Acts 7:57-58 Then they cried out with a loud voice, and stopped their ears, and ran upon him with one accord, and cast him out of the city, and stoned him: and the witnesses laid down their clothes at a young man’s feet, whose name was Saul.

The Greek word used here for clothes would be the outer garment, the cloak, mantle or tunic. At the time of Acts 7 this indicated ones station in life. You could tell a Priest from a Rabbi from a Sadducees from a Pharisees from a tax collector by the clothes they wore. Appearances were everything back then. Not like today.

The subtle act of removing their cloaks while stoning Stephen to death was to remove any appearance of guilt for causing Stephen’s death. They could keep up appearances because there was no blood on their cloaks. The inner garments representing the inner man, now that was a different matter. When they finished and put back on their “robes of righteousness” it became a man-made covering of their sin.

Mark 9:3 And his raiment became shining, exceeding white as snow; so as no fuller on earth can white them.

Here in Mark 9 raiment is the same Greek word, himation. A fuller is one who cleans wool. The implication here is that the righteousness of Jesus is not achievable by human effort. But that doesn’t stop us from putting on appearances, does it? In spite of our efforts, the undergarments are still bloody. Nothing will ever change that. So what are we to do?

Philippians 3:9 And be found in him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith:

Walk by faith not by appearances.

John 14:12 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father.

Jesus brought people back from the dead, healed the lame, restored sight, drove out demons, caused lepers to be whole again, how in the world could we do greater works than these? That question plagued me for some time. It wasn’t until the Lord showed me when He said it, that it started to make sense.

Jesus said this before He died on the cross and was resurrected. That one event changed the world. The Good News wasn’t the Good News when He said it. Now it is. If you will consider that all the works Jesus did before the cross was only temporal and that they had no effect on the eternal, then what came after is a greater work.

Lazarus isn’t some two thousand year old man walking the earth still, he died again. The sick that were healed, they got sick again. But we get to deliver the Good News and that lasts for all eternity.

2 Corinthians 5:18 And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation;

This is our greater works.