Created In His Image

Speaker 1: 0:06

Well, good morning. I'm Stephen Clark. It's my joy to be with you again. I'll tell you something new about me that you may not know. I have permission to do this promo.

Speaker 1: 0:15

By the way, I have written a book. It's called as Good as it Gets. It's about the song of songs. The word Song of Songs means the greatest of all songs. It's love poetry in many ways. So the book is about love, life and relationships 50 Days in the Song of Songs, which you can take a bit of it each day for 50 days and work your way through it. I've also got some reviews out there. Read the reviews before your bite. It's at the connections desk. I don't want you to come back next week when I'm here and say you sold me a bill of goods. I'm giving you the reviews, okay, so you can buy with your eyes open. Thank you, lord, for the joy of worshiping you this morning.

Speaker 1: 1:04

As we look at this difficult text out of 1 Corinthians, would you open up our hearts and our minds to it? We ask in Christ's name, amen. I have to tell you, this week I've been thinking about your new pastor who is coming. He did such an awesome job on a difficult text in 1 Corinthians 7, and I'm not just saying that, I mean that that I thought maybe I could call him up and say you think 1 Corinthians 7 was bad. You should try 1 Corinthians 11. Is there any chance you could come and do it for me please? I'll even drive up to wherever you are at right now if you would just please swap with me, but I didn't figure that that would go down so well.

Speaker 1: 1:49

The text this morning is difficult. There's some things about this chapter. For example, one commentator, a conservative, bible-believing commentator I even have his commentary it's 800 pages long on 1 Corinthians. He said this the argument that follows, however, is so involved that for most readers, the explanations tend to muddy the waters rather than to enlighten. So my job is to enlighten you this morning and not to muddy the waters, and, as he's saying, that's not easy. There are some things that we're going to talk about that we don't fully understand. At one point he says what that means in this context remains a mystery, but I don't want you to get scared. Yes, there are some things that Paul is talking to the Corinthians about that they would get that maybe. Maybe we don't fully get and understand, but that doesn't matter, because he's describing the symptoms, and it's not the symptoms that matter. The symptoms change in every culture and every generation. It's the underlying problem that matters. It's the principle that we need to get at here and that, I think, is pretty clear. I'll give you an example.

Speaker 1: 3:11

When I pastored inside the DC Beltway, we had a number, quite a lot, of members who came from an Islamic Republic, and one time I was in one of their homes and I was doing a Bible study and I, you know, I was seated like this in a regular chair and the floor was right here, and after we had done the Bible study, I just put my Bible down like this, and they were absolutely shocked, pastor, they said you can't do that. And I said what are you talking about? And and as I began to work out, work through it, what I understood was that in the Islamic Republic the Quran could only be held in the right hand, not the left. So you leftists won't get converted. But the thing was, if you put it on the floor, it was blasous and so for them, as Christians, in that culture, you wouldn't put the Bible on the floor because you would be saying your holy books more holy than mine, right? And so if you come up to me afterwards and you say to me I'm actually going to an Islamic Republic this week, I might send you a note in the mail and said don't remember, don't put your Bible on the floor, because we hold the word of God very highly. And if somebody from your family read my note to you and they weren't here this morning, they would go what's he talking about? Putting the Bible on the floor? You might miss the symptom, right, but you would understand the underlying principle that indeed we treat the word of God highly. And so that may be a little of the symptoms going on here that we'll try and work through and make plain.

Speaker 1: 4:59

So the first thing is the occasion for the text, why it is that Paul is writing and he says this now. I commend you as he looks at the reason for this, because you remember me in everything and you maintain the traditions, even as I delivered them to you. Remember, at this point we didn't have the New Testament, and so what was circulated was oral traditions and things that had been put to memory. And he is saying first of all and this is a good idea when you're taking on difficult situations to say to the people that you're about to take on I can commend you, I can praise you and give them reason why you respect them. He says I commend you, but I want you to keep in mind certain traditions.

