Zechariah 3:4, commentary and pictures

In the heavenly court Joshua the high priest stands in filthy clothing before the Angel with Satan at his right hand to accuse and resist him, until the Lord rebukes the accuser and Jesus commands the attending angels to strip away the defiled garments and dress him anew. The soiled clothing is sin and guilt and a stained character that can never earn favor and cannot be cleansed by the sinner, while the fresh clothing is Christ's spotless righteousness imputed to cover sin and justify the undeserving through His suffering and merits. By that word of command God pardons transgression and blots it out and records the pardon in heaven, laying the iniquity upon the pure Son of God as substitute and surety who bears it away from the sinner. The exchange is not a covering for continued disobedience but requires desiring to be rid of sin with confession, repentance and forsaking and faith in Christ's blood, yet it is open to all however corrupt, who may come just as they are without first making themselves clean. What Joshua received pictures every repentant believer and the whole church, and with peculiar force the faithful remnant in the closing time of trouble when, conscious of unworthiness and with prayer as their only defense, they are delivered, pardoned and clothed nevermore to be defiled.

Vision Setting and Speakers

The verse belongs to a series of symbolic visions given to sustain and encourage God's people amid uncertainty about rebuilding the temple, revealing God's compassion and love toward them. In that love and care for fallen people He removes their iniquity and gives them clean garments, resisting Satan's power to afflict and destroy them. The vision illustrates Satan's effort to hold God's people before their imperfections and Christ's work as their Mediator with power to overcome the accuser.

The scene is a controversy in the heavenly courts where Joshua the high priest stands in his sacred official office before the Angel of the Lord, with Satan standing at his right hand to resist him. The Lord rebukes Satan as the One who has chosen Jerusalem and delivers Joshua as a brand plucked out of the fire. The command to take away the filthy garments with the declaration that iniquity is caused to pass and clothing in change of raiment is God's forgiveness and restoration of Joshua within that rebuke of Satan. God thereby restrains Satan from destroying the sinner and preserves an opportunity for forgiveness and acceptance through patience and long forbearance, not because continued disobedience is excused, so that to presume on that mercy by persisting in sin is a dangerous abuse of it.

The command to take away the filthy garments is spoken by Jesus from His throne with joy to those standing before Him, the angels who do His bidding, and they carry out the removal and the new clothing. He speaks it for His people, whose suffering He shares as His brethren, ordering iniquity taken away and righteousness given in its place. The angels remove Joshua's garments of sin and defilement and clothe him anew, displaying justification and victory over Satan and sin.

What took place in the courts of heaven is repeated on earth when Satan in person joins himself to professing believers, standing by to accuse them even when they do not hear or understand his presence. Their sins place them where Joshua stood, with the devil linked arm in arm with them, and this is the position he now occupies toward every church and toward ministers, standing before the angel of God to resist them in their official work of ministering the Word and to resist the Lord's working in behalf of His people. In answer to intercession and in pity toward His afflicted people the Lord comes to their relief. The vision of Joshua and the Angel comes immediately before the message regarding the work of Zerubbabel. What it pictures is but a faint description of the reality of the last days when evil springs forth, and it shall become a living reality in that time when the end is near and Satan is drilling his army to develop strong parties ready for the great battle of the last great conflict, calling for wisdom.

Garment Symbolism Explained

The filthy garments are sin and guilt and iniquity and defilement and shame, a sin-stained character and defective character that cannot make a person worthy of divine favor and cannot be taken off or cancelled by the sinner. Their removal and replacement pictures iniquity taken away and a changed condition, with forgiveness and pardon recorded, and honor and glory given to those delighted in. The change of clothing is cleansing from sin and covering with righteousness, wholly the Lord's work and open to everyone.

More particularly the filthy garments are faulty religious lives of persons overcome by temptation, whose own righteousness cannot make them worthy, together with selfishness and laboring in human strength and human ways, weakness and folly, sins of ingratitude, and unlikeness to Christ that dishonors the Redeemer. They are sin and defilement pointed to as ground for destruction, yet taken away by royal command and replaced with clean garments. The accuser seeks to frighten with the thought that the case is hopeless and the stain will never be washed away, so that faith is destroyed and allegiance is yielded.

