Last night, the back roads called, and I answered on the motorcycle. It was calming to putter down lonely roads while the sun softly sunk to the horizon. It was a perfect end to a glorious day.
Something bike riders notice that car drivers usually miss are the smells wafting in the air. On my ride I passed a nearby pig sty, I recognized the smell immediately. There were some crops fertilized with manure—another distinctive fragrance. I passed flowers, fresh grass, and wild onions each identified by the smell.
A Powerful Sense
Smell is one of the five empirical senses, and it is powerful often transporting us to a certain place and time? What springs to mind when we smell Vicks Vapo Rub? Or cinnamon? When I ride in late summer and early fall the smell of the dying grass reminds me of football practice in high school.
A Fragrant Aroma
Paul refers to fragrance in 2 Corinthians 2:14-17. Paul says Christians live as a “triumphal procession” they are the spoils of God’s war with the devil. His victory is our victory over sin and death, and God uses our lives as a beacon to others. Then he adds, “through us [God] spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere” (2 Cor 2:14). The fragrance is the “aroma of Christ” among those who are perishing and those being saved.
Christ is a flower which draws the lost to his beauty and power through the aroma of the lives of his people. As Christians, we need to keep in mind our responsibility to live lives that smell good. There is nothing so off-putting as a rotten smelling Christian with the stench of envy, greed, pettiness, strife or other sin. It’s like riding behind a garbage truck. Our lives please others to entice them to Christ. Some will never stop to smell the roses and die in their sins. But some will smell the fragrance and seek the flower.
Make your life smell pleasant and inviting, and not rotten with sin.
Preaching Minister