For in the gospel the righteousness of and from God is revealed—a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: “The righteous will live by faith. Rom. 1:17
I delight greatly in the Lord;
my soul rejoices in my God.
For he has clothed me with garments of salvation
and arrayed me in a robe of his righteousness Isa.61:10
Jesus spoke to them again in parables, saying: “The kingdom of heaven is like a king who prepared a wedding banquet for his son. “But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing wedding clothes. He asked, ‘How did you get in here without wedding clothes, friend?’ The man was speechless. “Then the king told the attendants, ‘Tie him hand and foot, and throw him outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ “For many are invited, but few are chosen.” Matt.22:1,12-14
In the realm of classic Christmas movies, I would have to add The Santa Clause starring Tim Allen as Scott Calvin who startles Santa Claus into falling off his roof. His son declares, "You killed Santa Claus" as Santa disappears and his red "robe" is left behind. At Scott's son's urging, he puts on the robe to encourage the reindeer to get off his roof not knowing that by doing this he has accepted the Santa "clause" which in fine print says anyone who puts on this robe will become Santa. Scott, over the next year grows white hair and a beard, gains 100lbs, learns to distinguish naughty from nice, his heartbeat goes to the beat of Jingle Bells and everywhere he goes - kids start lining up to talk with him. His life completely changes because he put on the robe of Santa Claus!
Obviously you can see where I am going with this. Isaiah says that we have received a robe of righteousness and Paul says that it is given to us from God and it is His righteousness. All we have to do is by faith put it on. At the age of 5, I did. Like the movie, did I know what I was doing? No. I just did it for a purpose and it wasn't to get reindeer off my roof but it was to go to Heaven and not go to the place where there is wailing and gnashing of teeth. Little did I know that by putting on that robe, which by the way Someone had to die for me to obtain, my life would change. When the righteousness of God came upon me it transformed me from the inside out through the Holy Spirit living in me. Unlike the movie though, it continues on for the last 61 years - it didn't happen in one calendar year. Hopefully I am looking more like Christ year by year who wasn't obese, jolly with white hair and a beard but was loving, joyful, had peace, was longsuffering, gentle, good, kind faithful, meek, and temperate. (Gal.5:22,23)
It's interesting that becoming Santa wasn't work for Scott. He just had to just let it happen and quit trying to diet, dye it, and shave it. The same is true for us. All we have to do is daily surrender to the Holy Spirit's work inside of us and stop resisting it by trying to grasp on to the old us. When you look through the New Testament, never are we commanded to work "for" Christ, we are always commanded to work "in" and "through" Christ. That just means let Him do His thing with you as the willing body.
So why include the red letter parable of Christ? This represents the person that shows up at the gates of Heaven expecting to get in but has never surrendered to Christ by receiving and putting on the robe of righteousness. They are just trying to get into Heaven with their own merits. That does not get you in because our good deeds are compared to wearing filthy rags. Have you exchanged your filthy garments for a robe of righteousness? Yes you will cease to exist as the person you were but who you will become will surpass anything you could ever have imagined.
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