They are Satan's own character put upon God's people, black robes woven in his hellish loom out of sins he instigated them to commit and then charges against them, not a true representation of souls that have repented and felt and been humbled and ashamed over sin. He also brings reproach on the church by clothing it in filthy garments through misuse of divine reproofs and corrections to push it into false positions, casting reproach upon the kingdom. That work is aided when professed laborers tear down and denounce and accuse and condemn instead of restoring and winning the unconverted to Jesus.

The filthy garments are the sins he tempted them to commit, of which he has accurate knowledge, and which have not yet been blotted out. On that ground he urges that divine protection is forfeited and they are as deserving as himself of exclusion from favor, claiming right to destroy them and demanding sentence as upon himself and his angels. He questions whether lawbreakers who love self more than God and put their own interests above His service, loving the world and showing selfishness and malice and hatred toward one another, shall take his place and the place of the angels who united with him.

The change of raiment is Christ's righteousness, His spotless robe and robe of righteousness, given to the repentant and believing to cover defilement and sin. The undeserving sinner is cleansed and clothed with imputed righteousness, iniquity passing away and transgressions blotted out, so as to stand before the Lord and before the Father and before the heavenly universe in new garments. This is accomplished through suffering and crucifixion and merits and perfect obedience and sacrifice, by which humanity may be united with divinity, with pardon recorded in heaven and standing changed despite defects and accusations. The pardoned are marked as fit to minister before God, with Israel's sins pardoned and Israel clothed in that righteousness.

The change also signifies pardon and restoration and acceptance, a new standing and new righteous life, a changed clean character, and power to live a pure and holy life. It is granted to those who confess with sorrow and put sins away, repent and forsake wrongdoing, being forgiven and cleansed and made ready for holy service and life with Him. It is wrought through advocacy and intercession for those being brought to repentance, and refusal to turn from sin leaves no pure holy character able to stand in the judgment.

The new clothing includes restoration to favor with priestly garments and miter placed upon the pardoned, qualifying them despite former transgressions to minister in the sanctuary. The miter inscribed Holiness to the Lord is set upon the head with forgiveness and cleansing and renewal upon repentance and forsaking of sin. The gift comes with endowment of the Spirit and baptism of the Holy Ghost, bringing acceptance with God and courage and hope and light and increased faith, with a censer of righteousness and pledge to answer prayer, and with faithful obedient children at last clothed in coronation robes of final honor and victory. Even when His children err they belong to Him by purchase of blood, their best imperfect service accepted because He is perfect, deficiencies made up and character transformed as He abides in the heart by faith among those faithful and loyal and true.

In its final vindication sense the filthy garments are the contempt and reproach and meanness and sorrow and ridicule and oppression laid on the faithful by wicked men for refusing to worship the beast and his image, through prisons and dungeons and dens and caves and mountains and secret councils and torture chambers and hovels and garrets, through sore affliction and deep self-denial and disappointment. Their removal by heavenly command means the faithful will no longer be the sport and ridicule of the wicked. The change is white robes of righteousness, richer robes than earth has seen, with fair miter and diadems of glory set upon their heads. Then days of suffering and reproach and want and hunger and weeping are over and past, ending in victory and glory and song with palm branches, crying salvation to God and the Lamb.

Pardon and Cleansing Received

The command to take away the garments with the declaration that iniquity is caused to pass means guilt is removed, transgressions are blotted out, sins are pardoned, and defilement is replaced with clean clothing. That pardon is written in heaven opposite the names of the repentant and believing, though Satan does not know it. Those who receive it are those who have used probationary time to confess sins with contrition and put them away, who vex their souls over surrounding corruption, sigh and cry over abominations, keep themselves uncorrupted, and have washed their robes of character white in the blood of the Lamb. In answer to Satan's reviling, Jesus changes their appearance, causes iniquity to pass, and clothes them anew.

In removing iniquity God transfers it to the innocent, pure and holy Son of God. Christ bears it as substitute and surety, bearing what separates people from God and rescuing them from the second death. In the final fulfillment the sins of the pardoned are transferred to the originator of sin.

