When You Gather…
March 9, 2025
Preached by Benjamin Vrbicek
Scripture Reading
1 Corinthians 11:2-16
2 Now I commend you because you remember me in everything and maintain the traditions even as I delivered them to you. 3 But I want you to understand that the head of every man is Christ, the head of a wife is her husband, and the head of Christ is God. 4 Every man who prays or prophesies with his head covered dishonors his head, 5 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. 6 For if a wife will not cover her head, then she should cut her hair short. But since it is disgraceful for a wife to cut off her hair or shave her head, let her cover her head. 7 For a man ought not to cover his head, since he is the image and glory of God, but woman is the glory of man. 8 For man was not made from woman, but woman from man.9 Neither was man created for woman, but woman for man. 10 That is why a wife ought to have a symbol of authority on her head, because of the angels. 11 Nevertheless, in the Lord woman is not independent of man nor man of woman; 12 for as woman was made from man, so man is now born of woman. And all things are from God. 13 Judge for yourselves: is it proper for a wife to pray to God with her head uncovered? 14 Does not nature itself teach you that if a man wears long hair it is a disgrace for him, 15 but if a woman has long hair, it is her glory? For her hair is given to her for a covering. 16 If anyone is inclined to be contentious, we have no such practice, nor do the churches of God.
I don’t often call attention to the title of a sermon. At the point I’m preaching the sermon, titles don’t seem to matter much. But I will tell you that as Pastor Ron and I talked, it seemed good to title this sermon, “When You Gather . . .”, which is similar to the phrase used throughout the next few chapters. As we preach through 1 Corinthians, we’re entering a section from chapter 11–14 that speak to what takes place on Sunday mornings. Paul has already answered several questions the church in Corinth has asked him about all different aspects of marriage and their witness to the world. Now he’ll write about what is happening on Sunday and what should be happening on Sundays. Knowing this helps us understand why Paul is bringing up what he’s bringing up.
For those of you who like to read ahead, I’ll mention that the next passage is the second half of chapter 11 and covers the Lord’s Supper. It might look like we’re skipping that passage, but we’re just moving that passage to the sermon on Good Friday. So, that means next week Pastor Ron will preach the first half of chapter 12, and I’ll do the second half the week after him.
Now, back to the passage in front of us. When churches gather, God wants the church to pay particular attention that men and women look and act like godly men and godly women, specifically on Sunday mornings when men and women lead worship and speak to God (praying) and when they speak for God(prophesying). We’ll be talking about how the way we dress and the way we act signals what we believe about reality. And this brings us, as it did in Paul’s day, to culturally relevant but also sensitive topics.
I’ll pray and we’ll start after one final comment. Some of you know me really well, and for those who do, you know I’m not generally a “just tell it like it is” guy and a “I don’t care what people think of me” guy. That’s not me. I care way too much—way too much. I agonize about what people think and how I’m coming across and whether I’m too strong or too soft or whether some might see me as unprepared or whether I’m too academic or too whatever. I stew on this. It’s fair to say I have thin skin.
In some ways that makes me a wonderful pastor because caring for people is always on my mind. In other ways that makes me a lousy pastor because people-pleasing is too often on my mind. And it’s not helpful. It might even be, at times, sinful. Which means this is a significant area in which I’ve tried to grow over the last decade.
With all that being said, when it comes to these issues of men and women and God’s good design, I have resolved to preach this the way we see it as leaders—which happens to line up with how many Christian leaders see it across the world today see it and how many in the historic church have seen it. And I’m resolved to leave it there and go home and not worry about it.
Now, you can push back, you can suggest ways to consider these words differently, and you can even disagree. In these ways, if done in piety, you would make us better.
My point is simply that at some point the assault on manhood and womanhood, on masculinity and femininity, becomes so intense and so targeted and so personal and so ideologically driven, that I can’t help but shrug and just say, “Welp, this is what I believe God to be saying, and here’s why, and I’d love for you to consider it as well because it really think it’s how we can all thrive together best under the wonderful lordship of King Jesus.”
Let’s pray as we begin. “Dear Heavenly Father . . .”
A week ago on Saturday night, I was coming home from an event driving through the city. I was there with my wife and one of our daughters. As we got into the car, several people got into a big vehicle next to us. They seemed to be hanging out, and it looked like they were having a good time. We saw the men first. And then we saw the women. The women were all wearing white lace head coverings and conservative dresses. On the car ride home, we had a good conversation about that, as it just so happens I’ve been thinking about head coverings for the last month, actually for the last few years.
