I need your help! AND Modesty

OK, so I have made the decision that I need an alias. Signing my entries as "me" is getting old really fast. I need suggestions. I will pick my favorites from your suggestions, and have people vote for their favorite! So, stay tuned for that. I am actually writing this from my computer. Yay!!!! So, I just got back from a couple days in New England. I am still a little tired. Tomorrow I am going to a major league baseball game with my youth group from church and we are going on a scavenger hunt. Enough about me. Now that I am back on my computer (at least until it stops working again!), I am going to try to get back into my devotional writing habit. I am going back to do one or two more entries on Modesty since I didn’t get that wrapped up in a tidy fashion. So here goes…. I am going to start with a quote from one of my teachers from my homeschool co-op. I e-mailed her to get her opinion, since I respect her and wanted to hear her viewpoint. Here goes:

"Modesty is easy to recognize in clothing (a lack of modesty is probably more easily recognized!!!), but to put the concept into words is very difficult. Still, here goes my attempt:

Modesty in any form has to do with humility. Modesty about intellect would encompass not "showing off" what you know without being asked for information or offering information merely to try and impress people with your intelligence.

Sticking with that idea then, to me, modesty in dress would be dressing with humility. With an understanding that God grants us many gifts, which may include intellect, beautiful eyes, a loving spirit, and/or an attractive figure, modesty recognizes our gifts don’t need to be "flouted" before people. In fact, doing so can cheapen the gift and (depending on which gift is not being handled with modesty) cause people to look at the immodest person with any number of negative responses – envy, dislike, disdain, lust.

Unlike the other gifts, however, dress carries with it an element of danger. Modesty in dress is a rather uniquely feminine issue for this reason. While immodest dress by males might cause lust, it is far more likely to be a response elicited by immodesty in female dress. While modest dress will not prevent unwanted sexual advances (or much worse) assaults, it certainly does not encourage them. Having seen victims and perpetrators of such crimes, bad choices, either in where the person was, who they were with, or what they were doing (and I would include in that choices in dress, mannerisms, and lifestyle) played a role to some degree.

So, short answer? Dressing with modesty is dressing in a manner God wouldn’t shake His head at. It’s dressing in a manner that recognizes our bodies are temples and not just showcases for skimpy clothing designed to turn the heads of the opposite sex."

Wow. She brought up something I hadn’t thought about. Modesty is connected to humility. It is not about serving yourselves with your clothing, but others. That really hits home with me. I tend to not think of others at times, and hopefully that will happen less often as I get older and closer to Christ. I am realizing that so many things that happen between me and my brothers, or my friends, or anyone can get out of focus when the focus is on me. When I start thinking WWJD or putting others ahead of myself, things change for the better. I dare you to find a self-centered person that is genuinely happy with their life and relationships. It is extremely rare that that will happen, if at all. I just wanted to share that with you today. Be humble, put others first, plain and simple!!

~Me (don’t forget to suggest aliases for me!!)~