Wedding Dresses
“I will rejoice greatly in the LORD, My soul will exult in my God; For He has clothed me with garments of salvation, He has wrapped me with a robe of righteousness, As a bridegroom decks himself with a garland, And as a bride adorns herself with her jewels” Isaiah 61:10
I recently had the opportunity to go into a wedding dress shop and try on a wedding dress. Every part of it felt like a fairy tale, the walking into the shop in my normal clothes. It was hot out; I was sweaty and gross. Yet this store let me walk in and pick out a big beautiful ball gown. Not an ordinary floor-length dress, but a big elegant sequined last scene in a Disney Princess movie dress.
I picked out my dress and put it on (along with the hoop skirt). I instantaneously felt like a new person. Looking at myself in the mirror, in this extremely expensive beautiful dress, I felt almost as if I got a glimpse into how God views each of us.
God is able to look past the our sin and shame and failures and see us as His beloved creation. The moment of awe that I felt as I looked into the mirror is the same way the God looks at each of us.
He created us, and we are precious to him. The changing out of my dirty clothes into the ballgown is a reflection of Jesus going to the cross for our sins. He took on a punishment and took all of the dirty things in our life so that we could put on his righteousness. I think so often we stop with Jesus taking away our sins, but he also provides us with “a robe of righteousness.”
We are part of the holy priesthood, and that knowledge changes every area of how we live our lives. Knowing that in Christ we forgiven, chosen, beautiful, beloved, and known means that we can go out into the world and love others in the same way, that we can look past the sin and begin to see the other people the way the Lord does.