Speaker 1: 5:44

And now comes the underlying principle. And it's not going to be clear at first, but let's look at the underlying principle. He says to them but what I want you to understand is that the head of every man is Christ, the head of the wife is the husband and the head of Christ is God. The head of every man is Christ, the head of the wife is the husband and the head of Christ is God. The head of every man is Christ. The head of a wife is her husband and the head of Christ is God. Now, what does the word head there mean? Obviously, it can't mean that Christ is inferior to the Father. I mean from all eternity they're one and the same. That's the doctrine of the Trinity.

Speaker 1: 6:30

But what we know is that when Christ this is his name given to him his title for his job here on earth, when he laid aside his glory and when he came to earth to minister to us and to lay down his life for us, he submitted himself to the will of the Father. You could hear it in the abyss before the cross Father, this is tough. Going to the cross, not just the physical pain, the taking on myself the sins of my people. It's going to be tough, but nevertheless. Not my will, but your will. He submitted himself to the Father, not that he was inferior to the father in any way, and so when he says wives, submit to your husbands, it's not saying, you know, women are inferior to men or something like that. It's talking about a certain role that, like Christ, they are going to play, and we'll touch a little bit more on that.

Speaker 1: 7:25

So there are two things regarding headship in the New Testament. First of all, the headship involves some sort of submission too. The second thing is that headship involves the source, and this might sound strange at first. Involves the source, and this might sound strange at first, but I can remember being in geography class in my school up in the hills of Jamaica you kids who are going to Jamaica, to the deaf school, that's about 10, 15 miles away from where I grew up and we learned in geography class. You don't have geography here, right, but anyway we learned about the headwaters of the Ganges. That means the river in India, where it started its head, how it flowed, what flowed into it and what came out of it and what it became. And then, as it ended up in the ocean, the head was the beginning and was the source.

Speaker 1: 8:27

And that word, that idea of source, is also used of Jesus. Here is one that sort of evokes that it's from Colossians and he, jesus Christ, is before all things, from eternity, and in him all things hold together, and he is the head of the body of the church, he is the beginning and he was the firstborn from the dead, and in everything he will have preeminence. He's the source, right the beginning, and he's the one who, as the river flows, accomplishes all things, and then he is the one who is preeminent in all things as it reaches its destination. And so I know this is a little technical and I know this involves some hard work that we have to do this morning, but I promise you it's going to be worth it, because when you take on the scriptures and you delve into it, it's always worth it. And so he's saying to us this morning that this sense of headship is what we need to get a hold of as a principle.

Speaker 1: 9:29

And here is his actual text. Now and again don't give up, we're going to work through it. Paul says he, the man the word is Adam is the image and glory of God. But ladies don't panic yet, okay. But the woman is the glory of God. But ladies don't panic yet, okay. But the woman is the glory of man. And guys, don't start doing this yet, for man was not made from woman, but woman from man. Neither was man created for woman, but woman for man. I know that sounds all strange, but as you begin to unpack it and you think about it, this is what he's saying.

Speaker 1: 10:08

When you go back to the creation narrative, when you go back to the origins, when you go back to the source, where it all began, you'll remember that God took the dust of the earth and God directly made Adam. Right, it was very direct. And when you looked at him and this is in contrast to the animals that had just been made you saw a thinking, willing, loving, active human being made in the image of God. And when you looked at him, you wouldn't know back then we'd one day end up even on the moon. I mean, that's how incredible it is to be created in the image of God and to be able to think and act and will and love. And when you looked at him you would say God, when he took him out of the dust, that's awesome what God did. And when we look at man, at the height of all creation, we go, wow, it's awesome to be created in the image of God.