I would bet if we had kept driving through the city for a few more minutes, I’m sure we would have seen other groups of people who were going, shall we say, to the other end of the spectrum. We would have seen men expressing themselves in stereotypically feminine ways and women expressing themselves in stereotypically masculine ways.
What would the conversation about all this have sounded like in your car had these issues come up? I suspect they will come up in your car rides on the way home today. Those of you who are younger, if you want to write questions as you listen, I’m sure your parents or whomever you came with would love to talk about all this with you. If not, I will be happy to talk about your questions as long as you want.
For my part, I will tell you that I think both groups are wrong. Both those who cover their hair and those who intentionally subvert gender stereotypes are wrong.
But they are not equally wrong. I think one group is trying their best to take the Bible seriously, and in their taking the Bible seriously, they come to different convictions than I have about what are timeless principles and what are time-bound practices. (We’ll say a lot more about that as we go.) The other group, however, seems to be rejecting outright God’s good design. And so my response to each is different. Paul’s response would be different. If someone at our church felt it was right to wear a head covering while leading worship, I’d like to hear more about why, and in the end, I would probably discourage it, but I also think that a woman could do so as a member and worship leader in good standing, as long as it didn’t become divisive or a distraction. The same would not be true in the other scenario, the other end of the spectrum that I mentioned.
My point in bringing all of this up is to say that the issues happening out in the world really affect us when we gather as a church—just as it did in an ancient city called Corinth. To put the struggle for them and for us more directly, I’ll say it this way: Being closed off to God’s design for men and women, while being open to the world’s design for men and women, makes us at best confused and at worst in rebellion. For the rest of the sermon I want to show this from our passage.
1. The Timeless Principles
I’ll start by talking about what I’ll call the timeless principles. Then we’ll talk about the time-bound practices. When I say timeless principles, as opposed to time-bound practices, I’m already indicating the way I believe God intends us to receive these instructions. Timeless principles were true in Corinth in AD 56, and they are true in Harrisburg in 2025. And if Jesus doesn’t come back in the next two hundred years, timeless principles will still be true in Harrisburg and will still be true in Hong Kong and Hamburg, Germany. Timeless principles don’t change.
At a high level, Paul indicates that certain aspects of men as men and women as women are timeless. Paul grounds these timeless truths in other timeless truths, by speaking of God’s good design in creation, speaking of the Trinty, the eternal relationships in God, and speaking of what is done in all the churches. These are indications of timeless principles. That’s what he’s doing at a high level. Now, let’s cover some of the specifics.
Paul begins by praising them for their devotion to God through their devotion to Paul’s teaching. He says in v. 2, “Now I commend you because you remember me in everything and maintain the traditions even as I delivered them to you.” It’s been a while since we’ve said this, but by way of reminder, I’ll mention that Paul spent eighteen months in Corinth working with them to plant the church. Then he moved on to other cities and wrote them this letter. This verse reminds us, as Paul reminds them, that he’s thankful for them and wants them to continue to be faithful, even as culture is shifting.
In Roman culture, during pagan sacrifices, the men would cover their heads during pagan worship. So Paul says don’t be like that. He’s also going to tell them to have haircuts that can be recognized as masculine. Then he says something different to the women, specifically those who are married. In their culture if a wife did not cover her head, it was a sign that she was not modest and she was not caring about the relationship she had with her husband, so Paul says don’t be like that.
I’d love to just read this in small chunks and explain it all, but perhaps it’s better to reread it all again now that I’ve explained more of the background. Look at vv. 3–16.
3 But I want you to understand that the head of every man is Christ, the head of a wife is her husband, and the head of Christ is God. 4 Every man who prays or prophesies with his head covered dishonors his head, 5 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. 6 For if a wife will not cover her head, then she should cut her hair short. But since it is disgraceful for a wife to cut off her hair or shave her head, let her cover her head. 7 For a man ought not to cover his head, since he is the image and glory of God, but woman is the glory of man. 8 For man was not made from woman, but woman from man. 9 Neither was man created for woman, but woman for man. 10 That is why a wife ought to have a symbol of authority on her head, because of the angels. 11 Nevertheless, in the Lord woman is not independent of man nor man of woman; 12 for as woman was made from man, so man is now born of woman. And all things are from God. 13 Judge for yourselves: is it proper for a wife to pray to God with her head uncovered? 14 Does not nature itself teach you that if a man wears long hair it is a disgrace for him, 15 but if a woman has long hair, it is her glory? For her hair is given to her for a covering. 16 If anyone is inclined to be contentious, we have no such practice, nor do the churches of God.
