The Aroma of Christ

I'd like to start out by reading just a few verses from 2 Corinthians 2, verses 14-16. But thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumph, and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of Him everywhere. For we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing, to one a fragrance from death to death, to the other a fragrance from life to life.

Who is sufficient for these things? We're all aware that from the time of the Exodus, God manifested His presence over the people of Israel by means of this strange cloud that hovered over them and led the way. There was a cloud that at night, of course, when it became dark, became a pillar of fire. When they arrived at Mount Sinai, and God desired to give the law to the people of Israel, this cloud descended over the mountain and shrouded it.

To receive the law, Moses went up the mountain and disappeared, you might say, in the cloud. Again and again, this cloud manifests itself in the life of the people of Israel. For instance, after the tabernacle was completed, the cloud then descended right down upon the tabernacle and filled it.

Then the cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. And Moses was not able to enter the tent of meeting because of the cloud which abode upon him, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. Throughout all their journeys, whenever the cloud was taken up from over the tabernacle, the people of Israel would go onward.

If the cloud was not taken up, then they did not go onward till the day that it was taken up. And throughout all their journeys, the cloud of the Lord was upon the tabernacle by day, and fire was in it by night in the sight of all the house of Israel. This cloud makes its appearance again when the temple is dedicated by Solomon.

And when the priests came out of the holy place, a cloud filled the house of the Lord so that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud, for the glory of the Lord filled the house of the Lord. It reappears again when Isaiah is called. In the year the king Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple.

Above him stood the seraphim, each had six wings. With two he covered his face, with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one called to another and said, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts.

The whole earth is full of his glory. And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called. And the house was filled with smoke.

The cloud reappears again at the Transfiguration. And after six days Jesus took with him Peter and James and John's brother and led them up on a high mountain apart. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his garments became white as light.

And behold, there appeared to them Moses and Elijah talking with him. And Peter said to Jesus, Lord, it is well that we are here. If you wish, I will make here three booths, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.

He was still speaking when, lo, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and a voice from the cloud said, This is my beloved son, with whom I am well pleased. Listen to him. When the disciples heard this, they fell on their faces and were filled with awe.

We see it again in Revelation in many places, but I just want to point out one. After this I looked, and the temple of the Ten of Witness in heaven was opened. And out of the temple came the seven angels with the seven plagues, robed in pure, bright linen, and their breasts girded with golden girders.

And one of the four living creatures gave the seven angels seven golden bowls full of the wrath of God, who lives forever and ever. And the temple was filled with the smoke from the glory of God and from his power. And no one could enter the temple until the seven plagues of the seven angels were ended.

Finally, we saw it in one other instance, and that's at the Ascension. And when he had said this, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and the cloud took him out of their sight. And while they were gazing into heaven, as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes and said, Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven, meaning, among other things, that you will see him coming in a cloud.

This cloud is a sign of the awesome, holy, wonderful presence of the living God. At times it is seen as a cloud, and at times this presence of God is invisible as an atmosphere. For instance, there are times when there is an atmosphere in an assembly of believers, or an atmosphere in the room where you're praying, or perhaps an atmosphere on the street down which you walk, which can only be described as thick with the presence of God.

As far as we know, the disciples saw the cloud in Jesus' ministries on only two occasions. Three of them saw this cloud at the Mount of Transfiguration, and eleven of them at least, maybe was it more of them, saw the cloud when Jesus was taken up. But the invisible atmosphere of the holy presence of God was upon and in and with and around Jesus from the day of his baptism.

Jesus was the tabernacle now, filled with the cloud. His very body was the temple, thick with the dark light presence of God. Thick darkness, blinding light, combined together.

And this presence of God resting upon him is what drew multitudes, attracted sinners, gave hope to the sick. Jesus didn't have to advertise, didn't have to use any gimmicks to bring people to himself. The aroma of God rising from his very body and riding on the words that he spoke, the words that I speak to you, they are spirit and they are life, had the power to draw those who had broken contrite hearts and to repel those who were proud.

Then there were times when the cloud of God's presence withdrew from the temple, when it became a habitation of people whose hearts were no longer set upon God, but on some kind of corruption, something divided, something false. Then the atmosphere changed and you could sense it. It was not what it was before.

