THINK TOGETHER
Can you think of a time when you were really dirty? Did you get clean?
READ TOGETHER
Every once in a while the Bible give us a look into heaven. One of those heavenly moments takes place in the book of Zechariah. Can you find Zechariah in your Bible? Zechariah the prophet had a vision of heaven. He saw a truly amazing scene unfold in front of God. Here’s a little bit of the picture:
Zechariah 3:1-5. 1Then [the angel] showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan standing at his right hand to accuse him. 2And the Lord said to Satan, “The Lord rebuke you, O Satan.
3Now Joshua was standing before the angel, clothed with filthy garments. 4And the angel said to those who were standing before him, “Remove the filthy garments from him.” And to him he said, “Behold, I have taken your iniquity away from you, and I will clothe you with pure vestments.” 5And I said, “Let them put a clean turban on his head.” So they put a clean turban on his head and clothed him with garments. And the angel of the Lord was standing by.
Who does Zechariah see? He sees the Lord seated on the throne of heaven. He sees Joshua the High Priest covered in “filth” (poop). Uh oh. That’s not good. He sees Satan pointing out Joshua’s poopy clothes to God and accusing him of being a big sinner. And he sees the Angel of the Lord, which is another name for Jesus.
When you and I sin something similar is happening in Heaven. Satan accuses us of being covered in filth. He loves to point out every little bad thing we do to God. But God rebukes Satan and tells him to shut up. Why? Because Jesus stands in front of God speaking for us. Jesus is our even better High Priest. Better than Joshua even, because he never sinned. Jesus looks at our filthy clothes, our sin, and says, Behold, I have taken your iniquity away from you, and I will clothe you with pure vestments (clothes). By the cross, Jesus has given us a clean heart and covered us with his own clean life, like putting on new clothes. Now we are forgiven and we are clean. And that is good news!
Because of Jesus we will never be seen as dirty and guilty by God again.
With Jesus we can admit our sins knowing God doesn’t count them against us.
DO SOMETHING TOGETHER
Read/Listen to the children’s book classic Harry the Dirty Dog. Like Harry all our “tricks” won’t make us better. We need to be cleansed by Jesus.
PRAY TOGETHER
Jesus, you have made me clean and taken away all my sins. Thank you! Amen.
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