Hair, hats and holiness
Day 597, Tuesday, Mar. 31
1 Corinthians 11:2-16
Until now, much of what Paul has said about restrictions in the church has focused on dietary laws that have little significance for the modern Christian. Today we get to teachings that have more impact on today’s church.
Concerns about proper hair length for men and women aren’t the hot issues they were 50 or 60 years ago, but still show up in some pockets of society.
Head coverings are a little closer to home. You still find people in mainstream churches who view it as disrespectful for a man to wear a hat or cap in church. Some Christian traditions still encourage women to have head coverings, but that practice is now more common in non-Christian religions.
The appropriate role of women in the church is still widely debated within the Christian community. Paul’s teachings on the matter are not as straightforward as some of his critics suggest.
The passage we read today is one sometimes used in support of the subordination of women in the church, particularly verse 7: “A man ought not cover his head, since he is the image and glory of God; but woman is the glory of man.”
Overall, though, this passage is not especially effective as an argument that women should be limited in their role in the church. Even the statement, “every woman who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors her head,” presumes that women will be praying and prophesying.
Verses 11 and 12 are egalitarian: “Nevertheless, in the Lord a woman is not independent of man, nor is man independent of woman. For as woman came from man, so also man is born of woman. But everything comes from God.”
As you read the passage, notice that the “bookend” verses, 2 and 16, appeal to the authority of “traditions” and “practice.” Given what we have read in the preceding chapters, it could be that Paul is appealing to the church (women and men) to not let their newfound freedom in Christ become a stumbling block for others, and to voluntarily submit to tradition to avoid making themselves, rather than the gospel, the center of attention.
Tuesday meditation
Psalms 104:31-35
May the glory of the Lord endure forever; may the Lord rejoice in his works—he who looks at the earth, and it trembles, who touches the mountains, and they smoke.
I will sing to the Lord all my life; I will sing praise to my God as long as I live. May my meditation be pleasing to him, as I rejoice in the Lord. But may sinners vanish from the earth and the wicked be no more.
Praise the Lord, my soul.
Praise the Lord.
Prayer focus
Lord, let us embrace the freedom you have given us and to share that freedom with others with love and grace.
-Rev. Mark Fleming