Christian Calendar Girls and Modesty

Immediate Context and Why Word Study Starts There

You start with the immediate context of what it's saying because that's where it's giving the definition of the words, the terms, things like that. Then you branch out to, you want to go chapter, you can do chapter, but chapter breaks are not inspired, neither are verse breaks, but you break out from that.

So you want, if you have something that is a section where you are starting to, where as we are looking at, you have something that is supporting. Well, you're going to start with, well, what's this supporting?

That's the immediate context that right there in that part. So you're going to use that because we're in the sentence structure may end up helping us to see how a word is used, what it's emphasizing, what's it supporting?

Is it being used as an illustration or as a literal? Things like that. Then you branch out and work your way out to a book. You can end up then going, if you're looking at specifically a word, you're going to then want to look at how that word is used by the same author.

Because the author may not use the word the same way. You then can break out into how the word is used elsewhere in scripture. But just because a word is used several times one way by many writers of scripture doesn't mean it's being used the same way every time.

And so that's why the immediate context is so important. This is Apologetics Live. To answer your questions, your host from Striving for Eternity Ministries, Andrew Rappaport. We are live, Apologetics Live, here to answer your most challenging questions about God and the Bible.

We can answer any question that you have about God and the Bible. We do it every week. You come in, you give us some challenging question, and I go, I don't know. Because I don't know is a perfectly good answer.

I'm your host, Andrew Rappaport from Striving for Eternity. I'm going to bring in my co-host here, who is only with us for about 45 minutes, Mr. Drew Vonita.

Howdy, howdy, howdy. That seems to be my favorite answer to any Bible question is, I don't know. And it gets me out of like, especially like on Twitter. I don't know. Oh, that's okay. You're right. Yeah, I don't know.

Hey, well, speaking of Twitter, wait, X, it's the X Twitter. Yeah, you know, that's what happens when you leave Twitter, right? You're X Twitter. Supposedly, people on Twitter that respond, did I just see a little child run past you?

Wow. And trying to see how fast he or she could go.

Well, we only have voice for now. Yeah, but he is. He's very fast.

Calendar Controversy, Modesty, and the Christian Witness

Yeah. So supposedly now they've they've made some changes and we will be able to supposedly put up comments that are put on Twitter. So if you're watching us on Twitter, we now StreamYard should have that where we would be able to to see those.

OK, now we only have Drew for 45 minutes. We're going to change things up. We are going to I was planning on triggering Drew and making him around for longer and see. But he's got some he actually has to go do.

So we're going to postpone the in the news section. I'm just going to let Drew know he hears so he knows what he's missing. We're going to talk about in the in the news section. There's I don't know if any of you guys heard.

There's this big, big, huge news that the, you know, I've seen pilot client list has been released. Well, no, not really. I'm going to tell you why the client list will never be released. It may not be what you're thinking, but it's very simple to know what really is going on there.

OK, I'm just going to lay the facts out. I'll let you come to your own conclusions. You'll know the real reasons by the end of the show, because we'll end with that. You know, which, you know, we also may not be able to, you know, Drew will have to listen later to find out how a woman could be raped in the metaverse.

Yes, that's a real case before court. Yep. We will talk about that. Those are two things I had for the in the news section, but we're going to wait on those. So Mr. Hunt holds is saying chat is active on Twitter for streaming.

Supposedly, I got a message saying that now StreamYard is working with X so that they would be able to we'd be able to see the comments from there. We usually see the ones on some Facebook Facebook pages, I think it is.

It's an age, but YouTube is the one that seems to work the best. But if you want to join us and ask us some difficult questions, you can go to Apologize Live dot com. You just scroll down to a little duck icon.

That's the the StreamYard icon and click on the duck and give your permissions, of course, to the browser to use your microphone and camera and join us.

And Jason Cave says, how about them dogs, Brother Drew? That's right. So now let me explain here, Andrew, because you don't understand this. I didn't know you have a dog. I do, but he stays way back in in the backyard.

The Georgia Bulldogs won the Orange Bowl against Florida State University, and they didn't just win. They demolished.

