DEVOTION: What’s in your spiritual closet?
By Pastor Don Squires,
Temple Free Will Baptist Church, Darlington
We preached this message a while back to our congregation here at Temple and wanted to share it with you today. Please continue to pray for us as we try to be found pleasing in God’s sight. If you don’t have a home church we would like to invite you to join us in one of our weekly meetings. Most ladies love to shop for new clothes. Most men like new clothes as well; we just don’t love to shop for them. Our closets are usually full of clothes. Some old, some new, some forgotten. I would like to share with you about the clothes or garments that the Bible speaks of. The filthy garment Zechariah 3:3-4: “Now Joshua was clothed with filthy garments, and stood before the angel. 4) and he answered and spoke to those that stood before him saying, take away the filthy garments from him. And unto him he said behold I have caused your iniquity to pass from you and I will clothe you with a change of raiment. (“New Clothes”) The dreadful garment Psalm 109:18: “He clothed himself with cursing, like with a garment.” The undesirable garment Job 8:22: “They that hate you shall be clothed with shame.” John 11:44 says that Lazarus was “Bound hand and foot with grave clothes.” We are truly dead men walking in our sins and trespasses. God gives us new clothes when we join up with Him. The garment of salvation Isaiah 61:10: “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God, he has clothed me with the garments of salvation.” This is the first and no doubt the most important of the new clothes that God gives us. He swaps out those filthy rags for a new suit of salvation. The garment of humility 1 Peter 5:5: “All of you be subject one to another and clothed with humility.” How about this awesome exchange of clothes? Exchanging a garment of cursing for a garment of humility. We should swap out our pride for passion. Humility ranks very, very high on God’s scale … not so much on man’s, but God holds it to a high regard. The garment of righteousness Psalm 132:9: “Let your priests be clothed with righteousness.” The Bible says that Christians are His priests. Here we find another great exchange of clothes. An exchange of a garment of shame for a garment of righteousness. God wants His children to be clothed in righteousness. He wants our lives to be right in His eyes. Our practice should correspond with our profession of faith. The Lord wants our actions to agree with our words. Put on the garment of righteousness. The garment of victory Revelation 3:5: “He that overcomes, the same shall be clothed in white raiment and I will confess his name before my Father and before His angels.” We’ve got to have on the right kind of clothes to stand before the King. If we desire to have an audience (relationship) with the King, you must dress right. Revelation 3:1-5: “And to the angel of the church in Sardis write; These things says He that has the seven Spirits of God, and the seven stars; I know your works, that you have a name that you are alive, but you are dead. [2] Be watchful, and strengthen the things which remain, that are ready to die: for I have not found your works perfect before God. [3] Remember what you have received and heard, and hold fast, and repent. If you don’t watch, I will come on you as a thief, and you shall not know what hour I will come on you. [4] You have a few names (people) even in Sardis which have not defiled their garments; and they shall walk with me in white: for they are worthy. [5] He that overcomes, the same shall be clothed in white raiment; and I will not blot out his name from the book of life, but I will confess his name before my Father, and before his angels.” What’s in your closet?