Chapter 2 "The Secret" and Chapter 3 "The Mark" Overview

Chapter 2 - "The Secret":

This chapter begins with a quote from Wendy Shalit, who is 20 year old author. She describes how people used to give her advice on dating when she was younger, especially if she was alone and not ''hooking up'' with people on a regular basis.

The question pops up: Is that what God really intended? Was it His plan to have us ''try'' this guy and then that one like you might a new cosmetic line that advertises, "Try us for 30 days free!"? Is it possible that God has something else in mind?

God originally created the woman to complete ... fulfill ... finish a man. Need proof? Genesis 2, God said "it is not good for man to be alone." God was walking and talking with Adam! God could have fulfilled that void that was missing in Adam, but he didn't. Instead, he crafted this masterpiece called WOMAN!

Bill Perkins, an author, said he's asked men on many occasions what the most beautiful sight on earth is and they respond with a"a gorgeous woman." We've been given all the power of the most beautiful masterpiece on Earth, just think about that for a minute! Advertising even attached little sensors to reader's eyeballs to see what makes someone spend time reading an ad, some things had like 1%, 2%, but if a woman was in the ad, it increased the length of time they spent looking at an add from 14 to 30%. That's way more than anything else. Not even good looking men get looked at as much, because even the women look at the women on the page. Why? Because we're beautiful, a beautiful masterpiece.

Author Henry Rogers shows us how powerful our power of beauty is on men by describing a situation. He says that "if it is the bottom of the ninth in the seventh game of the World Series ... (huge moment for guys) ... and the home team is down by three runs and has two outs with the bases loaded ... (the stakes are getting higher) ... and the home-run king is at the plate ... (now this is a major life moment for guys) ... and suddenly a beautiful woman pulls off her top ... the guys would forget the game! Now, thats some pretty powerful stuff.

Our bodies create quite a stir in guys and can drive a guy crazy. Proverbs 5:18-19 says "rejoice in the wife of your youth ... May you ever be captivated by her love." The word captivated means intoxicated. Just imagine your husband on your wedding night filled with a holy drunken stupor because of you. But there's a catch. The passage says "the wife" which means one woman. The Bible reconfirms countless times that this intoxication should only be shared by one guy ... after you're married. Yes, you could ''have many men'' but God says ''just one.''

Many girls today are not the best ''secret keepers'' with their hip huggers complemented by belly rings, miniskits, matched to high heels, tight shirts to go with tighter pants. Dannah's not telling us we have to cover our bodies from head to toe, she's telling us that fashion is OK. And although, God implores us to be more concerned with our inner beauty than our external beauty, He does provide a consistent theme for appreciating external beauty. There are many examples in the Bible of this. Even the woman of Bible times weren't without the use of fashion of the day. Esther was pampered for twelve months. Fashion, though, was as strange then as it was now. The difference? The culture then knew the power of modesty.

Beauty and fashion aren't condemned by the Christian faith, beauty actually seems synonymous with God's glory. Read Revelation 4:3. Beauty is one of God's greatest expressions, I think that we should strive to express ourselves through beauty, in His image!

Most girls do struggle with feeling ''not beautiful'', like they're too tall or too fat. And most girls that look at fashion magazines end up feeling depressed about their own bodies. But what does God say about us? God looks down on you and is "enthralled by your beauty" (Psalm 45:11). Think about it, God of the Heaven and Earth is enthralled by our beauty, not Miss America's, not Hilary Duff, ours!! Express your unique beautifulness, just be sure to keep the most powerful part of your beauty as a secret for just one mean. God's purpose for us is to express His beauty, and part of it is to ''intoxicate'' one man with that beauty. Dannah tells us at the end to buckle up and be ready to dig deeper.

Point to look at: "God's intended purpose for you as a carefully crafted masterpiece is to ''intoxicate'' one man with the fullest extent of your beauty."

Also, there are Truth and Bare Fashion Tests in which I will be going over with you on Thursday. But if you'd like to get a sneak peek to them, the website is:
http://purefreedom.org/downloads/SKLockerPoster.pdf

It is a download so it might conflict with some of ya'll's computers.

Chapter 3 - "The Mark":

This chapter starts off talking about Miss California Lisa Ryan and when they picked a dress for her that was rather sexy for her crowning. She said she felt a little uncomfortable with it, but then she was intrigued by the power it gave her. She realized, though, that she had crossed the line and that it wasn't what she wanted to be remembered for.

Then, Dannah asks you: How would you define sin? Well Chatta is the Greek and Hebrew name for sin. The Greek meaning for the word is "to miss the mark." If you're an archer, what do you want to hit? The bulls-eye. Well spiritually, the bulls-eye is God's intended purpose for you. This is a basic conception, but think about it, meditate on it. God's not condemning you for your sin, He is saying "do you have any idea the fantastic blessing you just missed? I can't reward you with the prize now, but try again." She then asks you to place the sin that misses the target all together. She's not saying that the sin has to be ''big'' to be a sin. The meaning of chatta doesn't mean "missed the target." It means "missed the mark." You can actually hit the target without hitting the bulls-eye. Gossip is an example of a sin that hits the target but not the bulls-eye, its when we do not willfully sin against God, but instead, we're mirroring the world around us.

She says God doesn't have ''levels'' of sin, but asks us to put sins that hit the target but not the bulls-eye. She, then, asks if we put immodesty. Of course, she's going to fall back on immodesty, after all, its what the book is about! The bulls-eye represents God's intended purpose for your life.

She goes on to talk about the automatic nervous system and how the ANS affects guys, visually. Its usually caused by the environment, its hard for us girls to understand how powerful this sexual attraction is since we are not guys. A guy can just walk past a larger-than-life Victoria's Secret poster and get aroused. The environment controls it. Its very hard for a guy to make a righteous choice when the ANS is activated, and he is completely responsible for his sexual advances. This temptation is even in the strongest Christian guys.

They talked to Max for Superchic about him and his band getting tempted while being on stage performing and girls in skimpy clothing down below him. His solution? To devour in his Bible as soon as he got off stage. These are Christian guys ministering at a Christian event. Most of these girls are causing their Christian brothers to stumble and they have no clue they're doing it.

Corinthians 10:32 says "Do not cause anyone to stumble." And Ephesians 5:3 says "But among you there must not even be a hint of sexual immorality, or of any kind of impurity, or of greed, because these are improper for God's holy people." Not a hint of sexual sin. We definitely have a hint of sexual sin when we wear tight T-shirts, short skirts, or low-cut blouses. Missing the mark is dressing immodest, because you can create arousal in many men. Is it just fashion? No, immodesty is sin.

Truth is, the path is narrow, but the gifts are rewarding. Its been even proven that women who wait for sex until marriage have better sex lives. Even USA Today did an article about it called "Revenge of the Church Ladies." Imagine if you save it all for your husband one day. She gives us a bit about taking us farther into the guy's mind in the next chapter.

Point to look at: "Since immodesty creates arousal in many men, it misses the mark of God's intended purpose for you. It's not just fashion. It's sin."