Dressed by Grace

Date: Saturday, October 31, 2026

It’s Halloween, the night of costumes, and for those of us in the Reformation tradition, also the day we remember Luther’s famous 1517 hammer-and-nails moment in Wittenberg. Wardrobe talk seems fitting. Colossians 3 is full of clothing imagery: “take off your old self with its practices and put on the new self” (3:9-10), language that echoes baptism. A costume lets you pretend to be someone else for the night. In Christ, you are given your true identity: “your life is now hidden with Christ in God” (3:3). That is true and eternal belonging. It’s an outfit you can wear everyday that never gets dirty.

Then Paul describes the outfit: “clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience… Forgive as the Lord forgave you” (3:12-13). Here Psalm 103 lights up the passage, because this wardrobe was not Paul’s invention. It is tailored from God’s own character. “The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love” (103:8), the very self-description God gave Moses in Exodus 34:6. “As far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us” (103:12). “As a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him” (103:13).

Do you see the logic? The compassion we are told to wear is compassion we were first wrapped in. Forgiveness flows downstream from being forgiven. Psalm 103 is the source; Colossians 3 is the application. So “let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts” (3:15), and as the psalmist says, “forget not all his benefits” (103:2).

Devotional Prompts:

Which piece of the Colossians 3 wardrobe (compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, or patience) feels least natural to you right now?
Is there someone you need to forgive, and how does Psalm 103’s picture of God’s forgiveness reshape that task?

Prayer: Compassionate Father, You have removed our sins as far as the east is from the west and wrapped us in Your mercy. Clothe us in the same kindness and patience, that we may forgive as You have forgiven us. Let the peace of Christ rule our hearts, and let thanksgiving be our song. Amen.