Oh, you mean like Trump won in 2020 demolished, but so they know sort of, but not the same.

Yeah, sort of, but not the same. So the Bulldogs won 63 63 to three.

And it's actually a football game.

Yes, yes.

So it wasn't like basketball where you get like 63 points scored.

Wow.

And this is it's making all the Georgia people upset.

You get like 70 or seven points, right?

If you score a touchdown and get six points for a touchdown and an extra seven points, right? Make seven points.

So they did like almost nine. Wow, that's a lot.

It is.

That's embarrassing. Yeah.

And but the thing is, is it's making a lot of Georgia people upset because we had the best record in NCAA, but we don't get to play for the national championship. And that has to do with all the politics and the NCAA.

And so now we being the best team don't get to play for the national championship. And we have to watch all the other teams that are not as good as us.

Well, I mean, since you're talking about dogs, Eric Mancini is saying that Frank Mullis has cat calendars. So I guess that takes some explanation on who Eric and Frank are. So many folks here know Frank Mullis because Frank Mullis was one of our speakers at Striving Fraternity.

Eric Mancini is his nemesis. And he's not only a nemesis, but a nemesis with a cat. That's basically what it is. And so, yeah. Actually, speaking of nemesis, look who we have here. It's Mr. Honnels himself, the nemesis.

There we go.

You know, I know why he's actually here.

Why is that?

Because he's afraid we're going to steal all his material for Voice of Reason Radio. And he wants to come in and make sure that he can claim that he was the originator of what we're going to talk about tonight.

And so when he says it on his show, he says, well, I was on Apologetics Live, but I had it first.

All right.

He brought all his show notes because, Drew, you and I both know that he comes with show notes to his show, right?

That's true. Yes, yes, yes.

So welcome, Chris.

Let me just say. Now, the reason this show came about is Andrew called me the other night and we were on the phone talking about it. And I said, well, hey, why don't we do this? Because it's a big thing in the Twitterverse right now.

And there's some backlash from supposed Christians about this very topic, which is kind of odd.

OK, so they talk about the topic. And then I'm going to talk about what I called you about as well, because we should start with that, too. And I didn't know about this. I'm not on. And it's not the Twitterverse.

It's the Xverse. I mean, come on, get up with the Times. So you were telling me how in the Xverse there is a whole bunch of brouhaha about the fact that there are there's a calendar of conservative Christian women in bikinis.

I will admit I know nothing of it. I didn't see the calendar. I don't plan to see the calendar. So I don't need to know much details about the calendar to talk about the topic of modesty. OK, so for the record, I leave looking at the immodest women to Drew.

Well, you're the one that knows all about the calendar. I knew nothing.

Just because I know about it doesn't mean I've seen it. Which, by the way, I have not seen it.

All right. So here's the thing. Here's what I called you. And I want to let folks know what we plan to do, not every single week on Apologetics Live, but probably many of them this year. I'm going to have you guys help me with some of my debate prep for my debate with Michael Brown on the charismatic gifts.

There is a show. Now, I will say I have yet to listen to episodes from them, but I've downloaded about 60 or 70 episodes to start listening to. And we're going to review them here throughout the year.

It's a show called Remnant Radio or The Remnant Radio. They're charismatics from what I gathered. Why are we going to review? Well, one of the things is they claimed, as was shared to me, these clips that they are willing to debate the issue of the continuation of gifts with anyone that's willing to debate them.

And I said, hi, here I am.

And you know what?

You know what I got back?

Crickets. That's right. Crickets.

Someone who challenged me told me how I'm a coward. I'm not willing to debate them. I said, I've offered the debate. I contacted them through their page and, you know, the YouTube, and I haven't heard anything.

Other people tagged me and said, Andrew's willing to debate you. I haven't heard anything. Now, for the record, I am a coward. I'm afraid of these guys. Granted, I don't know who they are. They may be very good at debates.

I am such a coward, Drew, that I was I'm willing to debate a guy who has what, like 100 formal debates? Michael Brown.

