Wearing new clothes on Easter is a tradition in my family. Dressing our best to worship our risen Savior seems appropriate, yet it’s not the clothes we purchase ourselves that matter. It’s the new clothes we’re given by Jesus that really count — clothes of gladness, unstained by sin.

Our sin produced for us a wardrobe tattered with rebellion, grief, fear, and heavy burdens. Though God calls us to put on the sackcloth of repentance, as we are reminded to do in Lent, we cannot clean ourselves up. Only Jesus can. He clothes us with garments of praise that He purchased for us with His own blood. Jesus makes us presentable to stand before God as children without blemish — until the day Jesus returns to give us our matching crown to wear eternally.