Do you know how girls especially love fashion? I grew up going to a parochial school. We wore the same uniforms daily: navy jumpers with red and green plaid over a white blouse. That sure cut down on the monthly expenditures of the clothing budget. The limited wardrobe laid the groundwork for me nearly always costume dressing after getting into public schools later. All kidding aside, I really did feel a new expression of creativity by choosing my own ensembles to wear. 

This all leads to the choices we get to make by receiving what Jesus accomplished for us through His birth, death, burial, and resurrection. This is foundational in our understanding. “For God made the only one who did not know sin to become sin for us, so that we might become the righteousness of God through our union with him” (2 Cor. 5:21, Passion Translation). The Greek word Paul uses is poieō, a verb that, when nominalized, is poiema (poem, or poetry). Christ is God’s poetic masterpiece, who became the glorious sacrifice for sin. Though disturbing to the eyes of man, God saw the work of redemption culminated in the masterful poetry of His son suspended on a cross to give us heaven’s righteousness.  

In the Passion Translation, Brian Simmons’ commentary says,“This one verse is perhaps the greatest verse in the New Testament to describe our salvation through the sinless Savior and His substitutionary death on the cross. A wonderful divine exchange took place at the cross. All of our sins were left there, our guilt was removed and forever gone, and we walked away with all of God’s righteousness. What bliss is ours! Every believer today possesses the perfect and complete righteousness of Christ. We are seen by the Father as righteous as His Son.” 

As I recently wrote in my new book, For the Rest of Your Life: Living Out Your Destiny Blueprint, in my chapter called Women in Wardrobe, I discuss scripture references to wearing linen (John the Revelator refers to it as the “righteousness of the saints” in Revelation 19:8). When we have high, hot temps, it keeps us cool. And I lay out even more prophetic insights regarding linen in that chapter. 

Isaiah 64:6 graphically exposes our need. Hear this out of the Passion Translation, “We have all become contaminated with sin, and you see our self-righteousness as nothing better than a menstrual rag. We are all like fallen leaves, and our sin sweep us away like the wind.” The implication is that we are whirled along by the wind of our sins. Thank God for our new robe! 

Understanding righteousness in Christ has been the demarcation point in our lives (which is fixing the boundary or limit of something). Everything hinges upon understanding the free gift of righteousness in Him—where you will go and what you will do, what you believe about Him and what you believe about yourself, knowing He has gone before you and fulfilled it all.  

It says in Isaiah 61:10, “I will sing and greatly rejoice in Yahweh! My whole being vibrates with shouts of joy in my God! For he has dressed me with salvation and wrapped me in the robe of his righteousness! I appear like a bridegroom on his wedding day, decked out with a beautiful sash, or like a radiant bride adorned with sparkling jewels” (TPT). Righteousness. We wear it well.