Speaker 1: 11:18

And then Paul says but when God made the woman, it was different, wasn't it? What he did was he took the rib from the side of the man and he made the woman and he called her woman, for she came out of the man. Doesn't mean that the woman wasn't created by God, she was just created differently by God. Doesn't mean the woman's not in the image of God Of course she also is. But he's saying when you go back to creation and you see how God created man originally Adam and how he created woman originally Eve, he did it differently. And so when you come to the summary text of his creation in Genesis this is what we're going to read when God created man, he made him in the likeness of God, male and female. He created them. And that, believe it or not, and you're going to marvel as we get further into the text is what the text is all about. It's about the fact that men and women are different, both created by God, but created originally differently, and that, male and female, we are different, and so this is as relevant as today. I mean, I still can't get over it. During COVID, they kept telling me to follow the science, and now when they talk about male and female, they don't want to follow the science. It's created male and female and that, so far, is what the text is about. Now it gets very interesting because now we got to go into Corinth and inside the church at Corinth and to realize the issues that are going on there.

Speaker 1: 13:23

And you see, back then in the Greco-Roman world, the Italians and the Greeks, back then, as a sign of modesty, as a sign of chastity and as a sign of faithfulness in marriage, women would wear a veil over their hair. It wasn't like what Muslim women wear today, you know, a big, long thing with two eyes peeking out or something like that. It was just a veil over the top of the hair. We know all this I mean from archaeology. We've got vases or vases I don't know which one I'm supposed to say because I'm Jamaican and I'm totally mixed up, but we've got vases and vases, you know, with pictures on them. We know what was going on back then and here's the reason why they wore a veil Hair.

Speaker 1: 14:16

You know, you got to admit it if you're you know from Spanish or Romantic cultures Italians and Greeks ladies can have beautiful, long flowing hair right and so long flowing hair was the essence of being a woman. Not just that, it was fashionable then to say wow. The thing about women I love is their long hair. You know, in the 60s it was mini skirts. Nowadays I don't know what it is, it's usually. Nowadays, I don't know what it is, it's usually celebrities wearing see-through clothing or something. Those are fashions that come and go.

Speaker 1: 15:01

Long hair wasn't just a fashion back then. It wasn't just that. They thought that the hair was the essence of what made a woman powerful and attractive and could shake you up and turn you upside down. A woman powerful and attractive and could shake you up and turn you upside down. They believed that the power, the essence of womanhood, was actually in the hair. It was more than fashion. It was that the essence of a woman, the power of womanhood, was in the hair. This is where all the power lay literally.

Speaker 1: 15:35

And so a woman would put a veil on her hair because it would be a sign of her modesty, sign of self-respect. I'm not some celebrity showing off my whatever. I am a woman. And she would put a veil on her hair because of how it would reflect on her husband If she didn't wear a veil. It would look bad on her husband, really bad, because the only women in Corinth who didn't wear a veil were the prostitutes from up on the hill, from the temple of Aphrodite. They didn't wear a veil. So if you were a woman and you didn't have a veil on, they would say oh, you're from up on the hill, right, but if you looked really wealthy and nicely put together, the other people who didn't wear a veil back then and it's a bit like modern celebrity culture today were courtesans, celebrities, really rich women who were showing off that yeah, I'm rich and I'm famous and I'm married to some hot shot guy or the other. And so here are these women and they're coming into church and they're not wearing veils. It looks like they came from up on top of the hill or that they were pretending to be celebrities. And here they are in church of all places and it's absolutely scandalous.

Speaker 1: 17:07

And we think maybe one of the reasons why the Corinthian women were coming to church without the sign of modesty on their hair was because they were thinking I'm free in Christ, I don't have to wear a veil. I mean, since Paul might even have in a way agreed with them right, and it's not one of the Ten Commandments, for example, for heaven's sakes. And the other thing that we think that maybe they were saying is because there's a reference to angels in the text. The other thing is that they may have been said. Jesus is saying that one day we will neither marry nor be given in marriage, but we will be like the angels in heaven. And they're saying hey, we've arrived, we're a new creation in Christ. There's no more male and female and all that kind of stuff. You know, we can do what we want to do.

