“But when the king came in to look at the guests, he saw there a man who had no wedding garment.” (Mt 22:11)
It is written in the Book of Revelation about the Bride of Messiah:
“’Let us rejoice and exult and give him the glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his Bride has made herself ready; it was granted her to clothe herself with fine linen, bright and pure’— for the fine linen is the righteous deeds of the saints.” (Rev 19:7-8)
There is a difference between the righteousness of the saints, which is referring to the righteous deeds of the saints as it is correctly translated here in the ESV translation, and the righteousness of God which is granted to us in the Messiah. The latter is freely given to us when we accept Messiah as Lord and Savior trusting in His atoning sacrifice for our sins. The former is the outworking of our relationship with Him after we have accepted Him as Lord. Without His righteousness we cannot even attain to the former, i.e. without a right standing before God through the sacrifice of Messiah, we cannot have access to God and fellowship with Him.
The Bridegroom does not want to marry a Bride that does not love Him. How happy will a marriage be if the couple does not love each other? Yeshua said: “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.” (Jn 14:15) If we do not keep His commandments it proves to Him that we do not love Him. If we do not spend time with Him in prayer and do not care about what He has said, can we truly say that we love Him? But if we do love Him, it will automatically produce results of obedience in our lives. This obedience is our wedding garment of righteous deeds.
“And he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding garment?’ And he was speechless. Then the king said to the attendants, ‘Bind him hand and foot and cast him into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’” (v. 12-13)
This man thought that it was enough to say a prayer and fill out a form and then be guaranteed eternal bliss while continuing to live his own life as if nothing had changed. He had no wedding garment. He had no righteous deeds to prove that he truly had repented. The result was catastrophic. Paul wrote: “If anyone has no love for the Lord, let him be accursed. Our Lord, come!” (1 Co 16:22)
“Behold, I am coming like a thief! Blessed is the one who stays awake, keeping his garments on, that he may not go about naked and be seen exposed!” (Rev 16:15)
It says about the Bride: “… it was granted her to clothe herself with fine linen, bright and pure’— for the fine linen is the righteous deeds of the saints.” (Rev 19:7-8)
Our righteous deeds are an outworking of God’s grace in our lives. Yeshua said:
“I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in me he is thrown away like a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned.” (Jn 15:5-6)
Let’s abide in the Messiah and let His Word abide in us!
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