06/02/2026
The Clothes You Wear
Sunday I talked about Joshua the High Priest having his filthy clothing replaced by a cleaned and beautiful garments. I also used the illustration of a boy becomes a dragon—who ‘wears’ dragon scales—and is stripped of those scales in order to be restored to a boy. In fact, I could have done the whole sermon around all the clothing imagery in scripture:
- Adam and Eve hiding in shame, then clothed by God (Genesis 3)
- Joshua’s filthy garments removed (Zechariah 3)
- the prodigal receiving the Father’s robe (Luke 15)
- “Clothe yourselves with Christ” (Romans 13; Galatians 3)
- All the white robes in Revelation
The Bible repeatedly imagines salvation as a clothing exchange because shame is social and visible. People in the ancient world wore identity publicly. Sin is not merely internal guilt; it becomes something we feel has attached itself to us.
That’s why Zechariah 3 lands emotionally for me. Joshua isn’t merely guilty. He is standing there in garments everyone can see. It is a visual declaration of an internal and spiritual reality.
Just thinking out loud.
I guess it’s a direction my sermon did not take but could have.
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