And instead of being the atmosphere of life, it was now the atmosphere of death. The temple, many, many times, in spite of all the marvelous appointments of this temple and the solemn rituals, when it was not inhabited by this atmosphere of the holy, was a place of real corruption. And you could almost feel it.

You could almost say that the cloud of God had been removed and the cloud of Satan had moved in to take its place. And there was a spirit there that was a spirit of deceit, lust, covetousness. Covetousness is always present where fleshly religion is present.

And blasphemous pride. Sinners, you could imagine, would try to go up to the temple to get right with God and somehow find it awfully frustrating. It would even sometimes, you could say, be difficult to pray there.

And it's not unfair to say that the scribes and Pharisees of Jesus' day very often carried with them that same atmosphere of religious flesh, spiritual death, so that people around them who were looking for God somehow were intimidated and couldn't bear their souls and couldn't say what was on their hearts and would withdraw, which brings us down to us. We, likewise, are part of all this picture. And there is, in each of us, a connection with all this.

And it begins by looking, again, and saying that when the temple, which was to be the house of God, and Jesus made no bones about that. You know, you've turned my father's house into a den of thieves instead of a house of prayer for all nations. When it was such, then the temple was not just neutral, but it was the source of an atmosphere that spread more death and more of a negative spirit than any brothel or any tavern ever could.

Likewise, once a man or woman has begun to taste the redemptive mercy of God, that life is now either the center of life, an atmosphere of life comes forth, or the center of death. Once you have come under the cloud of God, it is no longer possible for you to be a neutral pagan. Now you either give off the aroma of God, or you give off the aroma of spiritual death.

And how easy this is for us to do. You know, how many times we may be doctrinally correct, we may have something really good to say with our mouths, everything seems right, but the atmosphere that we exude, even though we say praise the Lord, pray beautiful prayers, quote the Bible, claim to be saved, is not the atmosphere of God, His peace, His mercy, His truth, His righteousness, His patience, but it's the atmosphere of self. Leslie Farber, a psychiatrist, wrote a book, which he called The Ways of the Will.

I believe there are one or two copies down in the main library. The thesis of the book is that anxiety comes from willing what cannot be willed. And Farber, as far as I know, is not a believer.

He would be Jewish, probably, in his thinking. But what he was saying there certainly is profound. Willing what cannot be willed is always, one way or another, an attempt to play God.

And it makes us anxious. The final chapter of the book is extremely interesting, and in this chapter he describes how schizophrenics have a way of filling the room with their presence. They walk into a room sometimes without even talking, and you know they're there, because they're experts at willing what cannot be willed.

Then he goes on to say that psychiatrists, who spend a great deal of time working with schizophrenic patients, very quickly pick up the same trait. And the psychiatrist goes in with a cocktail party, and he fills the room with his presence. But what Farber says about schizophrenics or psychiatrists also applies to many Christians.

How many times we fill the room with our presence, without even saying a word. We just walk in, and everybody knows we're there. And somehow or other, it's so charged, the atmosphere, with self, and with a kind of contagious deceit, that everybody around scrambles behind their mask.

They're intimidated by us, and they're brought under an atmosphere of criticism, and discouragement, and condemnation, and fear. And all the while, we think of ourselves as playing the Elijah role. We're preparing the way for the Lord.

We're making his path straight. We're shaking people up. And then one day we wake up and realize that it seems like almost everything we touch goes to death instead of life.

We look back over our trail and see how much death, and discouragement, and division in the body of Christ we have wrecked, everywhere we've gone. When we become conscious of the fact that we seem to be creating death instead of life, then it's time for us to ask ourselves what cloud we're living our lives under. What kind of smoke is this that fills the temple of our hearts? Because the atmosphere in which we live is also the atmosphere that we spread.

Am I living under the cloud of God? Am I dwelling in the spirit of his mercy? Really. But thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumph, and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere. For we are the aroma of Christ to God, among those who are being saved, and among those who are perishing.

To one, a fragrance from death to death, to the other, a fragrance from life to life. Who is sufficient for these things? What is this aroma of Christ to God? This atmosphere. It is the atmosphere, or the aroma, of a life offered up.

