It's not an excuse, but...

Michael at Christian Conservative authored a very interesting, nay even controversial post today, titled The virtue of Modesty. His premise is that modesty in society as a whole is a function of how women in that society act.

His exact words are "Women are the guardians of modesty in society." In addition, Michael makes a corollary statement that I think is right on: "Men will behave as badly as our women will let us."

I spent several years in the mid- and late-90s involved in ministry with single adults. It's an interesting group of people to know and work with, and sadly, one of the most under-served groups in a lot of churches.

The years between college and marriage, whether it's but a few or a dozen, are the most difficult of any for single Christians. The culture of Christian churches doesn't account for it. Ministries and their focus are built around young people and married couples while the 'tweeners are left to themselves.

Sexuality adds fuel to this already burning fire. The fact that men and women view it differently and react differently to it adds to the burden of single-ness for many.

Over the course of my years in this ministry, our pastor would every-so-often start a teaching series on "Christian dating." In a group of 100 single men and women you will run the entire gamut; well-adjusted young professionals who are relationally-literate but are involved in the ministry because they desire to meet like-minded people to the stereo-typical "social misfit," for whom relationship-building, much less dating, is pure torture. Like any other cross-section of society, a collection of Christians won't be too different than the society at large aside from their Christian faith.

To this group, Pastor Duncan would bring his series and try simply to offer some broad guidelines about developing meaningful Christian relationships between the sexes, be they platonic or romantic (and here's where we get to Michael's points).

Men, left to themselves, will speak and act sexually. They will stare, they will desire and they will vocalize it. At the extreme, they'll act it out if given the opportunity. It's hard-wired into the machinery.

Having said that, God offers sufficient grace to us for dealing with our desires in an appropriate manner. In the spirit of Paul's first letter to the Corinthians, Gordy would also point out that women have a responsibility not to feed the beast.

1 Corinthians 8: 9-13--9Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak. 10For if anyone with a weak conscience sees you who have this knowledge eating in an idol's temple, won't he be emboldened to eat what has been sacrificed to idols? 11So this weak brother, for whom Christ died, is destroyed by your knowledge. 12When you sin against your brothers in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. 13Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause him to fall.

As Christians have an obligation not to cause a brother to stumble in the case of food prepared before idols, so Christian sisters have a similar obligation not to tempt Christian brothers in their words, actions or by their dress.

Seems a bit oppressive at first blush, doesn't it? The important thing to understand though is that when single men and women honor each other--the woman by restraining herself and not feeding the man's natural tendency to sexual sin, and the man by engaging the woman in a relationship based on honor, love and affection rather than just sexuality--they are both better served and both better off.

I think Michael got it right. Women need to understand their responsibility in this matter. Having said that, a woman's behavior is not an excuse: ultimately how a man deals with his sexual nature is his responsibility.

As I said though, when a man and a woman each understand their unique responsibility in their relationship when it comes to sexuality each will be rewarded with a healthy and satisfying relationship that is God-honoring.

If you read the comments section after his post, Michael has taken a little heat about it today, but I think he got it right. Regardless of whether he did or didn't get it right, such discussions are refreshing and frankly for Christians in today's world, necessary.