Throughout the Scriptures garments are spoken of in connection with character. There is some intrinsic connection between the character of people and the clothing that they wear.

Abominable fashions, which originate in Paris and spread all over the world, are a positive expression of the corruption and ignorance in the souls of the people who wear the clothes.

In all generations true sanctity of heart, where it has had the liberty of expressing itself in raiment, has always taken on the form of simplicity, purity and natural grace.

From the first kind of a bodily garment that Adam invented with his fig-leaves, in the Garden of Eden, right straight through the Bible and through all ages down to the time of the Marriage Supper of the Lamb in the heavens, as described in Revelation 19, there has always been the revelation of character in the garments of the wearer.

The wedding garment is described by St. John in Revelation 19:8. He says, "˜T heard the voice of a great multitude, like the voice of many waters, and as the voice of mighty thunderings, saying. Alleluia, let us be glad and rejoice and give honor to the Lord God; for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and His wife hath made herself ready. And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white, for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints."�

There are three terms which are used in describing the raiment of the Bride of the Lamb. It is fine linen, and then white, or brilliant, dazzling. These terms describing the raiment exactly set forth the work of grace that had been wrought in the heart of those who make up the Bride.

In the first place, the raiment consisted of fine linen. It is significant that no wool is used in the wedding garment. Back in the Old Testament the Lord tells the Jews that if they wanted woolen garments they could have them, but they were not allowed to make their garments of wool and linen mixed together; for that mixture represented a mixed moral condition of life. Wool is an animal product and contains the natural grease of the animal, a type of the carnal nature. You may take wool and wash it for years but you can never take the grease out of it, for just as long as there is a particle of wool there will be the oily substance of the animal fat in the fiber. And so it is impossible to purify the carnal mind though you may wash it with nitre, and train it and develop it in all sorts of ways, and during a long life-time: the carnal nature can never be subjected to the law of God, but in its very nature is enmity against God, and the only true Scripture remedy is to have it purged out, expelled, put away from the heart and life.

God was more strict with the Jewish priests, and in the Book of Ezekiel we learn that He would not only not allow the priests to wear garments mixed with wool and linen, but they were not allowed to wear any wool on their persons when they went into the tabernacle for service; but they were commanded strictly to wear linen garments.

Linen is a vegetable product and free from oily substance, and has been selected by the Holy Spirit to represent righteousness, purity, integrity, and hence to be dressed in linen was a type of righteousness of heart and life.

In the next place, the linen garment was to be clean; washed from all earthly substance, and from all defilement, which represents the gracious work of sanctification; of the believer being cleansed from earthly mindedness, from carnal desires, from selfish dispositions; the true state of holiness in heart and in mind.

There are different kinds of righteousness, as well as different degrees of it. The word righteousness in Revelation 19:8 is in the original in the plural number, as it is also in the plural number in the Book of Ezekiel, and we are told that the fine linen is the righteousness of the saints.

The first kind of righteousness which a believer has is that perfect merit of Christ which is imputed to the penitent believer in justification, by which the satisfaction which Christ wrought on the cross is counted over to the penitent believer, and God counts him righteous for the sake of Christ, because he believes in Christ; but it should always be kept in mind that this imputed righteousness applies only to justification, to the removal of guilt from the sinner, and every passage in the Bible that speaks of the imputation of righteousness is always in connection with justification only, and not in connection with the new birth, or with sanctification, which must be imparted.

The second kind of righteousness which the soul can have is that which is infused or imparted to the believer by the inworking of the Holy Spirit. When a sinner's guilt is taken from him, then the way is open for the Holy Spirit through the Word of God to change the heart and put in that believer real uprightness of soul; a new love, a new desire, a new life, the life of Christ, the integrity of Christ, the principle of obedience which is in Christ; so that a believer is made upright in his heart, motives and actions. This is the righteousness of Christ through faith, the kind that Paul says he wanted to have at the coming of the Lord.

The third kind of righteousness is that which "˜the true Christian works out in his own life, in obedience, in longsuffering, in acts of mercy, in abstaining from evil, in practicing that which is good, in forgiving his enemies, in exercising charity for all men, in cultivating compassion, and the doing of all manner of good to his fellow-creatures. This is righteous living, this is the righteousness that the Apostle James emphasized in his Epistle, and says without this righteousness of living, which is a fruit of saving faith, that one's righteousness is vain.

These are the three kinds of righteousness that are represented by the garments of fine linen which have been made clean.

The third term which is used to describe the wedding garment, is that it is white. The original word means radiant, brilliant, dazzling, not only white in itself, but of a dazzling whiteness, as if polished to the utmost degree. This implies something more than purity. The Bridehood saints must not only be those who are sanctified, but those who, after their sanctification, are put in the fire and tried with all sorts of testings, and difficulties, and hindrances, and persecutions, until their faith and hope and love have been tested, till all the dross is gone, and the quality of pure gold is manifest, and they come forth from the fire with a brilliance and a beauty upon them which the testings have only made manifest.

The beauty of holiness with which the Bride is adorned is not only a negative holiness, simply the absence of that which is sin, but it is also a positive holiness: not only purity, but a burning purity; not only love, but a burning love; not only uprightness of heart, but uprightness in the form of perseverance and patience; not only love for all mankind, but, as the Apostle expresses it, fervent love — literally, boiling love — that kind of love which is warm and tender and immense in its extent, as well as pure in its quality. This indicates that the Bridehood saints are those who have the martyr spirit in them, and in some way are martyrs; and by possessing this martyr spirit they acquire that dazzling brightness which is manifest in the fine linen which has been pure. Hence justification is the fine linen, and sanctification is the fine linen made clean, and the whiteness or the brilliancy of the linen is the result of the martyr spirit; passing through the fire and being tested until the glory of melted gold is brought forth.

These qualities of the wedding garment are to be obtained in this life and yet there may be a sense in which the Bride of the Lamb is to make herself ready just before the marriage feast, for we read in the passage that when all the heavenly hosts praised God that the time had come for the marriage of the Lamb, that His Wife had made herself ready.