The filthy garments are taken away before the new garments are given, for righteousness does not cover continued disobedience and transgression. The clean garments are not placed over garments of disobedience and sin; sin is first taken away, then the sinner is clothed anew. The gift is not for those who continue in sin without repentance or presume on mercy, but for those who have confessed sins with sorrow and put them away. Receiving it requires desiring to be rid of sin, seeking separation from it, repenting, forsaking sin, striving earnestly to overcome with no sin tolerated, and relying in penitence and faith on Christ's blood and strength while pleading for pardon through Jesus as Advocate. Through repentance and faith pardon is received on Christ's merits, joined to obedience, and believers can then obey God's commandments.

The cleansing is available to everyone however sinful. No one is too corrupt or too sinful to receive strength, purity and righteousness; all may be cleansed, refined and ennobled. The sinner does not have to make himself clean first but comes just as he is, even with faltering prayer or feeble desire, believing in Christ as personal Saviour instead of preparing his own robe or relying on self-righteousness. Forgiveness, pardon and the gift of righteousness are freely offered through God's love to all who believe and accept salvation.

The taking away of iniquity and the clothing with change of raiment is accomplished through the blood of Jesus Christ, which pleads in behalf of sinners and cleanses from all sin. Christ the Advocate secures pardon and reconciliation through His perfect obedience and the merits of His sacrifice at Calvary, His atoning sacrifice by which God justifies believers. God does not deny their unworthiness but has bought them with a price. In this union of justice and mercy God remains just while justifying the repenting sinner and renewing fellowship with the fallen race, with the law standing in the most holy place as the rule of right covered by the mercy-seat before which Christ pleads His blood, raising multitudes from ruin to clothe them with spotless garments, unite them with angels who never fell, and bring them to dwell forever in God's presence.

Christ's righteousness is imputed even when His children err, because they belong to Him by purchase of His blood. When they do their best and call upon God for help their imperfect service is accepted because Jesus is perfect and makes up for unavoidable deficiencies. Jesus abides in their hearts by faith and transforms them into His character as they remain faithful, true and loyal, never betraying trust into the enemy's hands.

The cleansing makes the person fit to stand before God, ready for holy service and life with Him. Though formerly transgressors, the pardoned are qualified to minister before God in the sanctuary, lifted from corruption to serve Him, with priestly garments and miter placed upon them and with God not casting off His servants for errors made while striving to do His work. Pardon brings restoration and acceptance as God relieves His afflicted, punished yet repentant people and receives them as they return to obedience through the coming Messiah, the Branch, despite Satan's accusations and resistance. That cleansing leads into walking in God's ways and keeping His charge, with promise of judging His house and having places among the angels.

Advocate Answers the Accuser

Satan stands to accuse and resist, pointing to the filthy garments and the sins they represent, demanding that guilt be held against God's people rather than taken away. He claims the sinner standing in guilt as his own and seeks to keep him under his control and to destroy him, with Christ defending him as Advocate and Intercessor who brings him to repentance. Part of that work is reviving repented past sins to make the soul lose confidence in God and lose hold on heaven, while Christ commands the defiled clothing removed as causing repented iniquity to pass away and providing pardon and a justified standing.

He accuses from accurate knowledge of the sins he himself tempted them to commit, urging that by those sins they have forfeited divine protection. He declares them just as deserving as himself of exclusion from favor, claims the right to destroy them as his prey, and insists justice demands God pronounce sentence against them as He banished him and his angels. He challenges whether lawbreakers who love self more than God, place their own interests above His service, love the world, and show selfishness, malice and hatred can take his place and the place of the angels who united with him. He tries to frighten them that their case is hopeless and the stain of defilement will never be washed away, hoping to destroy faith so they yield to temptation and turn from allegiance. In this he steps between the repenting believing soul and Christ to cast his hellish shadow, dampen faith, eclipse Christ's love and acceptance and pardon, make God's words of none effect, point to mistakes and past unworthiness to rob rights, and discourage those striving for victory.

Christ answers accusation by commanding the removal, rebuking Satan, and refusing to abandon or forsake His people. He looks on them with compassion, intercedes and pleads as Advocate, defends and claims them by creation and redemption, and with royal authority refuses to let Satan destroy them though He points to no worthiness in them. He does not condemn the repentant but restores and forgives, changing their standing, acknowledging them before the heavenly universe, and recording pardon in heaven opposite their names. This deliverance comes through an all-powerful Redeemer come in humanity to live righteousness and give power to all who accept Him, helping those convinced of the sinfulness of sin to lay aside selfishness and cease laboring in human strength.

