Wearing of Gold | AdventAI

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 28, 1878

Wearing of Gold.

[Thinking that the following article clipped from Review, Vol. 40, No. 16, might be republished with profit to believers in present truth, I inclose it for that purpose. Theo. F. Kendall.]

A correspondent asks if we consider that the Scriptures forbid the wearing of gold. We do. Hear Paul: “In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobriety; not with broidered hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array.” 1 Tim. 2: 9. And Peter: “Whose adorning let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel.” 1 Pet. 3: 3.

Both these texts, it is true, are spoken in reference to women; but no one will claim that extravagance and folly are not just as bad, and just as much to be condemned, in men as in women. We therefore consider these as general rules, having a common application to both men and women in the church of Christ.

But may it not be that the apostle simply condemns an undue display of these golden articles and ornaments, and not gold in itself considered? If this question can be answered in the affirmative, then we ask, What other sin cannot be excused on the same ground? But for what are articles of gold worn if not for display? since the same articles made of less costly material would be equally serviceable.

We believe in the letter of the Scriptures as well as in their spirit. And they expressly mention gold among the prohibited articles of personal apparel or adornment. We can therefore come to no other conclusion than that those who wear it do so contrary to the teachings of the Scriptures.

There is good reason in the rule the apostles lay down on this point; for we are aware of no practical use for which gold is worn where a less expensive material would not answer equally well.

But, says one, these articles that I wear are not gold, but only gold-washed; therefore they are not expensive. Why, then, do you procure these articles that are gold-washed? Oh! to have something that looks like gold. Then you really do not like to wear gold, but only to seem to do so, that is, you wish people to think you wear it; and you would fain persuade your conscience into a belief that a sham service of Satan is not just as bad as a real one would be, and tenfold more contemptible. And how would this excuse sound at the bar of Judgment? “Lord, I did not really violate your word by wearing things forbidden therein, I only pretended to do so; I only took a course by which I should appear to the world to be transgressing your requirements; but it was all a sham.” As Bro. Waggoner justly remarked in the Review a few months since, “Pretending to serve God, while you do not mean to serve him in fact, is considered a bad thing; but pretending to serve Satan, while in heart you do not mean to serve him, is worse, if possible.” Let us at once abandon his service, both in reality and in pretense also.