“I will greatly rejoice in the Lord; my soul shall exult in my God, for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation; he has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself like a priest with a beautiful headdress, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.” (Isaiah 61:10, ESV)
In my life, I have had the opportunity to participate in many formal events. Events like the Senior Prom, Military Balls, etc. The event for which we planned the most was our wedding ceremony in Philadelphia. We planned a military wedding complete with arched swords. For these formal events there is an expected dress code. For the wedding I wore my dress blue uniform complete with white shirt and bow tie, spit-shined shoes, and decorations. Chris wore a wedding gown and proceeded down the aisle with a splendid bouquet of flowers. Everything was as expected.
At these types of formal events there is an expected dress code. Our guests would have been shocked if, when they arrived at the church, they saw Chris and I in tattered jeans, dirty tee-shirts and no shoes. However, I want you to consider the great event of entering into the presence of God and meeting the Lord in heaven. Would we expect that we could enter wearing anything less than brilliant clothing? There are certain garments that are appropriate. Isaiah called these, “garments of salvation,” the “robe of righteousness.”
These garments are precious and very costly. These are too expensive for us to purchase. Moreover, it is impossible for us to put these clothes on ourselves. In fact, Isaiah later tells us that the only thing with which we could clothe ourselves is filthy rags.
“All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away.” (Isaiah 64:6, NIV)
We could never clothe ourselves sufficiently to satisfy the requirements for heaven.
Yet, this is Isaiah’s point. He rejoices in the fact that while he was incapable of clothing himself with the “garments of salvation,” the “robe of righteousness,” the Lord God did for him the impossible. The Lord God clothed him with the garments necessary to enter heaven.
In the same fashion the Lord clothes every person saved by grace through faith, with these same garments. We who believe have been clothed with the righteousness of Christ. The garments that we formerly tried to put on ourselves through our own good works were “filthy rags.” We could not purchase the garments of righteousness for they were too costly for us. The price of the righteous garments was the shed blood of our Lord and Savior. Jesus shed His blood for us on the cross to purchase for us a place in heaven.
Thus, all true believers rejoice in the Lord. All true believers worship Him because of who He is, the incarnate God, and what He has done. He gave Himself for us, the just for the unjust, so that we could experience the blessings of eternal life. Will you take time today to give thanks to Him for this? Will you offer yourself to Him as an expression of gratitude for this gift of His grace?
Renewing the Heart 