When Paul uses the phrase “head,” he is indicating a kind of authority that is a timeless principle. But he is not saying that calling one person the head of another person makes that person in the equation who is described as not the head is necessarily inferior. He is not doing that. We know that because the equation involves not only men and women but also God the Son and God the Father. The rest of the Bible speaks of equality in essence between the persons of the Trinity. This means that when Paul says the head of Christ is God the Father, it does not mean that Christ is inferior. It is saying that in the plan of redemption they participate in different roles. One takes a larger role in planning and providing and leading, and the other takes a larger role in following and supporting that leadership.
In the same way, we know that Paul cannot be saying women are inferior to men because the rest of the Bible doesn’t teach that. God created both Adam and Eve in his image and God set up both Adam and Eve—not just Adam—as rulers over creation, as a king and a queen to rule together. I’d like to read from Genesis 1:26–27, 31, and later chapter 2. Please turn there.
26 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”
27 So God created man in his own image,
in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them. . . . [After more instructions, we read]
31 And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.
We see in this creation passage again that both men and women are made in God’s image and both are to have dominion over creation. This means, again, that men and women are equal in dignity, value, and worth. This is one of the timeless principles behind this passage in 1 Corinthians 11 that Paul wants them to preserve.
But it’s not the only principle. Men and women are also different. If you flip a page in Genesis to chapter 2, God zooms in for us on the sixth day and tells us that even before sin entered the world, Adam was made first and Eve was made as a helper. That word helper is used often of God himself, so it’s not a demeaning term. Look at 2:18.
18 Then the LORD God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.”
Perhaps you’d expect that if God says it’s not good for Adam to be alone, that the next step would be to make the woman. But that’s not what happens. What happens next?
Adam is told to name the animals, like all of them, meaning doing a kind of early taxonomy for each type of animal. And the point is, I believe, not so much that he names the animals but that in naming them, Adam was meant to realize something very important: Dogs are nice, but they are too different from me. Elephants are nice, but too different. Alligators might have been nice before the fall, but they are very different.
Only after this naming and classifying does Adam learn something. What is it? Look at v. 20. “But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him.” Adam is invited to learn experientially what God already knew. It’s only then, after Adam learns this, that God makes Eve. The first words spoken between two people are a Hebrew love poem.
“This at last is bone of my bones
and flesh of my flesh;
she shall be called Woman,
because she was taken out of Man.” (Gen. 2:23)
The idea of “at last” in the poem is that not the dog, not the elephant, certainly not the alligator, but Eve. Eve had the right amount of sameness, the right amount of fitted-ness (“bone of my bones”) but also the right amount of difference. And together in their sameness and their differing ways and roles, they rule over creation, spreading the knowledge of the glory of God to the watching world, both the seen world and the unseen world, meaning they display the glory of God to the angels and powers that watch what God is doing in and through his plan of creation and redemption.
This, by the way, is what I think is going on with that line in v. 10, “because of the angels,” meaning that there are timeless principles, and when the church gathers, they have the opportunity to display to the world the glory of God. When men and women respect each other, have godliness toward each other, and celebrate both sameness and differences, God is glorified among the watching world, seen and unseen.
Now, I’ve said a lot of words. Let me summarize the timeless principles in and behind this passage. That men and women are both equal and men and women have many overlapping roles and responsibilities. But at the same time, they also have some differences. And both their sameness and their differences are what God himself calls “very good.” Therefore, it’s important that whatever culture the church should find itself in, these timeless principles should not only be maintained but celebrated.
I know didn’t answer every one of your questions. But let’s keep going to the next point.
2. The Time-bound Practices
We need to keep the timeless principles separate from the timebound practices. I’ll put it like this: we need to translate the symbols from their culture to our culture. If you’ve ever worked in language translation, you know how important this is. In translation the point is to take the meaning of the words from one language and translate the meaning into the other language. The same is true with these symbols.
We don’t live in Corinth, a city in the Roman empire. We live in Harrisburg, a city in a country that didn’t even exist then. If we forget about just the time differences between then and we are now, even across our world symbols can send different meanings. For example, if I wore a skirt at a very formal gathering, that would be very weird. But what if I were Scottish and did it in Scotland, and I called it a kilt instead of a skirt? And if a woman got out of her Jeep in a parking lot and waited in line to order food from a food truck and she was wearing a bikini in Harrisburg in early March that would be strange to pretty much everyone who saw her. But if it happened in late July in the Outer Banks, it’s not so strange at all.