He secures pardon and reconciliation through His perfect obedience, death, merits, blood, sacrifice at Calvary, and resistance to every satanic device. The hope of the accused rests in God's mercy not their own worthiness, for those who trust by faith receive pardon and stand accepted. All who in penitence and faith have claimed His protection stand before Him as chosen and faithful and true, and not one such soul will He permit to pass under the enemy's power, for Satan has no power to pluck them out of the Saviour's hand. In the time of trouble those whose names are written in the book of life will thus be delivered from Satan's power when He commands their filthy garments taken away.

As they pray Christ hears, makes intercession, regenerates the sinner, writes pardon against his name, causes iniquity to pass away, and lets His light and righteousness shine into the heart. He gives power to become God's children and continues His redeeming work in them as they keep believing and trusting, refusing their accusers' claims. As connecting link between God and man He promises personal intercession, places the whole virtue of His righteousness on the suppliant's side, and pleads in God's presence as One equal with the Father who gave His life for the world. Angels clear away the practice of sin, for appreciation of His merits cleanses every fully repented sin and clothes the soul in His righteousness, accepting, encircling, renewing and transforming the humble confessing one in daily conversion.

Joshua Represents God's People

Joshua the high priest stands for the individual sinner for whom Christ intercedes, for every tempted soul standing in guilt before God, and for every soul Christ seeks to draw to Himself. His filthy garments picture the defilement of sin and the iniquity of the sinner, and their removal with a change to clean garments is forgiveness, restoration, salvation and righteousness granted as Christ brings the sinner to repentance. Satan leads such souls into sin and then accuses them as his own and as unworthy of divine love, resisting the Angel's work for them, but the Lord rebukes Satan, rescues the one He has chosen, causes iniquity to pass away, and clothes the person anew.

Joshua also stands for all of God's people who repent and believe and accept Christ as their sin-pardoning Saviour, coming to Jesus in penitence and faith to receive the robe of righteousness. The command to take away the filthy garments is carried out by angels who do His bidding, and when intercession is accepted iniquity is removed and new garments are given. Those garments of sin are not a true representation of the repentant, humbled and ashamed soul, for they are Satan's own character with which he clothes God's people, black robes woven in his hellish loom from sins he instigated them to commit and then charges against them, and sinners cannot remove or cancel sin themselves. As they pray Christ hears and makes intercession, regenerates the sinner, and pardon is written opposite the name with iniquity caused to pass away, while Satan steps between the repenting believing soul and Christ to cast his hellish shadow, dampen faith, eclipse Christ's love and acceptance and pardon, and make God's words of none effect, until Christ rebukes him to let light and righteousness shine into the heart. The change of raiment is Christ's righteousness in which He clothes the sinner, as a forgiving Father brings forth the best robe for the returning child, so the sinner must come just as he is and believe in Christ as personal Saviour instead of striving to prepare a robe of righteousness to cover deformity and sin.

Joshua stands for God's people, Israel, the church and Jerusalem, an imperfect sinful people contaminated by sin yet repentant, punished and afflicted yet relieved and received as they return to obedience. Their filthy garments are their sin, imperfections and guilt, which Satan accuses them of and demands be held against them, and God answers before the watching universe by ordering the garments removed, declaring iniquity forgiven and taken away, removing reproach, and giving clean clothing. Their hope is reconversion, repentance toward God and faith in Jesus Christ as righteousness and sanctification, accounted in heaven as a justified sinner, with acceptance for God's work resting on the righteousness of Christ who resisted every satanic device, so that though imperfect and unworthy they receive mercy, cleansing, pardon, restoration and compassion through the coming Messiah, the Branch. That cleansing leads into a call to walk in God's ways and keep His charge, and to the need for revival, reformation and sanctification by the Holy Spirit.

