Revelation 3:5 “He who overcomes shall be clothed in white garments, and I will not blot out his name from the Book of Life; but I will confess his name before My Father and before His angels.”
In the passage of scripture quoted above it is revealed that the sixth reward that our Lord has for those who overcome is that they will be clothed in white garments. It is important for us to note that the Lord Jesus links this reward with two actions that He will take on behalf of the saint. The one action is that the Lord will not blot out the names of these saints from the Book of Life and the second action is that Jesus will confess their names before the Father and before His angels. Both of these actions relate directly to the saints salvation, for clearly if the Lord were to blot out the name of the saint from the Book of Life and if He were to deny the saint before God and His angels, then that individual would be condemned to the second death. So why does the Lord Jesus link our white garments to our salvation? We will understand the reason as we look at more scriptures that deal with this subject.
Revelation 7:13-14 “Then one of the elders answered, saying to me, "Who are these arrayed in white robes, and where did they come from?" (14) And I said to him, "Sir, you know." So he said to me, "These are the ones who come out of the great tribulation, and washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.”
The context of the above quoted passage of scripture is that the apostle John was shown a vision of the first time that the entire church will stand before the throne of God to worship Him. In this passage we see that all of the saints are arrayed in white robes and the elder informs us that the saints had made their robes white by washing them in the blood of the Lamb. And so we see in this passage that the reward given to each saint on that day is that they will freely receive white robes that have been washed clean in the precious blood of the Lamb.
Revelation 19:8 “And to her it was granted to be arrayed in fine linen, clean and bright, for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints.”
Although the saints are freely given white robes that are washed in the blood of the Lamb there is nevertheless a further truth that we need to understand regarding our robes. In the passage of scripture quoted above we learn that not only are our robes washed white in the blood of the Lamb, but that our white garments also reflect the righteous acts that we have done on the earth. And so we see that there are in fact two truths regarding our white robes. The first truth is that our robes are freely given to us washed in the blood of the Lamb, but the second truth is that we have a role to play in maintaining our robes i.e. we keep them clean through our righteous acts.
Revelation 3:4 “You have a few names even in Sardis who have not defiled their garments; and they shall walk with Me in white, for they are worthy.”
In the passage of scripture quoted above our Lord informed the church in Sardis that there were saints in that church that had not defiled their garments and would therefore walk with Him in white for they were worthy. In this passage Jesus clearly implied however that there were some saints in that church who had defiled their garments. It was to this church that our Lord made the comment about those who overcome not having their names blotted out of the book of life and of Him confessing their names before the Father and the angels in heaven. And so obviously the ones in Sardis who had defiled their garments had had their names blotted out of the book of life and they would be denied before the Father on that day. The reason for that was because these believers had committed the sin to death thus defiling their garments.
Revelation 3:17-18 Because you say, 'I am rich, have become wealthy, and have need of nothing'--and do not know that you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked-- (18) I counsel you to buy from Me gold refined in the fire, that you may be rich; and white garments, that you may be clothed, that the shame of your nakedness may not be revealed; and anoint your eyes with eye salve, that you may see.
The next time our Lord mentioned the saints’ garments was in the above quoted letter to the church in Laodicea. In this instance our Lord informed that church that they didn’t have white garments and that they were in fact naked. So how is it possible that some saints don’t have white garments? The reason is simply because they haven’t done any righteous acts yet, for as we have seen in an earlier quoted passage of scripture we are required to do works befitting repentance so that we may be clothed with the fine linen of our righteous acts on that day. Sadly there are some saints that receive the truth of the gospel and are born-again, but they never produce any fruit and continue to live as they did before they were saved. Our Lord very clearly teaches us that the Father removes all in Him who do not bear fruit (John 15:2). And you will recall the parable of the wedding guest who did not have a wedding garment being cast into outer darkness (Matthew 22:11-14). In the same letter to the church at Laodicea our Lord warned the saints that if they did not repent from their chosen lifestyle that He would eventually be forced to vomit them out of His mouth (Revelation 3:16). And so we see that God is not mocked and all those who sow to their flesh will of their flesh reap destruction, i.e. they will eventually go back into the world and commit the sin to death (Galatians 6:8).
Michael E.B. Maher
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