22.03 | A Church Called Free
1 Corinthians 11:2-34
‘Every man who prays or prophesies with his head covered dishonors his head, but every wife who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors her head, since it is the same as if her head were shaven.’
1 Corinthians 11:4-5
My wife once visited a highly conservative church gathering. Arriving late, she and her friend immediately noticed the heavy, dour atmosphere. The only seats available to them were on the front row. Walking past the (silent) congregation, her friend noisily dropped his keys, clattering their way up the aisle. Retrieving the keys, they took their seats, in time for the sermon to begin. On the way, they noticed that every single women in the room was wearing a hat.
The passage for the day was 1 Corinthians 11. And it was all about the biblical importance of women wearing head coverings in church. Lydia’s hair, resplendently uncovered, sat like a beacon of sinful attire, an exemplar of Christian laxity. She could almost feel the judgement of the congregation, boring into the back of her scandalously uncovered head. The preacher never once made eye contact with her, and yet every word of the sermon seemed to be shared for her critique and correction.
I won’t name the denomination. But, fairly ironically, its name included the word free.
1 Corinthians 11 picks right up from the previous three chapters, but with a switch of topic.
Men, women, and head coverings.
Some cultural background is helpful. In the First Century world, a married women would commonly have worn a covering on her head. It was a symbol of unavailability, demonstrating to every other man that this women was taken. She was married. In contrast, an uncovered head communicated that a women was available and that advances were welcome.
The Corinthians, however, had a strong understanding of Christian freedom. A freedom that meant that their salvation was so deeply secure in what Jesus had done for them, that they were ‘free’ from religious and cultural norms. Their holiness was an inward matter—of the heart—and thus external things such as food, haircuts and clothing were irrelevant to their new situation. They were free. The Cross was that powerful.
So what is Paul doing?
It comes in exactly the same mould as the previous chapter.
He wants them to take this extraordinary freedom, and point it in the direction of love.
And in this instance, love manifests specifically as honour.
Every wife who prays or prophecies with her head uncovered dishonours her head.
Her ‘head’, in this instance, is (metaphorically) her husband.
Dressing like a single woman, in your culture, Paul is saying, dishonours your husband. In the culture in which you live, it denies your commitment to him, expressing something to your city and to your community that eradicates his significance in your life, and thus publicly humiliates him.
The church that called itself free, visited by Lydia that Sunday, had got things deeply wrong. They had taken a cultural norm from First Century Corinth, and used it to apply an external law to their people in their contemporary context. They had missed the deeper pursuit of mutual honour, turning it instead to a measure of graceless legality that actively dishonoured one of their only visitors that Sunday. In another twist of irony, they had abdicated both freedom and honour in a total reversal of the Gospel.
This speaks to all of us—men and women1—into our marriages, our friendships, our parenting, and our mission.
It speaks to us, once again, of inhabiting the radical permissions of the Gospel,
and yet,
and yet,
it also calls us to the higher path. To consider how our every means of presentation and choice may not focus on the indulgence of our liberties, but may be used to restore honour and beauty and holiness to those around us.
Because the higher way is always the lower way. The way up is always the way down. The way that truly inhabits the extravagance of freedom uses it for the ends of extravagant honour.
Reflect:
Think of my relationships, that have run through my mind as I read these words today.
What can I do today to show them a greater measure of honour?
Pray:
Father in heaven,
Today my prayer is so simple:
Stretch in me the measureless understanding of the freedom you have given me,
And create in me a heart of measureless love,
That I may have the courage and consistency
To go low;
Restoring honour to those around me,
With a life that looks and feels and heals,
Like the Jesus that I follow.
In His Name
Amen
Old Testament:
For those also reading the Old Testament this year, your additional readings are here:
Deuteronomy 12-13 | Proverbs 10:31-11:7
Fellas, we’ll get some specific words coming our way in later New Testament writings.