Yeah.

At least Michael Brown is man enough to take the debate. Don't say you're willing to debate and then run from it and say everyone else is being the coward.

Okay.

When do the terms Andrew run or Andrew coward or Andrew afraid of debate? Do those words ever seem to go together?

My rule of thumb has been. Why am I getting echo? My rule of thumb has been where angels fear to tread. Andrew goes.

Yeah.

I mean, so what we're going to do is since since they won't debate me, then what we're going to do is we're going to take clips from their show and interact with them. And so that'll actually help me in my prep for the debate with Michael Brown, which means hopefully there's going to be some folks that believe in the continuation of gifts that you're going to reach out, come on the show, and we're going to have good dialogues.

And that way we could discuss these things. And and hey, the worst is, is that the arguments that Michael and I make are going to be much better and it'll be a much better product for the Christian community.

That's one of the things I will say before we get into the topic tonight. I was really glad about when I did talk to Michael Brown about the debate, the fact that he he and I both had a strong view that we were getting some getting some echo from Chris, I think.

Yeah.

Yeah, I muted you. So you can unmute when you get figure out your tech. So both Michael and I were very committed to producing good content, to have a debate that doesn't have name calling, isn't doing all that, but being able to have something that will be useful for the body of Christ.

Facebook user says y 'all got Buddy the Elf on. Now, I would like to say that that must be Haps Addison because, you know, Haps is always the one that likes to be Facebook user. But he's he decided a good time to do the passing the torch classes would be during apologetics live.

Haps, what in the world, man? So I responded as he said, hey, we're going to start classes. And I'm like, yeah, well, it'll be real interesting when I have to teach the classes.

And I'm here just saying, you know, you know what I notice is in. Oh, it's Pastor Darren. Pastor Darren Stid.

Oh, OK.

In Chris's brand new office setup. He doesn't have any of his Buddy the Elf memorabilia, but I think he's got some Ultraman all over the place.

He's got no, no, no, no. He has Buddy the Elf cup hidden up and above.

You see?

See, he's pointing to it. All right. So let's let's talk about this calendar stuff. And then we'll get to the in the news section afterwards to talk about some stuff that that came up there. So I'm not.

Look, I didn't know about the calendars until you mentioned it.

The.

This is not new to me. I mean, I'm not surprised, I should say. I mean, it's like this is this is yet again, probably someone who is at least a professing Christian looking to act like the world, meaning, hey, a great way to make money.

Everyone else does calendars. Everyone else has girls in bikini calendars. Let's do one with Christians. The fact that as you shared with me some some of the stuff and seeing that there's people professing Christians, professing conservative Christians that are saying, hey, it's not a big deal.

That's actually kind of concerning. And the reason is twofold. One that gets me is one. It says that the Christian community probably has been so influenced by the world that girls in bikinis are probably not a big deal to them anymore.

Right.

OK, I think, you know, and it's not just and Chris, you're very active on on X as well. So it's not just now that he's retired, he's retired. But it's not just professing Christians saying it's not a big deal.

It's professing Christians actually going on the attack and fighting for it. That's what makes it even more concerning, because it's one thing to just brush it off and say it's not a big deal. So it's another thing to say it's not a big deal, but we have to have this or we must have this or I'm going to fight for this.

And the thing is, is like so now I don't know if all of the the women on there are professing Christians. I know Riley Gaines, the Olympic swimmer. I think she was an Olympic swimmer. I don't know. But we all know she's very active in the CRT trans type stuff.

Yes, she was a collegiate swimmer. She's on there and I know she's a professing believer. And so it's it's one of those things.

Let's let's stop you there, because this is what you and I talked about, right? Right now, she's a swimmer. Is it unusual for her to be in a bathing suit?

It's not unusual for her to be in a bathing suit.

No, when she's doing comfortable in a bathing suit, because that's where she's going to be photographed in bathing suits.

Right now, it's one thing to be to in your sport, have to wear that in your sport. Right, because something like swimming or running, the goal is to wear as little as possible or as skin tight as possible so that you have less drag.

