9-14-08
The Outcome of Submission: Beauty
Building a Joyful Marriage: Part 10
Peter 3:1-6 

Summary: Respect: Sarah referred to Abraham with unusually respectful terms in her thoughts.  Beauty: The purpose is to win a disobedient husband.  Men are not motivated by wives’ words as much as by beauty (purity and fear).  Submission has a humbling effect.  The source of beauty must be internal: a meek, calm spirit.  It all arises from hoping in God.  Another motivation is the fact that it is extravagant to God.

Introduction
1. The Motive: Headship
2. The Attitude: Respect
3. The Outcome: Soul-winning Beauty
The Purpose of Beauty: Winning the disobedient husband
Why don’t husbands listen to words?
What about believing husbands?
The foundation of beauty: purity and fear
Purity
Fear
Wives, don’t rely on words
Husbands, don’t ignore her words
The humbling effect of submission
The Source of Beauty: The Heart
External must not be the source
How to enjoy a woman’s beauty
Unfading
Inner beauty
Gentle
Quiet
The path to Beauty: Hope
Another Purpose of Beauty: Pleasing God
Conclusion
Devotionals
Day 1: The Source of Beauty: The Heart
Day 2: The unfading beauty of a meek, calm spirit
Unfading
Inner beauty
Gentle
Quiet
Day 3: The path to beauty: hope
Day 4: Striving to be beautiful to God
Day 5: The Importance of Aesthetics

1 Peter 3:1 Wives, in the same way be submissive to your husbands so that, if any of them do not believe the word, they may be won over without words by the behavior of their wives, 2 when they see the purity and reverence of your lives. 3 Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as braided hair and the wearing of gold jewelry and fine clothes. 4 Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God's sight. 5 For this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to make themselves beautiful. They were submissive to their own husbands, 6 like Sarah, who obeyed Abraham calling him her master. You are her daughters if you do what is right and do not give way to fear. 

Introduction

Women who have been influenced by the feminist movement very often recoil at the idea of putting any effort toward making themselves attractive.  It was the conclusion of the Gloria Steinem-types that spending time worrying about beauty is demeaning to a woman.  They say, “Why should I spend all kinds of time and money and energy and effort into primping myself and spending money on clothes and makeup and hairstyles and everything else just for the enjoyment of some man?  Why should I turn myself into an object to be ogled and objectified and dehumanized?”
That is the attitude of the radical feminists.  But most women want very much to be beautiful.  Billions of dollars are spent by women every year on makeup, hairstyling, jewelry, cosmetic surgery, and countless other things that have no other purpose than to enhance their attractiveness.  For most women it would make their day if they overheard someone talking behind their back and saying, “She is absolutely gorgeous.”  That has far more impact on the typical woman than it has on the typical man.  Most men would rather enjoy looking at a beautiful woman than to be looked at.  And generally women prefer being regarded as beautiful and being enjoyed more than looking at some attractive man.
Is that dehumanizing or demeaning to women?  Is it demeaning to want to be enjoyed as beautiful?  If you say that is demeaning to women you would also have to say it is demeaning to God, because God takes great pleasure in being enjoyed as beautiful.  God goes to great lengths to put His beauty on display for us to enjoy, and when we gaze upon it and take delight in it that glorifies Him and pleases Him.  That does not demean God – it does just the opposite.  It glorifies Him and honors Him.
Now, there is a way that a man can enjoy the beauty of a woman that is demeaning to her- just as there is a way to abuse the beauty of God.  And in 1 Peter 3 we are going to learn what that way is.  What is the right way for a woman to be beautiful and to be enjoyed as beautiful that honors both her and God, and what is the way for a woman to be beautiful and to be enjoyed as beautiful that dishonors both her and God?  It is all right here in 1 Peter 3.
Before we jump in to this passage I think we should take a moment to address a problem that has arisen in this series.  I have heard reports that this series on marriage is actually creating more conflict in some marriages than there was before we started the series.  There are some couples that were doing pretty well, and now they are having all kinds of fights and arguments.  
Part of that is because we have an enemy who launches counter-attacks whenever we do something that threatens Satan’s work.  However I think another part of it is due to the fact that as the wives hear what the biblical standard is for husbands, it makes them have higher expectations of their husbands, and it increases their frustrations and discontentedness.  They think, “Man, I thought my husband was somewhat bad, but now I can see that he is really, really bad!”  And husbands have the same tendency.  They hear the beautiful standard of what a wife is supposed to be, and they see how far short their wives fall, and they are angrier or more disappointed now than ever.
I warned you at the beginning of this series that that would happen if we fell into the temptation of fixing your attention on what the standard is for your spouse rather than what the standard is for you.  It is vitally important that we men focus all our energy on what Scripture says to husbands.  And wives, you focus on the standard for women.  In your heart the main goal for your marriage should not be for your spouse to live up to biblical standards.  It should be for you to live up to biblical standards.  You can have joy in your marriage if you follow the Biblical standards even if your spouse doesn’t.  But you will never have joy if you focus your attention on where your spouse is falling short.
We have come to the point in this study where we are examining what Scripture says about how wives are to submit to their husbands.  We found that there are three aspects of submission that are emphasized.  The first is the motive for submission, which is headship.  And the second we began looking at last week – the attitude of submission.  Submission is not submission unless is arises from an attitude of respect.

