How to Understand the Creative Masterpiece of God's Righteousness

Fashion for a girl is important. Girls love fashion. We love wearing the latest styles. Growing up, I started at a Catholic school. Daily, I had to wear the same uniform - a red and green navy jumper over a white blouse. Although it cut down on my parents’ monthly clothing expenses, it did nothing for my creativity. 

The limited wardrobe laid the groundwork for me. In my later years, I took to nearly always costume dressing in public school. Costume kidding aside, I did feel a new expression of creativity by having the freedom to choose my own ensembles. I looked forward to it and to wear them well.

The Masterpiece of Righteousness 

As fashion helped provide new freedom to self-expression and creativity, that same excitement I can equate to God’s creativity in his masterpiece of giving us righteousness through His Son, Jesus. 

We are given the freedom to choose righteousness by receiving what Jesus accomplished for us through His birth, death, burial, and resurrection. This is foundational for our understanding, “For God made the only one who did not know sin to become sin for us so that we who did not know righteousness might become the righteousness of God through our union with him.” 
 
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’s 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.”
 
Wearing the Masterpiece of Righteousness Well 
 
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 the scripture references to wearing linen (John the Revelator refers to it as the ‘righteousness of the saints’ Revelation 19:8). Linen keeps us cool in high, hot temperatures. In the book, 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 sweeps 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 gift of righteousness in Him….where you will go, what you will do, what you believe about Him, and what you believe about yourself knowing He had gone before you and fulfilled it all. 
In Isaiah 61:10, “I will sing and 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.” 
 
Righteousness, wear it well. 
 
Written by Denise Capra
Artwork by Polly Lunetto

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