Right. It creates less drag so that you can move faster. It's another thing to voluntarily pose in as little as possible for the sole purpose of marketing yourself or marketing something to men.

Yeah. So the question is, is and this was the question when you mentioned her that I asked you is, was she in a bikini? Right, because that then is different. She's not wearing a bikini when she goes to swim for her sport.

Right now, I think she's on the cover because that's the picture that's going around is the cover of the of the calendar. I think she's on the cover. I'm not sure if that's her or not. But yes, from what I understand, all the women that are featured in there in this conservative.

And of course, we go, well, what are we conserving that they are featured, all featured in bikinis?

Well, I think that's the real headache in all of this is that what does conservative mean? Because once upon a time and I wrote something that I threw both on Twitter and on the blog is that once upon a time, you know, the conservative political machine recognized there was something objective about morality and that fed into the belief system about why we wanted smaller government, why freedom and liberty was important.

And as we began to become more consumed with just getting elected, that objective morality became an obstacle. And I remember as much as 10, 15 years ago, having a co-worker who said she wanted to see the Republican Party jettison abortion and gay marriage as a platform issue.

Because, you know, you know, we need to be worried about, you know, winning the election, number one. And number two, you know, you know, everybody's going to have their, their, their different perspectives and all this stuff.

And it's not it's not helping them. And we went from having any sense of objectivity, objective morality that drove why we believe what we believe to we need to win. And you see that going forward, one of the biggest contributing arguments to just this particular issue is, well, you know, all this stuff is, is not going to do you any good if we lose and we can't address it if we're not in office.

So it's become an entirely pragmatic argument. That's why they're aping the left. They've unhitched themselves. They've done an Andy Stanley. They've unhitched themselves from the church and they see it only as a demographic to get votes for, but they see no need for our voice or our, or our belief system.

And so what they're trying to do is all that matters now is winning. That's the only driving factor. So if it means aping what the left does and accepting sexual immorality, which is what this is, then that's what they're going to do.

That's why they will partner with people like Dave Rubin, openly homosexual, who will rent the womb of a mother so that he can have a custom-made baby. That's why they'll congratulate him, pat him on the back, lift him up as an icon.

I think you did a podcast episode on that.

Yeah, we absolutely did. In fact, it's going to be again. But that's, that's the whole point is that, you know, the, the, the conservative political machine isn't conservative. Excuse me, Drew, you said it right on the head.

What are you conserving? You might as well change it to something else. You might as well just change it to not the left. Call it anything but conservative because you're not, you're not conserving anything.

You're just simply trying to be an alternative, you know, call it, say we're not, Hey, at least we're not Democrats.

You know, that that's a little bit less, they're a little bit less left or less Marxist, right?

Yeah, exactly. I mean, and that's the thing. It's like, what, everybody says, Oh, well, we need to vote in the right. Why? Yeah. You want government solutions from these guys. You're not asking for small government.

Why do you want them?

Well, we see it with, hold on a second. What I don't want to do, I don't want to do exactly what you're saying, right? It's so easy for us to fall into the political aspect of it as well. And, and really, I think I want to at least start with more of a biblical view with this, because I think that look what I see concerning.

And Drew sent, gave me some things with Twitter and I went and looked up some stuff and was like, wow. Okay. So it was interesting because there were comments about the fact that you have some people who are defending this.

And some people are kind of calling out going, Hmm, it looks like you want these calendars. Could it be you like looking at them, but you feel more spiritual about the fact that they're Christians. It's not bad.

And that seems to be some of the, what I was seeing in some people like, well, it's because it's Christians. It's okay for us to look at women, not properly dressed like that makes it okay. But that is some of the, the, the issue of what I, what I ended up seeing.

And so, you know, as we look at that, I want us to just address the issue first from a biblical perspective of modesty. And I'm going to tell you right off the bat, I am going to accept, I'm going to upset many people here, men included.

Okay. Because I'm going to say something that when we talk about modesty, that is going to upset everybody.

I think, I know where, I think I know where you're going to go and I think I'm going to agree with it as well.