1. The Motive: Headship

2. The Attitude: Respect

Ephesians 5:33 Each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must fear her husband.

And we see that as an emphasis in 1 Peter 3 as well.

1 Peter 3:5 For this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to make themselves beautiful. They were submissive to their own husbands, 6 like Sarah, who obeyed Abraham and called him her master. 

Sarah is the great example of both beauty and submission in Scripture.  Sarah obeyed Abraham and called him her master.  Literally it says, “like Sarah, who obeyed Abraham, calling him lord.”
Some of you have asked if this is referring to the times when Abraham told Sarah, “Just say you’re my sister, and don’t let them know you’re my wife.”  He did that in Genesis 12 with Pharaoh and again in Genesis 20 with Abimelech.  The grammar that Peter uses give us insight into which event Peter is referring to.  The grammatical structure requires that the obeying and the calling Abraham lord occurred at the same time.  And the only instance we know of when Sarah called Abraham lord was in Genesis 18, where Abraham told her to bake some bread and she obeyed, and while she was baking the bread she referred to Abraham as her lord in her thoughts.  So the reference is not to Genesis 12 or 20, but to Genesis 18.  And so the act of obedience was not lying about their marriage, but rather it was baking bread for some visitors.  It is about as ordinary and mundane as an act of submission can be.  But what Peter picks up on is not so much that she obeyed Abraham, but that she did so while referring to him with a very respectful title.
That is significant because even in Abraham’s day it was not a common thing for a woman to refer to her husband as “lord.”  That was a term of unusual respect and honor.  There are not any other instances of a woman referring to her husband that way in Scripture, and scholars assure us that it was not commonly done in that culture.  Sarah uses a term that was normally used to address kings and high dignitaries and officials.  It would be kind of like you calling your husband “sir,” although probably quite a bit stronger than that.  But even if most women – even Christian women – tried to call their husband “sir” it would probably be so out of character that the husband would assume she was joking around or being sarcastic.  And he would probably be right.  Not many women have such admiration and respect and fear of their husbands that they would say “yes, sir” in a serious, respectful way when he said to do something.
So it is remarkable that Sarah refers to him as lord.  But there is something even more amazing than that.  The thing that makes this such a perfect illustration for the kind of attitude Peter is teaching about here is the fact that it is not even something Sarah said out loud.  Any woman could force the word “sir” out of her mouth if she thought it was required of her, or if she thought it might do her some good.  But Sarah didn’t say it.  She thought it.  When the angel of the LORD said that she was going to conceive a baby… 

Genesis 18:12 Sarah laughed to herself as she thought, "After I am worn out and my lord is old, will I now have this pleasure?"

She was not even thinking about anything to do with authority or leadership or some heroic thing Abraham did.  She was just thinking about the fact that his body was old and incapable of procreation.  Her thoughts were just ordinary, plain, everyday type thoughts - in fact, they were thoughts about his weakness and frailty, but when she thought of her husband she thought of him as “my lord.”
What that shows us is that this was her genuine attitude.  It wasn’t for show.  It wasn’t to manipulate him.  It wasn’t to butter him up or prove anything to him.  It wasn’t to prove anything to us (when she had these thoughts she didn’t know anyone would be listening).  It was just her natural way of thinking about her husband.
Now, I am sure her attitude did come out in her speech.  If you think you have a respectful attitude toward your husband but it doesn’t come out in your speech, you are kidding yourself.  What is in the heart comes out of the mouth.  So I am not saying that it as unimportant what you say as long as you think the right thing.  What I am saying is that it has to be such a genuine part of the fabric of your heart that it comes up not only in your speech and actions but even in your most private thoughts.

3. The Outcome: Soul-winning Beauty 
The Purpose of Beauty: Winning the disobedient husband
So, the motive for submission is headship, the attitude of submission is respect.  Now let’s take a look at the third aspect: the outcome of submission.  I am guessing points one and two did not come as a surprise to anyone.  But this one is not as obvious.  The outcome of submission, according to 1 Peter 3, is beauty – more specifically, soul-winning beauty.

1 Peter 3:1 Wives, in the same way be submissive to your husbands so that, if any of them do not believe the word, they may be won over…
…be submissive…so that…they may be won over.

The objective is to win the unbelieving, disobedient husband to Christ – and to do so by means of beauty rather than words.

… be submissive to your husbands so that, if any of them do not believe the word, they may be won over without words by the behavior of their wives, 2 when they see the purity and reverence of your lives. 

So they will be won not by your words when they hear you, but without words when they see you.  It is going to be what they see rather than what they hear that will have the greatest impact on their souls.