In other words, the smoke that fills the temple is the smoke of an offering. Whether it's incense, or a burnt offering of some kind, it's smoke going up to meet and join and mingle with the cloud of God. It's something given.

Or when the aroma of that nard filled the house where Mary was anointing the body of Jesus. This alabaster, 300 years' wages for this expensive spice. It was really the aroma of Mary's life being given to Jesus in all purity.

The aroma of Christ is the aroma of give. And the aroma of Satan is the atmosphere of take, cheat, steal, get. Now when we are, in fact, offering ourselves truly to God, you know, presenting ourselves in worship of the Lamb, giving ourselves to Him, there's no other way you could go through the motions of worship, but if you're not giving yourself, you're not worshiping.

When we are presenting our bodies as a living sacrifice and our minds are allowed to go up and mingle with that cloud of God, and when we yield ourselves totally to the Spirit of God's mercy, then we become the center of an atmosphere of God. And people around us come into the presence of God. Consciously or unconsciously, they are under His cloud.

In a number of ways. For instance, when we are daily giving ourselves to the Lamb, we become the aroma of reality. People around us will feel free to take off their masks and be what they are.

There is nothing covered that shall not be revealed, neither hid that shall not be made known. And the thing about Jesus was that people were free when they came near Him to be who they were. And the ones who insisted on maintaining their pretenses never did really get close to Him.

And when we are living without our masks before the presence of the Son of God and giving ourselves to Him constantly, the effect of this is that people around us very quickly begin to find that they can relax and be who they are. When we are offering ourselves constantly and daily to the Lamb of God, we become the aroma of a kingdom welcome, a joyful call to repentance. We so often think of the call to repentance as coming as REPENT! And it's something ominous.

And it is for those who are so sure they're right. That was the only time Jesus talked in that kind of voice, when He was dealing with people who were so absolutely convinced that they were flawless, so to speak. But for the ones who knew their problem, or at least were aware that they were a mess, the call to repentance was always a joyful thing.

Zacchaeus wasn't having a hard time repenting. He was glad to repent and change his life. And when the prodigal son came to his senses, he was glad to rise up and go back to his father.

And the woman who was washing Jesus' feet with her tears was certainly shedding not just tears of sadness for what she'd been, but tears of joy for what Jesus was for her now. And when we are living a life of joy and joyful repentance ourselves before the Lord all the time, then people around us will be encouraged just by the atmosphere to go out and sell everything they have and buy the field with the treasure. When we are presenting ourselves to the Lamb of God continuously in worship, in our lives, all the time, then we become the aroma of forgiveness.

And those who hunger and thirst for the forgiveness of God smell it. And the troubled consciences will find their way to us. The telephone will start to ring.

People that you wouldn't imagine will start talking to you. And the sick of mind or the people who are discouraged and really down will be drawn. And we will become the broken bread and the poured out wine, the sacrament, the giving of God.

And people will find hope in us instead of the death they have so often found. And finally, when we are presenting ourselves daily to the worship of the Lamb of God, we become the aroma of peace. On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being shut where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, Peace be with you.

And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, Peace be with you.

As the Father has sent me, even so I send you. And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, Receive the Holy Spirit. Now this peace that we're reading of here is not just the absence of conflict, but it's palpable life.

It's an atmosphere. It spreads life over those troubled waters and calms them just like the hand of a mother. It quiets the brow of her sick child so that it can get to sleep and wake up better in the morning.

Blessed are the peacemakers. When we are living under the cloud of God, we don't have to advertise what we have to offer. We will be saturated with God's mercy everywhere we go.

God help us to worship his Son, our Lord, his Lamb, so continuously and so genuinely that we may be in fact the aroma of Christ in the midst of the troubles of this world and that people may find the living God in our presence. Thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumph and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere. For we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing, to one a fragrance from death to death, to the other a fragrance from life to life.

Who is sufficient for these things? Let's pray. Father, we just ask that today by the power of your Spirit and by the cleansing of the Lamb's blood we afresh may be set free from the suffocating atmosphere of self and that we may be just lifted out of ourselves to be your servants and unselfconsciously do your will that in our presence many may find you and find your healing. Father, in your salvation we ask it in Jesus' name.

Amen.