“There's not a wind but whispers of thy
name; And not a flow'r that grows beneath the moon, But in its hues and
fragrance tells a tale Of thee, my love.” - Barry
Cornwall
Maybe I could blame it on my partner in English in the 9th grade, who reeked so badly I was sure he’d never bathed in his entire life, that caused me to lose brain cells from holding my breath everyday trying to write a paper with him. Or the American students that consumed incredulous amounts of garlic in effort to boost their immune systems and signing themselves up for a life of isolation as well. Whatever the cause I have become obsessed over the years with smelling good. Here in this hot tropical island I am always bathing, spritzing perfume and seeking out immaculate smelling soaps. I’m a bit of a fanatic about it if I’m honest with myself. There’s a Western store in Manila called Lush where I splurged on a four dollar bar of soap. It was called “fairy Godmother” and boy was it magical. The scent was absolutely amazing. You know the kind where you could eat yourself it smells so yummy. I deeply inhaled its aroma as I used it savoring the scent. Delighted to have something that smelled so good, I thought it would be wonderful to keep smelling it all day long. But I found out very quickly that it had no staying power. Ten minutes after my shower and the scent was absolutely completely gone.
This left me wondering,
after I leave someone, does my scent still linger? I'm not talking about natural smells here.
The Bible says that we are a fragrance
of Christ among those who are being
saved and among those who are dying. (2 Corinthians 2:15) We are meant
to carry the scent of Jesus. Wow what a
responsibility. Aromas are powerful when
it comes to drawing people in. Just
think about how quickly you’ll run to the kitchen when you smell Chocolate Chip
Cookies!
I was wondering, what made one soap or perfume scent
linger and another fade so quickly? This reminded me of a time our
entire house smelled strongly of men's cologne.
It was overpowering yet left me wondering what handsome man was in the
house? I later learned it was my younger
brother, yeah the one you had to force to take a bath, who had completely saturated himself in a bottle of axe cologne. His scent was going to be
lingering for months after he left the room and it was not going to wash off
anytime soon either even if we forced him to bathe. This observation shows us
how strongly we exude the fragrance of Christ depends on how much of him we put
on. How much time are we taking in our
daily routines to lather or spritz on Jesus?
The
last point I would like to make is how we do not get to chose for some people
to smell us and not others. Think about
how a bouquet of flowers can change the atmosphere in a room with its scent. Now is it only the people that think the
flowers are beautiful that get the honor of smelling it? Does the flower close up and refuse to emit
it’s fragrance to those not intelligent enough, wealthy enough or friendly
enough? No the flowers freely and
equally smell magnificent to anyone in it’s presence. So should be the same for us as followers of
Christ. We do not get the choice to love
some and not others. Or encourage some
people and ignore others. Just like the
bouquet of flowers we should willing share the fragrance of Christ with
everyone in our presence.
In the Messiah, in Christ, God leads us from place to place in one perpetual victory parade. Through us, he brings knowledge of Christ. Everywhere we go, people breathe in the exquisite fragrance. Because of Christ, we give off a sweet scent rising to God, which is recognized by those on the way of salvation—an aroma redolent with life. But those on the way to destruction treat us more like the stench from a rotting corpse.
– 2 Corinthians 14-16
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