Why don’t husbands listen to words?
We husbands are very often terrible listeners.  But even in those times when we are good listeners, still, when it comes to being influenced by our wives, for whatever reason, words are not the most powerful method.  I won’t ask for a show of hands, but I am guessing pretty much every wife in this room has experienced this: You say something to your husband 100 times and it has no impact on him at all, and then some other person comes along and tells him the exact same thing that you have been telling him, and he thinks it is the most brilliant thing he has ever heard.
Why does that happen?  I don’t know, to be honest.  Part of it might be sin – a lack of respect for our wives.  It might be laziness – we husbands don’t want to deal with the issue, and we can ignore it when it is just her saying it, but when someone outside the family brings it up that forces us to deal with it.
Or it might be something a little more innocent than that.  It might be that if just one person is saying it, that is not enough to convince me, but when two different people say it that makes me take it more seriously.  So it is not that I am regarding the other person as more credible than my wife, it is just that I am more moved by two people than by just one.
Another possibility is that the wife is ultra sensitive or ultra-picky on the issue at hand, and so he doesn’t put as much weight on what she says on the topic because she has such a bias, but when someone else who is more objective agrees, that makes him take notice.
We could speculate all day long about why this is, but whatever the reason, the fact is that we husbands are not easily influenced or won over by our wives’ words.  Maybe part of it is the way God designed men and women to function in their proper roles in the home.  But whatever the reason for it, there is no question it is a reality.
When it comes to winning your husband’s heart over to some aspect of godliness, he will be somewhat responsive to words, but much more responsive to beauty.  They say the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.  But really the way to a man’s heart is through his eyes.  God designed men to respond to beauty.

1… they may be won over without words … 2 when they see … 

So if you love your husband you are going to pour most of your efforts to win him into the method that Scripture says will work the best.  The next time things are going south in your home and you feel you need to step in and do something about it, instead of targeting your husband’s ears, target his eyes.  Use beauty, rather than words, because he will be influenced more by what he sees than by what he hears.

What about believing husbands?
And by the way, even though the focus here is on unbelieving husbands, I believe the principle applies just as much to husbands who are Christians but who are disobedient to God in some area.  What works on an unbeliever will also work on a Christian who is acting like an unbeliever.  In fact, the word translated “do not believe” should probably be translated “do not obey”  That word is used four times in 1 Peter and each of the other times it is translated “disobey” by all the major translations. 
And the idea of winning someone over can also refer to a believer.  When Jesus gave us the church discipline process in Matthew 18 He said step one is to rebuke the person one-on-one.  And if that works, Jesus says, you have won your brother over (Mt.18:15).  So whether your husband is a non-Christian or if he is a Christian who is straying from the Word in some specific area - either way the goal is to win him over to the right path by means of what your husband sees when he looks at you.

The foundation of beauty: purity and fear
So, what is it that your husband must see in order to be won over to godliness?

1… they may be won over without words by the behavior of their wives, 2 when they see the purity and reverence of your lives.

Purity
The first term is a broad term that refers to purity from sin in general, but in this context the main idea is purity from sins against his headship.  Any impurity in your life will hinder your witness to him and your influence with him.  But especially if your words or attitudes are disrespectful, if you are not submissive to his decisions, if you try to seize control of the home, if you order him around – those kinds of impurities will really destroy your influence.  Purity is attractive, and when someone who is living a pure life invites you to live in purity, there is a powerful, powerful draw.  But when a wife is unrighteous and she tries to urge her husband to be righteous, that is not as powerful a draw.

Fear
The other term is translated reverence.  The Greek word is actually fear.  When your husband sees your fear, that will tend to win him over.  All the commentaries I read agree that this is talking about fear of God and not fear of the husband.  But given what we saw last week in Ephesians 5 I don’t know how they can make such a sharp distinction between the two.  Paul was clear in Ephesians 5:33 that the fear of Christ, in the heart of the godly wife, will be expressed through fearing her husband (with the good kind of holy fear).  A woman who does not honor and respect her husband, and fear his displeasure and fear any estrangement or alienation from him, and take very seriously his authority - a woman like that does not fear God.

Wives, don’t rely on words
So what is it that the husband needs to see with his eyes in order to be won over?  Purity and fear.  That is the core out of which soul-winning beauty grows.  It is the woman’s godliness and her fear of God expressed through godly fear of her husband that will have an impact on his heart.  So if your husband is responsive to words, then go ahead and use words (as long as you use them with the meekness and honor and respect described in the rest of this passage).  But when he is not responsive to your words, back off of the words and ramp up your pursuit of the beauty of godliness. 

Husbands, don’t ignore her words
Now men, don’t take this as a license to disregard your wife’s words.  When God says, “Here is a way to win over someone who is disobedient to the Word” that does not mean it is OK to be disobedient to the Word.  If anyone points out something from Scripture to you, or points out a sin in your life, whether it is your pastor in a sermon or your wife or your children or a bum off the street, it does not matter who it is – if someone delivers a message from God’s Word to you and you fail to listen or take it to heart you are guilty of a very serious offense against God.

