“A Garment of Praise”
Isaiah 61
 

Read Isaiah 61

We are ending our study of the book of Isaiah, only seven more messages to go. In today’s Scripture, Isaiah returns to one of his common themes, the idea that God’s people will be empowered to live righteous lives. 
And when God’s people start living righteous lives, this will in turn, draw others to God. 

This theme of needing empowerment in order to live a righteous life was definitely something the Israelites needed. Every time they turned around, they were messing things up and behaving less and less like the people of God. 

This theme is relevant still today. Christians are called to live righteous lives, we are called to be like Jesus. And when we are, others see us and want to be like us. Isaiah reminds us, of the means, by which we are able to live a righteous life. The Spirit of the LORD anointed Isaiah with Verses 1 – 3b. They give us the purpose of the Messiah and the purpose of all Christians. This list answers the question WWJD, What Would Jesus Do? 

The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD has called us to 
> preach good news to the poor 
> bind up the brokenhearted
> proclaim freedom for the captives
> release prisoners from darkness
> comfort all who mourn
> provide for those who grieve
> give a crown of beauty instead of ashes
> give gladness instead of mourning
> give a garment of praise, instead of despair.
The benefits we are to receive from living a righteous life are what follow in verses 3b-7.
> we will be called oaks of righteousness
> we will display the LORD’S splendor
> there will be restoration of places long devastated
> renewal of ruined cities
> our flocks will be shepherded
> our fields and vineyards will be taken care of
> we will be called priests of the LORD
> we will be named ministers of God
> we will feed on the wealth of nations
> instead of shame, God’s people will receive a double portion in their land and everlasting joy

In verses, 8 & 9, God speaks, making it explicit that what He desires is a covenant of righteousness, and He is the one who makes righteousness possible. 

In verses 10 & 11, the people respond with a psalm of praise to God.  The Israelites had been oppressed by the nations around them. But as we read in verse 8, God is a lover of justice, and hates robbery and iniquity in His people. One of the effects of God’s everlasting covenant which He makes with His people is that they will be able to live the life of God’s true children. And all who see them, will recognize this fact. 

How will they be able to do this? 

God, himself, will give His people the righteous behavior, which they are unable to produce themselves. 

Why will God do this?

He does this for His own praise and glory as a witness to other nations of His almighty power. 

Isaiah uses the symbolism of a wedding dress to describe this praise.   In verse 10, Israel sees herself as a bride, whom the Groom has dressed in beautiful wedding garments. These garments are “salvation” and “righteousness.” Paul used the same analogy with the church as the bride of Christ, in Ephesians 5:27, where he says the church will appear before Christ “without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.” 

These images tell us that God wants to have an intimate relationship with us, in which He will do for us what we cannot do for ourselves, which is make us like Himself, to make us behave as He does.

In order to completely understand this analogy, we need to go back to how weddings were celebrated in ancient times. Back in the time of Isaiah, the week leading up to the consummation of the marriage consisted of a time of celebration. Men celebrated in one area and women in another. On the day of the wedding, the bride was led to the groom’s home, dressed in a gown which he had provided for her. More feasting occurred before the two went to their wedding chamber. 

Today, the church is in that week of celebration. Jesus, the groom, has sent us a “garment of praise.” We read its description in verses 1-3. It is a gown of righteous behavior that God enables us to experience. This gown is what has all the onlookers uttering “ooohs” and “ahs” as we walk through the streets and go to His house. 

Are you wearing that gown, the “garment of praise?”

When onlookers look at you do they see Jesus? 
Do they want to be like you? 

How do we know? What does wearing this garment of praise look like in today’s society? 

It begins with believing in Christ. This may seem like a simplistic statement.  Isn’t that what Christianity is all about?  Although, today, with our myriad of denominations, you could ask what does believing in Jesus mean and you would receive a myriad of answers.  

Many of the answers would be that believing in Christ is something like having faith that Christ is your personal savior from your sin, and that He is also the Savior of the world. 

This leads me to ask the question, So what does it mean to be saved from sin? 

For many believers today, being saved from your sin means the believer is delivered from guilt and condemnation of his or her sins. Yet when we read the Scriptures there seems to be more to it. 

Christ’s life, death and resurrection are to not only deliver us from guilt and condemnation, they break the power of continued sinning. 

Somewhere along the line Christians miss the significance between faith and Christian living. Somehow we think that we are brought into a relationship with God through Christ by faith. Then within this faith relationship we experience forgiveness of sins. 

Which is true. 

But this is where many go wrong, they think that as an expression of our faith, it is up to us to try to do good works, believing that we are expected to do so, but knowing, deep down inside we are going to fail. 
 
Where as, when we read the New Testament we discover that faith in Christ is for the purpose of changing our likeness into Christ’s likeness. And Christ told us if we have seen Him we have seen the Father. 

This demonstrates that forgiveness of sins is not the end; it is only the means.  The end is us living out the righteousness of God, 
By faith.

Christ is the one making our character to be like His. When we try to do good things as an expression of our faith and in our own strength, we are bound to fail. 

Many of us have asked Christ to make us like him, we have experienced some changes in our lives, but we still fail to be all that we know God wants us to be. 

Why is that?

It may well go back to our belief in Christ, our faith. 

Do we have a faith that is an act of complete trust in which we renounce all other supports. 

Have we surrendered our way, our desires, our own will, before the Savior? 

Have we allowed God to do whatever He chooses?

Were we truthful we might have to say “no.” 

Were we truthful, we might have to say that we want God’s power of holy living but only if we are allowed to keep our hands on the steering wheel of our lives. 

We would like to be “better” Christians, but not at the price of being a bond-servant. 
You see God asks us to be His bond-slave, which means we allow God’s power to take over so we can: 
Love, when we are not loved
Be kind in the midst of cruelty
Be clean in the midst of filth
Be self forgetful when everything around us says to “take care of yourself at all costs”
You see, humans don’t steer their lives the same way God does. 

There is another reason many of us have not allowed God to do with us, whatever He chooses. Were we truthful, we may also admit that too often we allow the accuser to defeat us. 

When we do not see instant, painless change in our behavior, we allow doubt to replace faith. When we don’t see God’s power prevail, immediately, we figure we have failed, and we easily retreat. 
Instead, at the point of failure, rather than give up, it is at that point we need to ask God, 
“What is it in our being that is preventing His power to take over and prevail?”

We refrain from doing this because we know that should God begin probing around our being and point out the places and things that are causing us pain, we will have to enter a painful process of facing those things. We are keeping those things hidden because they are painful. Though the process may be painful, the outcome brings freedom and joyous growth and is well worth the pain. 

I had a wonderful Christian therapist who helped me walk through the pain of my childhood. 
I met with her, once a week, for two years, before I was willing to share any of my anger towards my parents. That was over a hundred hours of therapy before I could open up and reveal the pain. Once I started talking about it, I spent another year, where I left the hour of therapy in tears. Over fifty hours of tears, shed for that pain. It’s not easy. It’s exhausting. 

But when we allow ourselves to enter those places of pain we come to the place where we rejoice in wearing the garment of praise. The bridal gown that represents God’s attributes, not ours. We experience the spotless, white reflective gown we are able to experience and give things like:
* affection for others, 
* exuberance about life, serenity. 
We develop a willingness to stick with things, 
* a sense of compassion in the heart, 
* and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. 
We find ourselves 
* involved in loyal commitments, 
* not needing to force our way in life, 
* able to marshal and direct our energies wisely, (Galatians 5: 22-23, The Message).
That is the freedom in Christ, God wants for each of us. 

Let’s pray.