Speaker 1: 17:58

And Paul says if you're going to be so shocking in your culture as to throw over the sign of your modesty and of your regard for your husband, why don't you just shave your whole head off? And he's not just being sarcastic. Only slaves shave their heads off. And when a woman had her hair shaved off, it was the most humiliating thing that you could do to a woman If a judge said her punishment is to have her hair shaved off. There's nothing more humiliating. Remember, you're shaving off where they thought the essence of the womanhood lay in. And think about the derision and the scorn the poor husband would go through. Hey, that's your wife over there with the shaved head. Eh, it was humiliating, it was scandalous. And now you're not going to believe me at first, but I promise you this is out of archaeology, this is out of textual references from the time. And the other ladies who wore their to shave their heads off were those who were identifying as lesbians or identifying as transvestites.

Speaker 1: 19:28

I'm not making this stuff up, folk. I mean, you're sitting here thinking, what's the world coming to? Well, it's coming to what it was back in Corinth too. Okay, there's nothing new under the sun. And so you say if you have a little feminism in you, which I'm not thinking is altogether a bad thing why is Paul always picking on the men? Well, actually, he's not picking on the men.

Speaker 1: 19:54

The text I just read to you began with this Every man who prays or prophesies with his head covered dishonors his head. Whoa, what's going on there? So we go to the Greek text and this is the place where we have the most problem, you know working out exactly what it means. The Greek literally says every man who prays or prophesies having down the head. We're not quite sure what that means, but there are a couple of things that that could mean.

Speaker 1: 20:32

In the time of Corinth, if you saw a man in worship with a veil over his head, you would know he's worshiping a pagan god. So first of all, paul would be saying that's out okay. And if you saw a Jewish man with a covering over his head, you would say something bad has happened in his family, he's in mourning. And Paul then would be saying hey, you can't come to church like you're in mourning. This is Sunday, this is the day we're celebrating the resurrection and new life. You can't come to church in mourning. This is a joyful occasion. That's one possibility.

Speaker 1: 21:10

The more likely possibility is that Paul is referring to men wearing long hair. Now, in our culture it's different. I mean, if you see a rock star up there, you know, with long hair, pounding on the guitar there's nothing feminine about him or anything like that you go, wow, he's cool. One of my sons had long hair with a ponytail. My wife wasn't fond of it but you know we didn't tell him that he looked like a girly-girly or something, because he didn't Not in our culture. And in fact when he went to get a job interview and he cut his hair off, my wife cried job interview and he cut his hair off. My wife cried. So that was in that culture and this literally happened to me this week.

Speaker 1: 21:57

I'm trying to work out what Paul is saying here and I'm busily on my computer working it out and my wife is about over there and she's reading a book. It's quite a well-known book now. It's called Dominion, by a man called Holland. I forget his first name. It's in my notes here somewhere if I could find my notes. But she's reading Tom Holland and she says listen to this. And I'm like, oh no, here she comes again. I'm trying to do my sermon. She's not here so I can get away with that one. And she says listen to this, you know what Holland says.

Speaker 1: 22:35

He says back in the time of Paul there was a sect, s-e-c-t. A cult called the Gali G-A-L-L-I, and the priest in this sect called Gali wore their hair long, crimped it it, put on a lot of makeup and pretended that they were a third gender. And if you don't believe me, there are transvestites today who go back to the galley and say I'm galley, okay, there's nothing new under the sun. And Paul is saying we're created differently. We're created male and we're created female.

Speaker 1: 23:22

And to come into the worship service, guys or girls, and say I'm free in Christ and to be shocking and to be shameful In worship of all places, don't you understand, ladies, that you're compromising your womanhood and your dignity? You know you're being treated. You're letting yourself be treated as what do they say? An object. They're objectifying you. You're saying I don't care that I'm married or what my husband thinks or not. You're saying, frankly, I don't care about worship, I'm going to be free, I'll wear my veil or I won't wear my veil. And the guys are saying, hey, I don't care if I look like the galley, I think it's cool. And Paul's saying you can't go there, not in that culture, okay, you can't go there, you're sending the wrong message all together.