The humbling effect of submission
So men, listen to your wife.  But wives, when your husband is disobedient to the Word, use beauty rather than words as your main means of winning him, and in particular, the beauty of submission and respect.  Remember last week when I said that when a woman respectfully submits to her husband, and honors him joyfully defers to his leadership, it has a humbling effect on both husband and wife?  That humbling effect may be a part of why this is the best method for winning your husband.  To have another adult who is your peer and your equal (as Peter says in verse 7 a fellow-heir with you in the grace of life) – to have someone like that voluntarily subordinate herself to you and with an attitude of respect and honor place herself under your headship – that does have a humbling effect on the heart of a man.  Nothing will soften a man’s heart like that.  In some ways it even feels kind of awkward.  And it tends to make a man want to live up to the ideals of biblical, Christ-like headship.  It is such an un-natural thing in this world that it is almost startling, and it tends to cause a man to realize what a huge responsibility he has before God now that this woman is following his leadership.
Even for a non-Christian man, there is something very humbling about having a woman submit to you.  If you accuse your husband, that will push him toward becoming defensive.  If you nag your husband, that will push him toward anger.  If you order him around, that will push him toward giving up his efforts to be a leader.  But when a woman respects a man and submits to him, and speaks to him with respectful terms that, more than anything else, will tend to soften his heart.
The Source of Beauty: The Heart 
So the purpose of beauty is to win over the disobedient husband to righteousness.  Now let’s look at the source of beauty.  Where does it come from?  Peter starts by telling us where it doesn’t come from.

External must not be the source 

3 Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as braided hair and the wearing of gold jewelry and fine clothes. 

Some have taken it to mean that braids or jewelry are forbidden for Christian women.  The problem with that interpretation is the part about clothes.  The word “fine” is not in the Greek.  Literally it just says, Your adornment should not come from the outside; braided hair, the wearing of gold and the putting on of clothes.  So we took this to mean that it is wrong for women to braid their hair or wear jewelry then we would also have to say it is wrong for women to wear clothes.  Obviously that is not what Peter is saying.
Others have said, “Well, maybe it’s just forbidding too much of those things.”  So the idea is you can wear clothes, just not fancy clothes.  And you can have some jewelry, just not too much.  And you can style your hair, but don’t go overboard.  You can go ahead and be attractive on the outside, just not too attractive.
I do not think that is what it is saying either.  The passage says nothing about degrees.  Whatever is being forbidden here is being forbidden altogether.
And what is being forbidden is right there in the first line of verse 3.  What is prohibited is having external adornments as the source of your beauty.

1 Peter 3:3 Your beauty should not come from outward adornment

External adornments have their place.  Sometimes men will see 1 Peter 3 and say, “Oh no – don’t tell her not to worry about external adornment!  I don’t want her to just let herself go and not care about how she looks.”  Letting yourself go and doing nothing to look good to your spouse on the outside is not a good thing at all.  When we take a look at the Song of Songs we will find that the way you look on the outside is a very important matter in your marriage.  You should wear attractive clothes, and you should fix your hair nice, and if jewelry helps – throw that on too.  And when it comes to makup – it is like one pastor said – “If the barn needs painting, paint it!”  1 Corinthians 11:15 says that the glory of a woman is her hair and that long hair was given to her as a gift from God.
Peter’s purpose is not to ban all of that.  His purpose is to forbid you from having those things as the source of your beauty.  The purpose of clothes and makeup and jewelry and hair styling and perfume and all the rest is to enhance your beauty, not to be the source of it.  What is the source?

3 Your beauty should not come from outward adornment … 4 Instead, it should be that of your inner self 

Your beauty is to come from the inside.  And that internal beauty can be marred and obscured by a failure to attend to the external.  But where that internal beauty is absent, no amount of dressing up the outside will make you beautiful.  That saying actually is not far from Proverbs 11:22.

Proverbs 11:22 Like a gold ring in a pig's snout is a beautiful woman who shows no discretion.

External adornment without inner beauty equals ugliness.  It is like putting gold on a pig.  If you put gold on a pig it doesn’t make the pig beautiful – it just makes the gold ugly.
There are actresses who are some of the most externally attractive women in the world, who are just flat out ugly when you get a glimpse of their heart.  They seem gorgeous at first, but then you hear them talk in an interview and the ugliness of their hearts comes out, and from then on they are far less attractive.  That is one reason why some of the most gorgeous women in Hollywood can’t stay married for more than a few weeks.  When their husbands see their true ugliness they cannot stand to stay married to them.  And there are other women who might appear kind of plain when you first see them, but when you start to get to know them they get prettier and prettier.

How to enjoy a woman’s beauty
So to answer our question from the beginning of the sermon – I said there is a way that a man can enjoy the beauty of a woman that is honoring to her and a way he can enjoy her beauty that is demeaning to her - just as there is a way to abuse the beauty of God and a way to honor the beauty of God.  The way to abuse God’s beauty is to enjoy it without enjoying Him.  If you take the beauty and wonder of the creation and separate that from God, so that you enjoy it without paying attention to Him – that dishonors Him.  But if you enjoy the creation as an expression of God’s beauty, so that your enjoyment of it points your attention to Him and increases your love for Him that honors Him.  It is the same with a woman.  When a man turns a woman into an object and fixes his attention on her body without any regard for her soul that is demeaning.  But when he enjoys her as a person that honors her.
So when men focus on the body and ignore the person, and when women seek their beauty from external adornment, both are committing the same error.  They are separating the outside from the inside.

