A Fragrance of Christ (Part 2)

What comes to mind when we think of Christ?

I am afraid that for some believers, they think of Christ in terms of how much they have failed Him. Our own frustration and discouragement over messing up yet again, has left us wondering if our Lord’s patience with us is wearing thin. We know that God loves us but suspect that we have deeply disappointed Him. We are somehow convinced that Jesus could not possibly use us in any significant way; our usefulness has been permanently diminished due to our sins, our lack of faith, our neglect of Scripture, etc.

What does Jesus really think of me?

In His own words, Jesus says in Matthew 11:28-30, “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”

In all 89 chapters of the Gospel accounts – Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John – this is the only passage where Jesus opens His very heart to us; it’s the only place that He reveals who He is in heart. And when He does this, He does not say that He is demanding and judgmental in heart, or that He is harsh and severe in heart, but that He gentle and humble in heart.

Since the heart is what drives all that we do, reveals who we are, and is what impacts the genuine nature of our thoughts and words, Jesus is telling us what is most true about Him – He is gentle and humble in heart and thus gentle and humble in His thoughts toward us regardless of the burdens and thoughts that are weighing you down this morning.

The passage we will study this morning says that we, as believers, are the aroma or fragrance of Christ – a gentle and humble fragrance to everyone around us. And as we will see in our study this morning, this fragrance attracts some and greatly repels others.

Turn with me in your Bible to the Book of 2nd Corinthians.

2 Corinthians 2:12-17

Let’s pray.

I mentioned last week from this issue of being a fragrance of Christ that God has His children everywhere, and that we will recognize this aroma if we are relying on our spiritual senses. It was pointed out to me that this might not be the best interpretation of the sense of this passage, and I must agree.

There are surely places in this world without a Christian witness of any kind, so the sense of this passage is more so that as we go to anyplace in this world, the fragrance of Christ will attract those who would be saved, and thus multiply that aroma as others are drawn to Christ and are being saved, while at the same time causing those who are entrenched in the grip of Satan to be repelled by our presence. And this is our focus this morning – how this spiritual fragrance that each believer carries, will attract those who are in the process of being saved, and how it will also repel those who are actively rejecting Christ.

2 Corinthians 2:15

The Greek word translated here as fragrance, can also be translated as aroma or even sweet aroma. A different although similar Greek word is used in verse 16, and I will speak to that subtle difference when we get there. But here in verse 15, we are called the fragrance of Christ, or the sweet aroma of Christ to God. We are not the source of this sweet aroma, but we are the carriers of this sweet aroma, this gentle and humble sweet aroma.

This Greek word that is translated as fragrance, is only used here and in two other verses.

Ephesians 5:2 – “and walk in love, just as Christ also loved you and gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma.”

Philippians 4:8 – “But I have received everything in full and have an abundance; I am amply supplied, having received from Epaphroditus what you have sent, a fragrant aroma, and acceptable sacrifice, well-pleasing to God.”

In all three uses of this word, the sense and context are of a fragrance of offering and sacrifice rising to God, such as was the case when burnt offerings were made by Israel to God under the Old Covenant. It is often said in the Old Testament that the smoke these burnt offerings were a sweet-smelling savor to God.

The truth that we, as believers, are in Christ as Paul says repeatedly in the Book of Ephesians, which means that our lives through Christ and His sacrifice are now that fragrance and aroma and sweet-smelling savor to God. We need to grasp this truth, especially as it relates to my introduction. While we are indeed to be growing in sanctification and mortifying the sin our lives, even when we mess up and are temporarily embroiled in a pattern of sin, because we are in Christ, we are still a soothing aroma to God. God will discipline us as needed according to Hebrews 12:4-17, to correct our behavior, but that does not change the truth that we are in Christ and are thus always the fragrance of Christ in the nostrils of God.

In the flow of our passage, Paul expresses this truth as he was anxiously awaiting word from Corinth through his co-laborer, Titus. We saw last week that Paul was run out of Ephesus earlier than he planned and was apparently scheduled to meet Titus in Troas on a specific date. Paul is early because of the riot caused by his preaching in Ephesus. While waiting and now having some unexpected time on his hands, Paul establishes a church in Troas. It is in the midst of this wave of blessing from God that Paul is simply riding, that he is given this amazing thought of being a fragrance of Christ to God wherever he goes.

Paul realizes that he and all other believers cannot escape carrying this fragrance everywhere they go. What was likely an initial frustration of being forced to leave Ephesus and the church there that he established, being in Troas much earlier than planned and thus not being able to hear from Titus about the turmoil in Corinth, and not having an extended stay in Troas on his itinerary, turned into this incredible knowledge that he carried this fragrance, this sweet aroma of Christ with him no matter where he was and no matter what was happening around him.

