I remember a few years back, more like several years ago now, my friend called to say that the teacher forgot to tell me to look in Nathaniel’s backpack.

I wish she would have told me not to look in the back pack. Don’t look, wrap it in packing tape, shrink wrap it 52 times, and then burn it in a field outside the city. That would have been the wiser thing to do.

Maybe then I could have saved myself from seeing and smelling what was in that bag. It looked to me like we forgot a carton of chocolate milk in the bag that was long past sour. Lumps of milk had oozed their way out of the carton and onto the books. And the smell was horrendous.

As I got to thinking about that today, I was reminded of the stench of my sin. As much as we might like to think highly of some people, the Bible tells us that no one is righteous, not even one.

We talked about that a little bit the other day when we read Ezra chapter four. We saw how Satan went about to stop the work that Joshua* and Zerubbabel had started on the building of the temple. We read how the accuser went before the king with accusations against the Israelites.

Digging yet a little deeper, we see something interesting taking place behind the scenes of that chapter. It’s found in Zechariah’s vision in Zechariah Chapter 3. Once again I’m reminded that there’s a spiritual war behind every battle we face. We see Joshua the High Priest standing before the Lord, and who is standing beside him? The accuser. But, just as he starts to point out his sin, the Lord rebukes him.

Joshua was dressed in filthy clothes before the Lord. There’s no denying that. In the same way that you and I are guilty of sin, he was guilty of the accusations set before him. But let’s remember once again: where sin abounds, His grace abounds all the more!

And so, we see the beauty of the Lord and the power of His grace in Zechariah Chapter 4,

“I have taken away your sin,” He says, “and I will put fine garments upon you.”

If that sounds familiar to you it should. It’s a foretelling of the righteousness of Christ. The righteousness that clothes each and every believer who puts their faith in God. That we might stand blameless before the King, not having our own righteousness but that of our Lord Jesus Christ who was perfect in every way.

Isaiah writes,

I delight greatly in the LORD; my soul rejoices in my God. For he has clothed me with garments of salvation and arrayed me in a robe of his righteousness, as a bridegroom adorns his head like a priest, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels. (Isaiah 61:10, NIV)

* This isn’t the same Joshua that succeeded Moses and led the Israelites into The Promised Land. This Joshua is a High Priest and Ezra Chapter 4 takes place hundreds of years after the time of Joshua the Son of Nun.


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Tilling the Soil

Read Zechariah Chapter 3. And also check out part one of this devotion: Click here.

Planting Hope

I delight greatly in the LORD; my soul rejoices in my God. For he has clothed me with garments of salvation and arrayed me in a robe of his righteousness, as a bridegroom adorns his head like a priest, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels. (Isaiah 61:10, NIV)


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Darlene Schacht and her husband Michael live in Manitoba Canada where the summers are beautiful and the winters are cold. Together they’ve come to learn that relationships aren’t always easy, but that marriage, the way God intended it to be, is a treasure worth fighting for.

She began her publishing journey about twelve years ago when she pioneered one of the first online magazines for Christian women, known at the time as “Christian Women Online Magazine.” After three years, Darlene left CWO to blog as a solo author at Time-Warp Wife Ministries.

It was also during this transition that she worked alongside actress Candace Cameron Bure to write the NYT Best-Selling book, Reshaping it All: Motivation for Spiritual and Physical FitnessReshaping it All was the winner of both the 2011 USA Best Book Awards and the 2012 Christian Reading Retailers Choice Awards.

Author of more than 15 books, Darlene continues to write and to minister to her readers through her blog at TimeWarpWife.com.

Connect with Darlene:

Facebook: @timewarpwife
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You are loved by an almighty God,

Darlene Schacht
The Time-Warp Wife