Unfading
So beauty must not come from the outside.  When it does, it is not real beauty and it is very temporary.  It fades fast.  We make all our frantic efforts to hold off the aging process with anti-wrinkle creams and surgeries and everything else, but age catches up to all of us eventually.  If you are attractive according to this world’s standards you will not be that way very long.  And so if that is the source of your attractiveness, then when it fades you are left with nothing but ugliness.

Proverbs 31:30 Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised.

Beauty that comes from the outside is fleeting, but if the source of your beauty is internal, then your beauty and attractiveness can persist beyond the time when the external fades.  Look at verse 4.

4 [your adornment] should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God's sight. 

This kind of beauty doesn’t fade – it grows.  And so you do not get depressed about aging, because the aging process in the kingdom of God is a beautifying process. 

Inner beauty
And in verse 4 Peter gives us even more detail on what submission is.  He already broke it into two parts – purity and fear.  Now he describes it even further – the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit.

Gentle 
The word translated gentle is the word meek (as in “Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth”).  It means “not insistent on one’s rights” or “not pushy or selfishly assertive” or “not demanding one’s own way.”  Meekness is a great virtue for anyone to have, and we should all strive for it, but it is an especially important ingredient for a woman’s beauty.
Selfishness and pushiness is ugly.  It pushes a man toward more and more unresponsiveness, and it throws cold water on the fires of his love.  But meekness is delightful, and it functions as a crucial component to a woman’s beauty.

Quiet
The other word is translated quiet.  When you think of an attractive woman you usually don’t picture an obnoxious, boisterous loudmouth.

Proverbs 9:13 The woman Folly is loud; she is undisciplined and without knowledge.

So if you tend to be loud in your speech, that is something you need to get under control.
The word translated quiet here, however, is a word that has more to do with attitude than volume.  A better translation would be “tranquil” or “calm” “at peace.”  It speaks of a woman who is unruffled by the dangers and threats of life.  Nothing rattles her.  She is like the Proverbs 31 woman who laughs at the future (Pr.31:25).  That is why Peter summarizes in verse 6 by saying You are [Sarah’s] daughters if you do what is right and do not give way to fear.  That word for fear is a rare word referring to agitation and inner turmoil.  She doesn’t get worked up.
It is a very attractive thing to see that kind of strength in a woman.  It is an unattractive thing for a wife to be constantly flustered and anxious and worried and fretting over everything.  And it is especially offensive to her husband, since it is his role to provide for her and protect her.  If you are constantly upset and worried, you are not only calling God a bad provider and protector, but you are calling your husband a bad provider and protector.
Not only that, but it is just an unbecoming, unattractive thing to be a worrier.  People have a lot of different tastes and preferences in what kind of woman they are attracted to.  But no one is attracted to complainers and worriers.
The path to Beauty: Hope
These two terms put together describe a quiet strength and poised dignity that makes a woman particularly beautiful.  But how do you get that way?  We have seen the purpose of beauty and the source of beauty, but what is the path to beauty?  How do you get there from here?  You read this standard and it seems so high and unattainable, you might be tempted to just sit there and think, “Oh well, I guess I’ll just never be beautiful.”  I mean, just look at this list of characteristics of submission that Peter gives us:  In verse 2 purity and fear, in verse 4 a meek and tranquil spirit, in verse 6 obedience and deep respect and honor even in your thoughts, and later in verse 6 doing what is right and not being afraid of any threat.  That sounds like super-woman.  How do you pull all that off?
How did Sarah do it?  What made her so beautiful?  Sarah’s beauty was legendary.  The Jews wrote about it many times.  And no wonder – they went down to Egypt and Abraham says, “Don’t let them know we’re married, because when Pharaoh sees you he’ll do whatever it takes to get you into his harem.”  Pharaoh can have any woman in his entire kingdom.  So you might think Abraham was just flattering his wife saying that he would want her.  But it wasn’t flattery – that is exactly what happened.  As soon as they got down there Pharaoh took her.  She must have been absolutely dazzling in her beauty.
You see, this kind of inner beauty creates outer beauty too.  We tend to think that the two are not connected.  If you ask, “Is she pretty?” and they say, “Well, she’s pretty on the inside” usually that means she is ugly on the outside.  But a woman who has true inner beauty will also tend to be physically attractive.  That was definitely the case for Sarah.  She was evidently among the most beautiful women in all of Egypt – which is even more remarkable when you realize that she was 65 years old at the time!  At age 65 she is competing with all the young beauties in Egypt.
And if you think that maybe Pharaoh just had unusual tastes, remember that it happened again with king Abimelech in Genesis 20, and that was 20 years later!  Now she is 85!  And when King Abimelech sees her he has to have her.  Remember how Peter described this beauty – the unfading beauty of a meek and tranquil spirit.
So how did Sarah do that?  How did she manage to attain that whole list of qualities Peter describes?  How did the holy women of the past make themselves beautiful?