Joshua stands for ministers, and the churches also are pictured as wearing filthy garments, so both ministers and congregations, as ministers and church members together, need to humble themselves, fast, pray and repent. Removing the garments is pardon with iniquity taken away and clean garments given, and those who sincerely repent and continue serving God are forgiven through dependence on the merits of the crucified Saviour and trust in His atoning sacrifice, needing revival, reformation and sanctification by the Holy Spirit, until God looks on them with pleasure.

Joshua also stands for the tried, tempted, faithful children of God, the despised remnant and little company who afflict their souls before Him pleading for purity of heart, resist the wiles of the deceiver, and refuse to turn from loyalty at the dragon's roar. When they do so He commands the filthy garments to be taken away, declares their iniquity removed, and gives a change of raiment which is the spotless robe of Christ's righteousness placed upon them. They are then clothed in glorious apparel nevermore to be defiled by the corruptions of the world, with names retained in the Lamb's book of life enrolled among the faithful of all ages, now eternally secure from the tempter's devices, with their sins transferred to the originator of sin and a fair miter set upon their heads.

End-Time Trial and Vindication

The vision applies with peculiar force to God's people in the closing scenes of the great day of atonement, in the final crisis and time of trouble, when what was pictured becomes a living reality. Evil springs forth and Satan drills his army to develop strong parties ready for the great battle of the last conflict, calling for wisdom because the end is near. Though Satan accuses them of real sins and points to their weakness, they plead for pardon and deliverance through Jesus their Advocate, with hope resting in God's mercy and not in their own worthiness. When they humble themselves and plead for purity, guilt and defilement are removed and they are clothed anew in spotless righteousness, so that pardon and acceptance belong to the tried and faithful remnant who will no longer be defiled by the world's corruption.

It pictures the remnant church brought into great trial and distress as those who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus. They are a little company resisting Satan's supremacy while he numbers the world and even many professing Christians as his subjects, and he seeks to blot them from the earth to complete his triumph. As he influenced heathen nations to destroy Israel, he will stir up the wicked powers of earth to destroy God's people when obedience to human edicts in violation of divine law is required and the remnant feels the ire of the dragon and his hosts. In that final crisis they are menaced, denounced, proscribed, and betrayed by parents and brethren and kinsfolk and friends even unto death.

In that time they plead before the Angel with broken hearts and afflicted souls, with earnest faith and unfaltering prayer as their only defense and the mercy of God as their only hope. They are fully conscious of weakness, unworthiness and sinfulness, seeing little good in review of life and ready to despair, while Satan tries to terrify them that their case is hopeless and the stain of defilement will never be washed away. The Lord permits Satan to try them to the uttermost, so that confidence, faith and firmness are severely tested in hope of destroying faith and turning them from allegiance. Yet afflicting their souls, confessing sins and pleading for purity of heart brings the command for filthy garments to be taken away, iniquity removed, and change of raiment given, without denying mistakes made while striving to do God's work.

Those whose names are in the book of life are delivered from Satan's power in the final time of trouble. Holy angels guard them, their cases are decided in the sanctuary above, their pardon is recorded in heaven opposite their names though Satan does not know it, and God removes their garments and clothes them anew in answer to the claim that their case is hopeless. Satan sees the guarding angels and infers their sins have been pardoned, yet presents an accurate but exaggerated account of sins he tempted them to commit, declares them as deserving as himself of exclusion from favor, argues God cannot in justice forgive them yet destroy him and his angels, and claims them as his prey to destroy.

Having resisted the wiles of the deceiver and refused to turn from loyalty at the dragon's roar, they become eternally secure from the tempter's devices and are clothed in glorious apparel nevermore to be defiled by the corruptions of the world. Their names are retained in the Lamb's book of life enrolled among the faithful of all ages, their sins are transferred to the originator of sin, and a fair miter is set upon their heads. Full glorification still waits until after a time of watching for defects and a life of walking in God's ways and keeping His charge. This cleansing comes when Satan is about to lose his last chance to ruin these souls, immediately before his last great act of personating Christ, a disguise that none but those established in the Scriptures and acquainted with the word of God will discern.

