children, and they had children together. The big article in the paper says that the woman she had the children with no longer wants to be, as they say, a lesbian. She wants to be married to a man. And they say, what are we going to do now? We have these children together. And she suddenly decides she wants to be with a man. Think about modesty and order and decency and identity. So they've had to buy houses that have adjoining backyards. And one mommy lives now with her husband in one house with an adjoining backyard to this mommy who has no husband and has another woman living with her. What a world. But the selfish, self-centered, self-worshippers who said they wanted children to love really gave no serious thought to the place those children ought to hold in their heart. They would just consume with their own lust and behave that way. And we read things like that and it's almost like, well, that goes on in the world. How do we become a people who have lost our blush? A little girl is dressed in a way where there's more of her body showing. She's just a little thing, but she's dressed in a way where more of her body is showing than it normally shows. And she feels a little uncomfortable about it going out of the house, but mommy thinks she looks good. Like the little girl in Colorado who was just a child, maybe looked like a teenager. That's immodest. And then suddenly she puts on a piece of clothing and it shows the midriff and she's never gone out in public. Oh, mommy and daddy may have seen her like that, but she's never gone out in public showing that much flesh. And she's a little embarrassed that she tries to pull on the top a little bit. Other girls are doing the same thing. So why should she care? And she's embarrassed by it. But after a while she gets used to it. Parts of her arms and parts of her body and parts of her legs are showing and then it gets skimpier and skimpier and she gets older and more developed but she's already used to showing that part of her body so she doesn't care anymore to expose that part of her body because all standards of decency and purity and modesty and identity are fading. And how she once yanked on a little dress to make it longer and tried to cover her midriff so you couldn't see it. Now she wants to display her midriff and have her navel pierced so everybody could see it and buy clothing that accentuates it. She wants to buy things that are really too small for her to wear because she wants to accentuate the sexual zones of her body. And she wants to wear the bottom part of her clothing as low as she possibly can just to try to infatuate the minds of people. And it doesn't make any difference who she turns on, men or women, just so she turns them on. She doesn't blush anymore because her blush is gone. That's what we see on the outside. But what's happened on the inside? Listen, God gave her a conscience. And her conscience cried out. That's not right. Don't do that. And we have a conscience that cries out. God made a spirit, soul and body. In our spirit we have a conscience. In our spirit is where God lives if we are saved. In our soul we have intellect, emotion, and will. In our body we have five senses. But that conscience cried out. You ought to have more clothes on. You ought to look differently. That's not right. And so you don't want to hear that conscience. And so you try to put it to silence. And you don't want to go anywhere where people are talking about things that make that conscience continue to cry out. And you start using things and listening to things and behaving in such a way that silences that conscience until long, listen, before long, listen, before long, there's a searing process in that conscience and the little voice that once cried out is no longer so loud. It's sort of fading now. Searing over, hardening. It's been violated. There's a hardness on the inside. It doesn't make any difference what other people think now. It's what I want to do and what I think, because that caring, compassionate feeling doesn't matter now. And what we see happening on the inside is only evidence of what's happening on the outside. It's only evidence of what we see has happened on the inside. And that little girl or that boy is no longer able to care and love and be compassionate and to feel like they once were. And it's evidence because they can't blush anymore. Something's happened to their conscience. I want to tell you something, if you want that to happen to you, then you get lost in this lost generation. You get lost in this lost generation, they're lost. Let me tell you what this generation thinks. A homosexual, he calls himself a homosexual activist by the name of Swift, wrote this in the gay community news a few years ago. We shall seduce your sons, emblems of your feeble masculinity, emblems of your shallow dreams and vulgar lies. We shall seduce them in your schools, in your dormitories, in your gymnasiums, in your locker rooms, in your sports arenas, in your seminaries, in your youth groups, in your movie theater bathrooms, in your army bunk houses, in your truck stops, in your old mail clubs, in your houses of Congress. Wherever men are with men together, we shall seduce your sons. Your sons shall become what we want them to become, and our bidding, they shall be recast in our image. They will come to crave and adore us." So he wrote. That type of rhetoric isn't heard often anymore from that crowd because they realize it's a little too hard sell. But now, let's just try to change any standard God has of modesty and identity. What I'm trying to say, if you're a Christian, if you're a Christian, God has a high holy standard for you. If you're a Christian, you do not take your standard from the world. If you're a Christian, you ought to be the person God allowed you to be born to be, a lady or a man. If you're a Christian, you don't dress immodestly and lewdly and lose your blush. If you're a Christian, young ladies, you understand your hair should not be shorn like some man just because it's easier to take care of. If you're a Christian, gentlemen, you shouldn't be wearing ponytails and earrings. If you're a Christian, you ought to look like a man. If you're a Christian, people ought to see you at a distance and know that's a man or that's a woman. If you're dressed like a man, ladies, they can't tell that. If you're a Christian, you ought to follow the standards of modesty and identity. And we are living in a lost world that's on a hurry to get to hell. They're going into the blackness of darkness forever. And we need to reach them. We love them. We care about them. They're welcome in our churches. We want to preach the gospel to them. We want to bring them to Christ. We want to lovingly plead with them to trust Christ as Savior. But we will lose all influence when we become just like them. And there ought to be some young people who say, I'll keep God's standard of modesty and identity in my life. Let's pray together, may we?