5 this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to make themselves beautiful: they were submissive to their own husbands

The key phrase in there is who put their hope in God.  All of these virtues come from hope in God.
How do you become meek, so that you are not pushy and you defer to your husband? – by placing your hope in God.  The reason you are tempted to be pushy is because you think joy will come by getting your own way.  That is putting your hope in your own way.  But when you see God as the source of your joy that frees you up to defer to others.  You do not have to push for your way because your joy is not dependant on that.
How do you develop a tranquil spirit? – by putting your hope in God.  If He is your hope you have nothing to worry about, so you can be calm even in the most threatening circumstances.  You remain poised and calm and you do not give way to fear.  Nothing frightens you and you can laugh at the future because the Source of your hope is untouched by circumstances.
How can you come to the point of being able to show such honor and respect to your husband? – by putting your hope in God.  The more you hope in God the greater your love for God, and the greater your love for God the more you will honor those God places over you.  The path to beauty is hope.
Another Purpose of Beauty: Pleasing God
So women – strive for beauty.  Should you brush your hair and wear attractive clothes and keep yourself in shape the best you can?   Sure, but make sure you don’t look to any of that as the source of your beauty.  The source of your beauty should come from the inside.  The outside should be consistent with the inside, so go ahead and do what you can about the outside.  But never look to that as the source of your beauty.

4 Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit.

Why?  Two reasons.  The first reason is because beauty is useful for winning your husband when he is disobedient to the Word.  But in verse 4 Peter gives us another reason.  And if this second reason isn’t enough to motivate you something is seriously wrong.  This is one of those statements in God’s Word that you would never believe was in the Bible if you didn’t see it with your own eyes.

4 Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit which is of great worth in God's sight. 

This kind of adornment is beautiful to God.  If you cannot bring yourself to strive for beauty for your husband, how about doing it for God’s enjoyment?
When I looked up the term great worth I expected to find that it is a word that emphasizes intrinsic value as opposed to market value.  It’s not.  It is the word that emphasizes market value – something that is worth a lot of money.  It is a term that speaks of lavish, extravagant, ostentatious, over-the-top adornment.  In fact, this is the same word used in a negative way in 1 Timothy 2:9.

1 Timothy 2:9 I also want women to dress modestly, with decency and propriety, not with braided hair or gold or pearls or expensive clothes.

In the church, expensive clothes are forbidden for women.  It is a sin for a woman to dress that way at church, because it draws attention to her rather than to the Lord. 
How expensive does a dress have to be for it to be considered extravagant or lavish?  I don’t know.  Cindy McCain wore an outfit to the Republican National Convention that some have estimated was worth $300,000.  I’m thinking that would qualify as extravagant.  Extravagant is when your clothes or jewelry is so expensive that it shows off how wealthy you are.
So think about what Peter is saying.  When God looks at a woman with a sweet, submissive, gentle, calm spirit, what he sees is a woman decked out in the most extravagant, gorgeous clothes.  When you have this kind of inner character, to God it looks like you are wearing a million dollar diamond necklace and the world’s most beautiful designer gown.  How’s that for a reason to strive for beauty?

Conclusion
Be careful not to undervalue the importance of aesthetics.  Beauty is not just icing on the cake.  Sometimes we think of beauty as a pleasant reality on the side that makes life a little nicer, but not really all that important.  That is as far from the truth as it can be.  Beauty is right at the center of what is important in life.  In fact, if you boil all of life down to one pursuit, it would be the pursuit of beauty.

Psalm 27:4 One thing I ask of the LORD, this is what I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD 

Nothing is more important than beauty – true beauty – the beauty of the Lord.  And so all the little illustrations and emblems of His beauty, like the beauty of a sunset or a forest or a river or a beautiful woman, if we appreciate them for what they are and what they are designed to point to, they can be some of the most important things in our whole Christian walk.
God made women more beautiful than men.  That is why when they want to sell a magazine to men, they put a beautiful woman on the cover.  And when they want to sell a magazine to women, they put a beautiful woman on the cover.  God has given women especially the gift of being the most direct reflection of His beauty in this world.  Ladies, you are the bearers of something exceedingly precious and important and powerful.  Use it for the glory of God.

Benediction - Eph.3:20,21  Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever

Devotionals
Day 1: The Source of Beauty: The Heart

3 Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as braided hair and the wearing of gold jewelry and fine clothes. 

What is prohibited is having external adornments as the source of your beauty.  External adornments have their place.  In the Song of Songs we will find that the way you look on the outside is a very important matter in your marriage.  You should wear attractive clothes, and you should fix your hair nice, and if jewelry helps – throw that on too.  1 Corinthians 11:15 says that the glory of a woman is her hair and that long hair was given to her as a gift from God.
Peter’s purpose is not to ban all of that.  His purpose is to forbid you from having those things as the source of your beauty.  The purpose of clothes and makeup and jewelry and hair styling and perfume and all the rest is to enhance your beauty, not to be the source of it.  What is the source?

3 Your beauty should not come from outward adornment … 4 Instead, it should be that of your inner self 

Your beauty is to come from the inside, and that internal beauty can be marred and obscured by a failure to attend to the external.  But where that internal beauty is absent, no amount of dressing up the outside will make you beautiful.

Proverbs 11:22 Like a gold ring in a pig's snout is a beautiful woman who shows no discretion.