Now, I think that even if it were the late summer here in Harrisburg and I wore shorts to preach, that would send the signal that I was irreverent. Is there a rule written about this somewhere? Will historians write someday that it was irreverent to wear shorts to preach in Harrisburg in the twenty-first century? Maybe. But written or not, we know it to be true. But I’ll tell you that when I pastored at a church in Tucson, Arizona the senior pastor of our church would sometimes wear shorts to preach. Now, those were days when it was literally 110 degrees outside after the second service. No one seemed to care about the lead pastor wearing shorts to preach—except for me. There was no way I was going to do that. It felt too strange. But it wasn’t strange or irreverent. This is what I mean about translating symbols.
Something like that needs to happen with Paul’s words given in Corinth. Given the cultural practice in Roman pagan worship that men would cover their heads,[1] Paul says don’t do that. Instead, men should look like men, not women, and men should have their heads uncovered.
And given the cultural practice in Corinth that some women were immodest and wanted to flaunt their supposed independence from their husbands, and thus started taking off their head coverings, Paul says don’t do that. Instead, women look like godly women.
For us, the important thing is not that we carry these exact practices forward into our church, but the way we carry the principles forward. We actually do this many times as we interpret the Bible. Just to encourage you with something from the end of the letter of 1 Corinthians, I’ll tell you that Paul instructs the church to “Greet one another with a holy kiss.” I realize that many cultures other than America do that today. But we don’t in Harrisburg. We translate the symbol of a holy kiss into a holy handshake, a holy hug, or a holy fist bump. You’re welcome. If we all started kissing each other, during our greeting time, I think we’d pretty quickly be able to go back to one service because half of you would leave, and I’m not sure what that would say about the half who stayed.
I’ll give another metaphor for interpretation. There’s a phrase that men often hear when they buy a suit called “off the rack.” Maybe the same thing shows up when women buy dresses. The idea is that right off the hanger or off the rack, the suit fits. No tailoring is required. If you have average height and an average waist and all of that, then you can be off the rack. But if you’re taller or shorter or stronger or thinner or whatever, then you have to get the suit tailored so it doesn’t look all out of sorts. That’s what I think God wants us to do with this passage. We tailor it but we do not change it.
You see, of course, you can take the suit and change it into something that’s no longer a suit. You could make a covering for a pillow or something like that. But that is going too far. The point is not to change the suit but to be aware of how God has made us and only tailor the suit so that it fits us the way God intends us it to fit.
So, look with me again at the last line from Paul in v. 16. “If anyone is inclined to be contentious, we have no such practice, nor do the churches of God.” Yes, he does say all the churches have the same practice, so that could sound timeless. But you must realize that all the churches were in the Roman Empire, even those as far away as Jerusalem, and that provided a lot of continuity. But if there had been at that time churches in Japan or South Africa or Harrisburg, just as there are churches in these places now, then the point is not to keep the timebound practice from those cultures but to keep the timeless principles.
So what might this look like for us? Paul has several do’s and several do not’s for them.
Here’s what this means for us. When men lead in worship on Sunday mornings and when women lead worship in the worship service on Sunday mornings—meaning anyone on stage—they should lead as godly men and godly women, and they should present themselves in a way that communicates that a man is a man and a woman is a woman and that we all are modest and we have deference to the leadership over us. That’s it. That’s how this applies. I’ll be more specific.
For men specifically, I do not believe that they have to have short hair. A man can have long hair and still look very much like a man. However, if a man has long hair and paints his nails and wears a feminine-looking blouse and begins to use mannerisms and gestures and tones of voice that are not masculine, then, no, in our culture a leader doing those things would not be communicating his submission to Christ and a love for the timeless principles. In the same way, if that male worship leader or pastor went to tanning beds and wore shirts halfway unbuttoned and had a fancy watch and tight jeans and took off his wedding ring at church, then this also would not communicate modesty and godliness and fidelity to his wife. And thus it would also be wrong.
For women, similar specific practices can be said. A woman could certainly have short hair and still be very feminine. And for various health challenges, a woman might have to have very short hair or no hair at all. Health challenges obviously have nothing to do with this passage; they are, of course, exceptions not covered. A woman could have very short hair and still be very feminine. But it is telling that in a lesbian relationship often one of the two women will wear not just short hair but short hair styled with a masculine short haircut, and this is often coupled with masculine forms of dressing. To participate in these time-bound practices in our culture sends the signal that the person was rejecting some part of her gift of being feminine and, in such a case, would not belong on the stage leading us in our worship services. In the same way, if a woman had the practice of wearing a mini skirt and a revealing dress and high heals and took off her wedding ring when coming to church, those practices would signal that she was not respecting the leadership over her. She would I hope be very welcome in church by all of us but would not be welcome to lead.