It wouldn't be Apologetics Live if you didn't offend all of us at some point.

No, no. Okay. So do you remember when we had Les and we, and we had everyone on talking about,.

I got the screenshot.

When we started talking about justification by faith and Andrew was talking about basically disagreeing with us on the point of regeneration.

Not disagreeing with the Bible, but you.

I have the screenshot of everybody's face.

Hanholtz has this perfectly timed screenshot of all of us going, huh?

It's great.

Beautiful.

But to get back, so a lot of what Hanholtz was just saying, we see, we do see it in the abortion movement, right? We see, well, we just need to get these people elected so we can end abortion. Then once we got them elected, it was, well, we just need Roe v. Wade to be overturned, right?

Then once Roe v. Wade was overturned, it was, oh, well, no one's going to vote for that. We've got to gain traction and no one's going to want to vote for the abolition of abortion. Okay, you're just continuing to push the goal post a little more, right?

But now what I'm going to say this, and I've said it before with my host, Chris Huff, who's backstage, and I said it when we were talking about when we did our episode on head coverings on Matter of Theology, and it was people don't realize the American church, they don't realize how influenced by feminism they are because this is very much an influence of the feminist movement that came in that told women, you can do whatever you want with your bodies and you don't have to cover.

It's the men who need to just control themselves.

We're going to push that even further because, and this is where, as I mentioned, I'm going to bring in some stuff from the news in the news section, but it's going to tie into this because there is stuff that's going on with the third wave of feminism.

And we did an episode on that here sometime last year, early in the year, I think. But where you look at the waves of feminism, where now the argument is, well, as women, we have to put ourselves out and we have to have control over things.

I'm going to hold off on that because I really want to jump right. I want to jump into some scripture here and see what scripture has to say on this. And then, you know, make sure I upset some people.

Okay, I will upset them because, well, that's just the way it is. But here's what scripture says. First, Timothy chapter two. I'm starting here in verse nine. Likewise, I want women to adorn themselves with proper clothing, modestly and discreetly, not with braided hair and golds or pearls or costly garments, but rather by means of good works, as is proper for women making a claim to godliness.

Let's look at this. He says he wants them modest. He wants them being discreet. Now, what's this whole thing with braiding your hair with golds and pearls? That's we believe that as we look at the history that the prostitutes would braid their hair with gold.

Now, keep in mind that in that at that time and even today, Jewish women would not let you see their hair. They cover their hair.

Okay.

It's a thing where to, you know, if they're sitting here and they braid their hair with gold or pearls. So it attracts the view of men.

Okay.

This is a culture where they didn't dress the way people do today. So they had to use other things to gather, get the attention, and this would be their hair.

What we could say today is women should adorn themselves with proper clothing, modestly and discreet, not wearing leggings.

I was going to say it.

Well, it's going to get worse than that. So hold on. We will get worse than that. But what does it say here? This is what is proper for women making a claim of godliness. So if you're going to sit there and say, oh, you guys are just you're against women.

No, no.

We're being really clear. What scripture says is if you claim you're claiming to be a Christian woman, you're claiming to be a woman of godliness. Then yes. Yes. This applies to you.

Now, one of the things in those comments, which was also really disturbing, is you saw mothers defending their children in dressing that way or being models.

Right.

Which also would lead to go that this also gains a father's approval. Now, as a husband. Now, my wife, she would never do that out in public.

Right.

And she does. She makes that conviction on her own. But at the same time, I don't want her dressing that way either. And she knows it. And also, not only do I not want her dressing that way, I don't want other men looking at her in that way.

Let alone if I had if we had a daughter, I definitely would not want that.

So let me take this now to an issue that I see very common within Christian circles on social media. We look at women in modesty. And a lot of people talk about what women should be modest in their apparel.

We agree. I just read the scripture. Hey, guys, you too. I don't care how much weight you've lost. We do not need to see you stripped down to your underwear in a before and after photo to see how good you look.