External adornment without inner beauty equals ugliness.  It is like putting gold on a pig.  If you put gold on a pig it doesn’t make the pig beautiful – it just makes the gold ugly.
There are actresses who are some of the most externally attractive women in the world, who are just flat out ugly when you get a glimpse of their heart.  They seem gorgeous at first, but then you hear them talk in an interview and the ugliness of their hearts comes out, and from then on they are far less attractive.  That is one reason why some of the most gorgeous women in Hollywood can’t stay married for more than a few weeks.  When their husbands see their true ugliness they can’t stand to stay married to them.  And there are other women who might appear kind of plain when you first see them, but when you start to get to know them they get prettier and prettier.
There is a way that a man can enjoy the beauty of a woman that is honoring to her and a way he can enjoy her beauty that is demeaning to her - just as there is a way to abuse the beauty of God and a way to honor the beauty of God.  The way to abuse God’s beauty is to enjoy it without enjoying Him.  If you take the beauty and wonder of the creation and separate that from God, so that you enjoy it without paying attention to Him – that dishonors Him.  But if you enjoy the creation as an expression of God’s beauty, so that your enjoyment of it points your attention to Him and increases your love for Him that honors Him.  It is the same with a woman.  When a man turns a woman into an object and fixes his attention on her body without any regard for her soul that is demeaning.  But when he enjoys her as a person that honors her.
So when men focus on the body and ignore the person, and when women seek their beauty from external adornment, both are committing the same error.  They are separating the outside from the inside. 

Day 2: The unfading beauty of a meek, calm spirit

Unfading
So beauty must not come from the outside.  When it does, it is not real beauty and it is very temporary.  It fades fast.  We make all our frantic efforts to hold off the aging process with anti-wrinkle creams and surgeries and everything else, but age catches up to all of us eventually.  If you are attractive according to this world’s standards you will not be that way very long.  And so if that is the source of your attractiveness, then when it fades you are left with nothing but ugliness.

Proverbs 31:30 Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised.

Beauty that comes from the outside is fleeting, but if the source of your beauty is internal, then your beauty and attractiveness can persist beyond the time when the external fades.  Look at verse 4.

4 [your adornment] should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God's sight. 

This kind of beauty does not fade – it grows.  And so you don’t get depressed about aging, because the aging process in the kingdom of God is a beautifying process. 

Inner beauty
In verse 4 Peter gives us even more detail on what submission is.  He already broke it into two parts – purity and fear.  Now he describes it even further – the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit.

Gentle 
The word translated gentle is the word meek (as in “Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth”).  It means “not insistent on one’s rights” or “not pushy or selfishly assertive” or “not demanding one’s own way.”  Meekness is a great virtue for anyone to have, and we should all strive for it, but it is an especially important ingredient for a woman’s beauty.
Selfishness and pushiness is ugly.  It pushes a man toward more and more unresponsiveness, and it throws cold water on the fires of his love.  But meekness is delightful, and it functions as a crucial component to a woman’s beauty.

Quiet
The other word is translated quiet.  When you think of an attractive woman you usually do not picture an obnoxious, boisterous loudmouth.

Proverbs 9:13 The woman Folly is loud; she is undisciplined and without knowledge.

So if you tend to be loud in your speech that is something you need to get under control.
The word translated quiet here, however, is a word that has more to do with attitude than volume.  A better translation would be “tranquil” or “calm” “at peace.”  It speaks of a woman who is unruffled by the dangers and threats of life.  Nothing rattles her.  She is like the Proverbs 31 woman who laughs at the future (Pr.31:25).  That is why Peter summarizes in verse 6 by saying You are [Sarah’s] daughters if you do what is right and do not give way to fear.  That word for fear is a rare word referring to agitation and inner turmoil.  She doesn’t get worked up.
It is a very attractive thing to see that kind of strength in a woman.  It is an unattractive thing for a wife to be constantly flustered and anxious and worried and fretting over everything.  And it is especially offensive to her husband, since it is his role to provide for her and protect her.  If you are constantly upset and worried, you are not only calling God a bad provider and protector, but you are calling your husband a bad provider and protector.
Not only that, but it is just an unbecoming, unattractive thing to be a worrier.  People have a lot of different tastes and preferences in what kind of woman they are attracted to.  But no one is attracted to complainers and worriers.

Day 3: The path to beauty: hope

These two terms put together describe a quiet strength and poised dignity that makes a woman particularly beautiful.  But how do you get that way?  We have seen the purpose of beauty and the source of beauty, but what is the path to beauty?  How do you get there from here?  You read this standard and it seems so high and unattainable, you might be tempted to just sit there and think, “Oh well, I guess I’ll just never be beautiful.”  I mean, just look at this list of characteristics of submission that Peter gives us: In verse 2 purity and fear, in verse 4 a meek and tranquil spirit, in verse 6 obedience and deep respect and honor even in your thoughts, and later in verse 6 doing what is right and not being afraid of any threat.  That sounds like super-woman.  How do you pull all that off?
How did Sarah do it?  What made her so beautiful?  Sarah’s beauty was legendary.  The Jews wrote about it many times.  And no wonder – they went down to Egypt and Abraham says, “Don’t let them know we’re married, because when Pharaoh sees you he’ll do whatever it takes to get you into his harem.”  Pharaoh can have any woman in his entire kingdom.  So you might think Abraham was just flattering his wife saying that he would want her.  But it wasn’t flattery – that is exactly what happened.  As soon as they got down there Pharaoh took her.  She must have been absolutely dazzling in her beauty.
You see, this kind of inner beauty creates outer beauty too.  We tend to think that the two are not connected.  If you ask, “Is she pretty?” and they say, “Well, she’s pretty on the inside” usually that means she is ugly on the outside.  But a woman who has true inner beauty will also tend to be physically attractive.  That was definitely the case for Sarah.  She was evidently among the most beautiful women in all of Egypt – which is even more remarkable when you realize that she was 65 years old at the time!  At age 65 she is competing with all the young beauties in Egypt.
And if you think that maybe Pharaoh just had unusual tastes, remember that it happened again with King Abimelech in Genesis 20, and that was 20 years later!  Now she is 85!  And when King Abimelech sees her he has to have her.  Remember how Peter described this beauty – the unfading beauty of a meek and tranquil spirit.
So how did Sarah do that?  How did she manage to attain that whole list of qualities Peter describes?  How did the holy women of the past make themselves beautiful?