Speaker 1: 24:26

And so he says judge for yourselves. I take that to be a cultural reference because maybe if we were in other parts of the world, we would look at the length of hair and curly hair and men and women differently. I might take him to be saying hey, given your context, judge for yourselves. Is it proper for a wife to pray to God with her head uncovered? Does not nature itself teach you that if a man wears long hair, it's a disgrace for him? Look at it, is just nature doing this. But if a woman has long hair, is it her glory, for her hair is given to her for a covering. If anyone is inclined to be contentious, we have no such practice, nor do the churches of God. So what we're finding out so far is that the principle is we're created male and female and in the context of that culture, don't bring shame on yourself ladies. And in the context of that culture, don't bring shame on your husbands. Don't come into worship with what everybody is going to think is absolutely shameful behavior. Because, he says even of the angels, meaning by that there are angels present in worship here now and in the heavenly worship at this moment, and if they were to see you coming in and doing something in worship that is shocking and shameful to your culture, the angels themselves would be saying what are you thinking? Why are you behaving this way?

Speaker 1: 26:13

Somebody told me between services that the sermon came down to. What was it? Just behave properly. I said I couldn't make the sermon that short, but if you love God and if you want to glorify him, then you understand. We're created male and female. And now I want to end very positively, and the first thing is this Understand we're created male and female. And now I want to end very positively, and the first thing is this I want to go back to the original principle, but I want you to understand that the head of every man is Christ, the head of her wife is her husband and the head of Christ is God.

Speaker 1: 26:55

Guys, buckle up your seatbelts, because we are created differently from the very beginning. You have a relationship to Christ as your head. That is very immediate and very direct. It doesn't mean that you're better than your wife. It doesn't mean that men have certain rights that women doesn't have. Doesn't mean that men have certain rights that women doesn't have. What it means is that God holds you accountable in your family and for your family, and that that is something you need to know, guys, and it's as relevant as today.

Speaker 1: 27:38

What is the greatest source of crime, violence and poverty in our country? Homes with men absent. Okay, don't go there, guys. The Lord has given you a certain responsibility, and to you ladies. You know, maybe your husband is a school teacher, and what a great thing to do, but you're a lawyer and you're making twice as much as him. You just be sure that he knows that you're behind him, that you're strengthening him, that you're building him up and that you want him to be, in his home, the one who is being held accountable for his wife, for his children and for his church. So I take that to be really positive coming out of this, don't you? The second thing is I just love it.

Speaker 1: 28:35

Here is Paul now summarizing what it means to be male and female. Here is what he's saying is biblical. Here is what he's saying is biblical. Here is what he is saying is scientific. We've been created male and female, but look at how he puts it.

Speaker 1: 28:49

Nevertheless, in the Lord, woman is not independent of man, nor man of woman Of man, nor man of woman. For as woman was made From the man, so man Is now born of Woman. We are interdependent Upon one another, and that's guys and ladies. This is where the chemistry is. Don't you get it To be male and female? That's where marriage works, because we need each other and we enjoy each other. And, in contrast to all them legalistic religions where the women had to stay outside or they were over there and the men were over here, we are brothers and sisters in Christ who respect and love each other. We find ourselves working together in the church and we find we need each other. We find ourselves that we need each other in our families and we find that we need each other in our relationships so that boys and girls growing up can have a mom and a dad and understand what it means to be male and female.

Speaker 1: 30:05

And yes, we're broken and yes, we can struggle with our sexuality. But here is God's original purpose for us and it is good. And it is not only good, it's kind of fun too, is what I hear him say. Not despite the fact that earlier on he told us it's kind of a good idea to remain single, like me. But he gets it. He absolutely gets it. And then here is how it ends and all these things are from God. That's where it began and that's where it's going to end, because he's the beginning and the end. And as we live our lives together in our families and in our churches, male and female, all the glory ends up going, indeed, to God Shall we pray.