Now, I don’t think in our church this is too controversial. It’s just strange for me to say it out loud because we rarely talk about these things. But when we preach through a book of the Bible, if we believe that all of God’s Word is for his glory and our good, then we have to wrestle with what all of this means.
For all that it does mean, we need to heed Paul’s important qualifications in vv. 11–12.
11 Nevertheless, in the Lord woman is not independent of man nor man of woman; 12 for as woman was made from man, so man is now born of woman. And all things are from God.
Paul knows that what he is saying could be taken too far. He has said that a husband has a particular role as head, and a wife has a particular role. And in the wrong hands, these truths, these principles, could become very, very ugly in practice. In fact, this is not hypothetical; it is a too-common experience. This is why Paul gives these reminders. To whatever extent men and women in God’s good design complement one another in their differences (with men taking a lead but not exclusive role in protecting and providing and women taking a lead but not exclusive role in supporting and nurturing), that is good. But we must also stress our interdependence, without which neither thrives.
So, husbands, this passage and those like it are not saying you never have to run the vacuum, clean the bathroom, do laundry, or make meals. If you think that being a man means you never do these things, you could not be more wrong. In Ephesians 5, Paul tells a husband to love his wife as Christ loves the church, which means by serving your wife even if that service causes your death. Don’t tell me you can’t do the dishes.
And here’s another “nevertheless” consideration. You’ll note that the women apparently have a role in praying and prophesying during the worship service. They speak to God and for God in some ways. It’s not saying women are pastors, but it is saying that women should have a significant role in the life of the church, even what we might say in our church culture of “leading from the stage,” and we would be impoverished if that were not happening.
Conclusion: the redemptive plan of God
As we close, I’ll just highlight a phrase from v. 3. Paul writes that “the head of Christ is God.” In some ways, that small phrase whispers the plan of redemption. If we only had God’s good design, then we would have something beautiful to try to live up to, but that beauty would crush us. To only have the beauty of God’s design would mean we only have condemnation because we all fall short. No person and no church can look up to God and say, “Look, Lord, see how well we’ve followed your design? Now, please let us into heaven because we are so good.”[2]
The plan of redemption means the sinless Son of God who submits to his Father in dying for the sins of his people, and God chooses to look upon his people with favor as though they had done the good deeds that Jesus did. And when we trust him, he welcomes us into his family.
I mentioned at the start that I struggle with people-pleasing. I sort of told you that so that I could tell you something about one of your pastors and so that you might have some sympathy for him preaching this passage too long in a week that was bonkers.
But also, I told you about that struggle because we all fall short of the glory of God and need his grace in so many different ways. Maybe in ways related to what we’ve talked about this morning. Maybe a woman or a man who is pushing boundaries is doing so because they don’t really know the real God. They don’t really know his love and compassion and mercy and grace. And so it might not be so much that you and those you love are rejecting the God who is but rejecting the harsh and distant god who they imagine him to be.
One of the benefits of preaching in a way that follows the text closely is that it allows us to touch subjects many would ignore. The downside is that sometimes, we can zoom in so close that we miss the sweep of the story, the story of a God who loves us and saves us and invites us to participate not merely in his rules and commands but in his joy. This morning I took ten extra minutes than I normally preach so that we didn’t miss the specifics. More importantly, I don’t want us to story of redemption, that story that says, as Paul did in chapter 6, that “such were some of [us]. But [we] were washed, [we] were sanctified, [we] were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God” (1 Cor. 6:11).
Let’s pray. “Dear Heavenly Father . . .”
[1] I’m not taking time to show this from other sources, but this is where my research led me. The same for women and their head coverings.
[2] I’ve been helped in this point and in several others by the sermon from Jeremy Treat at Reality LA, “Gender and Culture,” September 13, 2022, https://realityla.com/resources/gender-and-culture/.
Sermon Discussion Questions
Have you been in churches where people wore head coverings? What was that experience like? Positive? Negative? Why?
This passage touches on issues between men and women. Why do you think this is so controversial? Can you frame your answer using biblical themes and passages that indicate why this might be hard? (Hint: see Genesis 3.)
In what ways could men be better in their roles? How might other men encourage them in this? How might the women?
In what ways could women be better in their roles? How might other women encourage them in this? How might the men?
What does this passage have to say about the redemption that comes through Jesus and how we all fall short of God’s glory, that is, God’s good design?