5 this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to make themselves beautiful: they were submissive to their own husbands

The key phrase in there is who put their hope in God.  All of these virtues come from hope in God.
How do you become meek, so that you’re not pushy and you defer to your husband? – by placing your hope in God.  The reason you are tempted to be pushy is because you think joy will come by getting your own way.  That is putting your hope in your own way.  But when you see God as the source of your joy that frees you up to defer to others.  You do not have to push for your way because your joy is not dependant on that.
How do you develop a tranquil spirit? – by putting your hope in God.  If He is your hope you have nothing to worry about, and you can be calm even in the most threatening circumstances.  You remain poised and calm and you don’t give way to fear.  Nothing frightens you and you can laugh at the future because the Source of your hope is untouched by circumstances.
How can you come to the point of being able to show such honor and respect to your husband? – by putting your hope in God.  The more you hope in God the greater your love for God, and the greater your love for God the more you will honor those God places over you.  The path to beauty is hope.

Day 4: Striving to be beautiful to God

So women – strive for beauty.  Should you brush your hair and wear attractive clothes and keep yourself in shape the best you can?  Sure, but make sure you don’t look to any of that as the source of your beauty.  The source of your beauty should come from the inside.  The outside should be consistent with the inside, so go ahead and do what you can about the outside.  But never look to that as the source of your beauty.

4 Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit.

Why?  Two reasons.  The first reason is because beauty is useful for winning your husband when he is disobedient to the Word.  But in verse 4 Peter gives us another reason.  And if this second reason is not enough to motivate you something is seriously wrong.  This is one of those statements in God’s Word that you would never believe is in the Bible if you didn’t see it with your own eyes.

4 Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit which is of great worth in God's sight. 

This kind of adornment is beautiful to God.  If you cannot bring yourself to strive for beauty for your husband, how about doing it for God’s enjoyment?
When I looked up the term great worth I expected to find that it is a word that emphasizes intrinsic value as opposed to market value.  It’s not.  It is the word that emphasizes market value – something that is worth a lot of money.  It is a term that speaks of lavish, extravagant, ostentatious, over-the-top adornment.  In fact, this is the same word used in a negative way in 1 Tim.2:9.

1 Timothy 2:9 I also want women to dress modestly, with decency and propriety, not with braided hair or gold or pearls or expensive clothes.

In the church, expensive clothes are forbidden for women.  It is a sin for a woman to dress that way at church, because it draws attention to her rather than to the Lord. 
How expensive does a dress have to be for it to be considered extravagant or lavish?  I don’t know.  Cindy McCain wore an outfit to the Republican National Convention that some have estimated was worth $300,000.  I’m thinking that would qualify as extravagant.  Extravagant is when your clothes or jewelry is so expensive that it shows off how wealthy you are.
So think about what Peter is saying.  When God looks at a woman with a sweet, submissive, gentle, calm spirit, what he sees is a woman decked out in the most extravagant, gorgeous clothes.  When you have this kind of inner character, to God it looks like you are wearing a million dollar diamond necklace and the world’s most beautiful designer gown.  How is that for a reason to strive for beauty?

Day 5: The Importance of Aesthetics 

Be careful not to undervalue the importance of aesthetics.  Beauty is not just icing on the cake.  Sometimes we think of beauty as a pleasant reality on the side that makes life a little nicer, but not really all that important.  That is as far from the truth as it can be.  Beauty is right at the center of what is important in life.  In fact, if you boil all of life down to one pursuit, it would be the pursuit of beauty.

Psalm 27:4 One thing I ask of the LORD, this is what I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD 

Nothing is more important than beauty – true beauty – the beauty of the Lord.  And so all the little illustrations and emblems of His beauty, like the beauty of a sunset or a forest or a river or a beautiful woman, if we appreciate them for what they are and what they are designed to point to, they can be some of the most important things in our whole Christian walk.
God made women more beautiful than men.  That is why when they want to sell a magazine to men, they put a beautiful woman on the cover.  And when they want to sell a magazine to women, they put a beautiful woman on the cover.  God has given women especially the gift of being the most direct reflection of His beauty in this world.  Ladies, you are the bearers of something exceedingly precious and important and powerful.  Use it for the glory of God.