Because the reality is what we have going on today. And I know I'm going to quote someone who claims to be Christian but seems to be more Catholic. But I don't know. And that's Candace Owens. She just did an episode today.

Where she makes the argument very well, I may say, made the argument that it's the women today that are the perverts. When you look at the third wave feminism, where has it led? It led to your you're saying women shouldn't wear leggings.

Think about how many cases we see of women going to the gym, having things hanging out. And then they get upset when guys look at them and they try to make a big deal. They record it.

Right.

Oh, I'm a victim. Well, Candace Owens had a woman that decided, you know, what's the difference between leggings and paint? And so she went to the gym wearing nothing but paint. And a guy threw her out of the gym.

Good for him. And she, along with a bunch of other guys who probably wanted her in the gym so that they could stare at her, were sitting there trying to defend it. OK, so so the reality is, is don't tell me that the girls don't want to look at the guys bodies either.

OK, so guys nowadays are doing this. It's like we're doing a role reversal here where the girls are trying to be like, oh, we can flaunt it and it's not a big deal, but it's the guys that we're looking at.

And so this is something we talk about modesty. And I know you, Drew, you want to talk about the calendars, but I wanted to extend it because this is something I've been seeing on social media a lot from Christians and who we would say are good conservative guys.

Guys in our own camp, but what are they doing? Here's what I used to look like. Here's what I look like today. And there's they're wearing less than some of the girls, probably in this bikini.

Chris Huff and I have talked at length about this throughout, probably, I don't know, the past three, four years or so.

Oh, man.

Yeah, we've we've talked a bunch about this, a bunch about this. And I have a lot of thoughts about this as well.

And let me say this. Chris, you you post pictures of you working out in the gym.

Yep. Yep.

You do. And that's encouraging to people. I just post pictures of it, of an of a bathtub, a cold plunge.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

A cold plunge. That's that's.

You're insane.

He supposedly took.

I believe him. I believe nobody. Nobody's going to brag about doing a cold plunge unless they actually do it. Trust me. Listen, they're not.

You can ask my neighbors because I think they heard the scream.

Look, see, I don't I don't brag about it, but I've been doing this for about six or seven months or so. And that's in the shower. I'll end my shower with about three to five minutes of cold water.

Yeah.

Yep.

And because it's because it's really it's really good for you.

Yeah. Yeah.

I don't get it.

Yes.

It's even it's even better than watching, you know, Buddy the Elf.

OK.

So but it was torturous to Chris Huff's, you know, you post pictures or videos of you working out.

Yeah.

But in those you're not. I mean, you're dressed.

I'm I'm fully clothed.

Yeah.

OK.

There's a big difference there.

And I'm very careful, by the way. I'm very careful. And this plays into it. And I'm going to just let me just say this. I'm very careful when I do that of angles.

Mm hmm.

And very, very, very careful on length as well. Why are there balloons?

That's crazy.

Did you guys see that?

You were like this and you're probably using some crazy things.

Yeah.

You're using a new iPhone software where if you do certain like when Chris did the two thumbs up.

Yeah. Yeah.

It was like.

Yeah.

So. So.

But I mean, you have to be mindful of that stuff. You can do it tastefully. I mean, I know people personally and we all know people personally. We'll put it that way.

Who? Who?

Andrew, I think, you know, we're thinking of thinking about. Let me just go ahead and say it like I understand that might be your job. You might you. That may be what the Lord has given you as far as a way to provide for your family.

But it can be done in a way that does not cause people to stumble. I think of Paul's words in Romans 14. I think of Paul's words to the church at Corinth when he's when he's reminding them to to not do anything to cause a weaker brother or sister to stumble in any way, shape or form.

And of course, Paul's talking about what you eat, the meat that you eat, if you, you know, but but but the same principle applies in this situation. You know, going back to the Riley Gaines thing, a couple of things real quick.

I've been I've been sitting on this. I wasn't going to jump in, but but I've been sitting on this for a minute. A couple of things about Riley Gaines. Now, I have not seen the calendar. I heard about it like like Drew and Han holds like, you know, it was all over Twitter X.