All right. The next question concerns church standards. And it applies to our general topic of critical thinking because, yeah, it means the answer to the question involves critical thinking. It's a good question. And this is the question sent in. It said," The Bible doesn't say very much about modesty. We shouldn't impose things on people that the Bible doesn't say." Since the Bible doesn't give specifics about modesty, that means we certainly shouldn't make black and white rules about modesty.
Whether something is modest is subjective, and it depends on individual conscience and the culture that you're living in. Now, the person sending this in didn't necessarily it doesn't represent their personal view necessarily. They're saying this is what they hear all the time. And how would we respond to this? And it's not absurd reasoning. I mean, it's a very logical question. Nothing uncritical about that thinking.
And I'd say there's a lot of truth in the basic premise, but the conclusion does contain a fallacy. And I'll point to the fallacy. The conclusion is saying that because people can't agree where to draw the line between two points in this situation, modesty. What constitutes modesty? What constitutes immodesty? Since Christians can't agree, then there isn't a line that we can point to. Now, like I say, this fallacy occurs all the time in a lot of different forms. So it's really good.
One reason I wanted to address this question is that you'll recognize this fallacy when it comes up in other things because it takes different shapes, but it's always the same kind of argument. Now, when I was in college and I took a course in logic, this was known as the fallacy of the beard. And that may sound like a strange name. But it was called that through the illustration of somebody's, you know, no one would argue this, but someone supposedly arguing, well, there's no such thing as a beard.
And someone else would say, well, of course there is. That guy over there has got a beard. Oh, really? Well, tell me how many whiskers you have to have on your face to constitute a beard. Well, the person would say, well, I don't know. Uh-huh. See, there's no such thing as a beard. If there was, you could tell me how many whiskers it takes. Well, yeah, that's a fallacy just because there's not a hard line somewhere.
And in the case of a beard, no, nobody has a magic number that if you've got 100 hairs on your face, that's a beard. If you have 99, nope, that's not a beard. It just means you haven't shaved. Well, yeah, there's no hard line, but there is such a thing as a beard and there is such a thing as a beardless man like myself. And because you can't draw a line doesn't mean that those two truths don't exist. Now, today, this fallacy is usually called the continuum fallacy.
A continuum just means a line that starts here and ends there without any break. It's just one continual thing. And because you can't point to a spot on that line to distinguish something, then you're saying, oh, well, it doesn't exist. For example, you might say, well, there's no such thing as a good boy or a bad boy. Well, what do you mean by that? Well, if there is, now you tell me exactly what constitutes a good boy and what constitutes a bad boy.
How many times do they have to disobey before they're disobedient? And how many times do they get to disobey and still be called an obedient child? Oh, you can't name the number. See, it doesn't exist. I mean, it's absurd reasoning, but it sounds logical. And so it occurs, like I say, not usually in such obvious ways like the beard, but in ones that are a lot more subtle. And this one that we're just looking at about modesty is a more subtle way.
Another way to state the fallacy with regard to modesty, the present question, would be to say that because churches can't draw the line or agree where the line is to be drawn on what is modest and what is immodest, then that means there is no such thing as a hard line and no one should try to draw one. Well, that's the fallacy of the beard. Just because sometimes we have to draw an arbitrary line doesn't mean that truth doesn't exist. So like you know what constitutes long hair on a man?
Well, I don't know that anyone has an objective thing, but there is hair that's long and there is hair that's short. And churches or when I was in school, they would draw an arbitrary line. It had to be above your like in my school, it couldn't go over your ear. If it was over your ear, it constituted long hair. That's an arbitrary definition, but you have the right to draw definitions where there's a continuum. Otherwise, you couldn't make any laws or any rules anywhere.
And the interesting thing is a lot of people think, well, it's only the Mennonites who have standards on modesty. But I'll tell you right now, virtually every church draws a line somewhere on modesty. I mean, for example, I don't think there's a church on earth that would allow you to show up to church in your bathing suit, and they wouldn't say something to you. Or even worse, you show up in your underwear.
Is there a church that would say," Oh, hi, yeah, you look nice today," or maybe something even less than that. No, I mean, even a very worldly church is going to draw a line somewhere. Now, that line has moved. When I was a boy, even a worldly church would not have let you come to church in shorts. I mean, they may not have stopped you at the door, but someone would have said something to you about don't come back dressed that way again or to come in a t-shirt.
Now, nowadays, when I'm heading to church on Sunday, I go by a number of other churches. Yeah, I see people coming in or out of churches. Some of them have very early services. And yeah, they're in shorts and t-shirts and tank tops and all of that. So the line has moved from where it was when I was a little boy of what they call modest, but they still do have a line. I haven't seen anyone in their underwear you know crossing the street and walking into a church.
So yeah, is it wrong then for a kingdom-minded church to have stricter standards about dress than allowing people to come in shorts? I personally think that a kingdom-minded church is going to try to draw a line that best represents the standards of the New Testament church. I don't mean that we're going to dress like New Testament Christians, but you know as the question itself pointed out, it is a subjective decision. There isn't a hard line in the Bible.
It's subjective, but that doesn't mean it's not valid just because it's subjective. And I would also agree that styles of dress change between cultures and across centuries. What would have been immodest or strange in, say, the year 500 or 1,000 or even 1,800 is different than what it is in 2022. But that doesn't mean just because something is considered okay in 2022, that that means that it's modest. No, there's still some objective standards.
And let's just look at what some of those objective universal principles are that we can see in the early church. And those objective standards, they stay the same in every century and every culture. In other words, the kind of dress might change between cultures and between centuries, but not these principles. One of the principles is, does our clothing cover most of our bodies? Or does it expose a lot of our bodies? So that's one principle that doesn't change about modesty.
A second one, is our clothing tight or sensuous? Does it invite lust from the opposite sex? If it does, then it's not modest. And that principle, like I say, it never changes. The style of dress might be different in different countries and different centuries, but that standard doesn't change. And then a third standard I'll give that is universal and that was practiced by the early Christians and is consistent with the New Testament. Is our clothing costly, luxurious?
Or is it showy where everybody notices, oh, what a beautiful new dress you have on. If it is, it isn't modest because it's drawing attention to ourselves in a way to flatter ourselves.
No materials available for this lesson.