New Clothes

DEVOTION

THE LETTER TO THE GALATIANS

NEW CLOTHES

Gal 3:26-29

26 You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, 27 for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. 28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise.

NIV

What does it mean to be a son of God through faith in Christ Jesus? What does it mean to clothe ourselves with Christ? It would seem that all of humankind are in some sense children of God as we all are descendants of Adam. Yet we all have sinned, or run away from God, and we who accepted Jesus are somewhat like the prodigal son. Nevertheless, we are now children of God, or sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. We are no longer spending all our inheritance on self-indulgences as that prodigal son did. We have come home and we have been baptized, or immersed in Christ. The Greek word baptizoo carries the meaning of to dip repeatedly, to immerse, to submerge and it can also mean to cleanse by dipping or submerging to wash, to make clean with water. In a metaphorical sense to overwhelm. Of course, as it was instituted by John the Baptist, it became a religious rite or sacred ablution as a sign of removal of sin. However, pondering on the context in which this word is used in conjunction with clothing ourselves with Christ, it seems right to consider we are to fully immerse ourselves in Jesus. That would be in some sense like putting on a costume that would completely hide our identity. Except in this case we are washing away that old identity and taking on the new identity of Jesus. We are getting rid of the old filthy clothes, not just washing them and putting them back on, because no matter what we wash those with the stain of sin will not come out. So we take them off, becoming, as it were naked before God and he clothes us with Jesus Christ, who is even purer than the white driven snow. This is the only way we can become the sons of God, is to immerse ourselves in Jesus, being clothed with Jesus. Of course, we do this by faith, as we cannot actually see any difference in ourselves when we look into the mirror. But by faith, we have to know that what we see is not who we are anymore. We are the seed of Abraham and we are heirs according to the promise. We have a new identity, we have been transformed from being a slave to sin to a son of God. We live in new clothes.