Life and Fellowship Application

The verse shows Christ pleading the case of every tempted soul while Satan accuses, and the filthy garments are the faults, mistakes and iniquity of believers which accusers point to when they condemn their brethren. When God's people accuse and condemn one another they take their stand with Satan and grieve Christ, while those who accuse take the side of the accuser against the tempted. Those who are criticized and condemned should not become discouraged, because while brethren condemn them Christ defends them and claims them as His own by creation and by redemption. Those whom others point to as polluted may in fact be justified by God and receive the sympathy of Christ and the angels, for God removes guilt and replaces filthy garments with clean clothing as forgiveness and restored standing. Satan presents the sins and mistakes of God's workers in the worst light, figuratively clothing the erring with filthy garments to discourage and to give murmurers an excuse to turn against fellow workers instead of helping restore God's honor and advance His cause.

Those who have been forgiven through the removal of iniquity and the clothing with Christ's righteousness should help restore people who have sinned rather than condemn them. Those who claim to be laborers together with God must not help Satan tear down, denounce, accuse and condemn, but must restore the erring and win the unconverted in the church to Jesus. Satan clothes the church with filthy garments by casting reproach upon Christ's kingdom and by misusing the reproofs God gave to show sin, urging believers into false positions. The servant of God falsely covered with reproach must have the filthy garments removed, for the Lord clears away guilt wrongly laid upon him, exposes false accusations against His servants, clothes him anew and restores his good name. Ministers who dress Seventh-day Adventists in disgraceful accusations use those accusations to build prejudice against them.

To be clothed in filthy garments means to be represented as a sinner under condemnation, and those who suffered for the truth, witnessed a good confession through self-denial and self-sacrifice, overcame by the blood of the Lamb and the word of their testimony, and died in Jesus with their names in the Lamb's book of life must not be presented in that way. Their past mistakes and errors must not be paraded before the world nor must faithful believers who died in the faith be exposed to appear clothed in error and fanaticism before a hostile world. Rather they are to be described as the patient saints who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus, who understood, accepted, communicated and distinctly experienced the redemption freely received through Jesus Christ. God removes the errors and sins of His people and replaces filthy garments with clean clothing.

Receiving the removal of iniquity and the new garment of Christ's righteousness, which is available to all to be cleansed, refined and ennobled, calls for looking to one's own faults rather than accusing others. Those who need this gift should look to their own defects, pray, and rely on Christ's personal intercession which brings victories that would otherwise be missed. Those who gain this experience plead for themselves to be baptized with the Holy Spirit and invested with Christ's Spirit, virtually clothed with priestly garments and placed on vantage ground, with a censer filled with the incense of His righteousness put into the hands and Christ's distinct pledge to answer supplication in His name, and they do not utter accusations against others. Those who occupy the time justifying themselves and finding fault with others lose the opportunity to be thus clothed, shame Christ, and encourage evil angels to war against God's people. Accusers must get on their knees in humility and contrition to confess their own sins, and then Christ's intercession prevails with God as the almoner of infinite grace.

Understanding and receiving the vision leads to practical work for people who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for the change of raiment is Christ's righteousness abundantly imputed to those who hunger and thirst for it. That work is to be urged forward and upward. Those clothed with Christ's Spirit wear priestly garments and are commissioned to minister to others. God removes iniquity and clothes the person with new garments, which is the robe of Christ's righteousness.

Filthy garments represent iniquity that must be put away rather than clung to, for those who cling to their sins make themselves unfit for heaven and lose its eternal joy. Iniquity defiles like filthy clothing, and God removes it and provides clean garments, yet a person with a blot on his garments cannot be treated as clear before God or lightly assured that all is well while sin remains unrepented. Self-sufficiency is under the rebuke of God, and sinners must walk humbly before God depending wholly upon the merits of a crucified and risen Saviour in order to appear before God clothed with the garments of Christ's righteousness. Because the work is great, the time is short and the end is near, hearts must now be in earnest to receive this clothing.

The removal of filthy garments represents God forgiving the sins of those who sincerely repent, causing their iniquity to pass away and clothing them in clean garments as restored standing after repentance and pardon. Those who have truly repented are not to be shamed for their former sins, though Satan seeks to humiliate and shame them and those continuing in wrongdoing may join in taunting and accusing them. Satan pointing to filthy garments as evidence of sin also shows the shame and guilt of adulterous conduct, which is recorded in heaven's books and must not be excused or concealed.