Beloved, this is an incredible truth that we must apprehend and keep at the forefront of our minds. No matter the twists and turns of our lives, no matter the places we go or even settle at, no matter the current struggles we face or the sins we are battling, we are never a stench to God. Because of the offering and sacrifice of Jesus Christ, we are always a sweet aroma to God.

A common issue that I have seen through the years with believers who are not following God as closely as they are called to be, is this demonic guilt they carry around with them over their failures and recent sins. Yes, the Holy Spirit will bring conviction into your life so that you will lean on Him to turn from those sins, but He will never crush you with guilt – that’s Satan trying to deceive you into thinking that God no longer wants anything to do with you.

If you get nothing else out of this sermon, please get this – God is not angry at you! You are His precious child, and the fragrance of Jesus Christ is all over you. The sacrificial offering of Jesus Christ has completely covered you. Stop being duped by Satan and start believing and applying what God has declared in His Word. God’s grace is greater than all of your sin.

This fragrance of Christ that we carry with us wherever we go, will be recognized by those we come into contact with. Paul says it will be recognized by those who are being saved and among those who are perishing. And please note that Paul does not place any requirements on this truth. We may go a long way towards disguising this fragrance when we are blatantly ignoring God and His Word, but we cannot eliminate this fragrance of Christ if we are indeed believers who have placed our trust in Jesus.

The following example is the opposite of what this truth teaches but it makes the point. As a foolish and last teenager, I would sometimes pick up a favorite shirt from the floor that needed to be in the laundry to wear again. I’d take a quick sniff of the armpits of that shirt and quickly verified that it needed to be in the laundry. But instead, I grabbed my bottle of spray cologne and spritzed each armpit on that shirt and wore it again. The cologne somewhat masked the odor, but it did not eliminate the odor.

Conversely, your present sinful ways, if and when you find yourself in that condition, will somewhat mask this fragrance of Christ that is all over you, but it never eliminates the fragrance no matter how far you fall into the stench of sin. Those who are being saved will still recognize the smell of life and those who are perishing will still recognize the smell of death because of the fragrance of Christ in you – no matter how faint that fragrance is.

2 Corinthians 2:16a

As Paul continues this thought, he chooses a different Greek word that is translated in the NASB as aroma – twice in this verse and once in verse 14. The subtle difference between the Greek word translated as fragrance in verse 15 and this one translated as aroma is that fragrance is always a sweet smell, while aroma can be sweet, and it can also be a foul odor.

The unique thing is that this aroma is sweet to those who are being saved and it is at the same time a foul odor to those who are perishing. The tense of these terms in Greek are not necessarily permanent conditions in what Paul is conveying. This does not necessarily mean that everyone who is attracted to you because of the sweet aroma of life to life will eventually be saved, nor does it mean that everyone who is repelled by the foul odor of death to death will end up in hell.

This is where we must be careful to not fall into the trap of what is called hyper-Calvinism. This train of thought misapplies the doctrine of election to mean that God is going to save who God is going to save, so it doesn’t matter if we witness to others or proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ to others – those who have been appointed to salvation will eventually come to Christ and those who are not appointed to salvation will never come to Christ.

I know election and being chosen by God unto salvation is a tremendously difficult doctrine and will never be completely settled in our minds, but this verse in the tense of the Greek grammar makes it clear that we must leave these things in God’s hands and be diligent in being His witnesses to everyone, no matter how accepting they are of the message or how much they violently reject the message of the Gospel. It is not our job or responsibility to determine who the sheep and the goats are – that is 100% in the fully capable hands of God.

2 Corinthians 2:16b

“And who is adequate for these things?” No one is adequate or sufficient for these things, which lends itself to the last point I made. We are not capable to determine how the Holy Spirit operates in the hearts of people unto salvation. All of our adequacy is from God in Christ, and in His perfect will and providence He has determined to use us to draw people to Himself. God takes the salvation that He has bestowed on us through His grace and causes this fragrance of Christ to draw some while repelling others – and in both cases He is mercifully reaching out to them, not willing that any should perish.

The emphasis in the grammar of this last phrase is on “these things” as opposed to who, meaning that Paul desires for us to dwell on the condition of the souls of people with our thinking. Of course, we are not adequate to change the eternal condition of a person’s soul, but we must be concerned, we must have a burden for them to come to Christ, we must pray for their salvation diligently and earnestly.

The only One who is adequate for these things is Jesus Christ. And as we will learn when we get to chapter 5, we are ambassadors for Christ and have the ministry of reconciliation, which means we are called and commissioned to represent Jesus Christ and be His witnesses.

2 Corinthians 2:17

Paul adds an important factor in the responsibility that we have in carrying this fragrance of Christ. We must witness with sincerity and we must understand that we are from God. What does that mean? It means that our hearts must be pure, and our attitudes must be sincere. We are not peddling the word of God, meaning that we are not following Christ and following the call on our lives from Scripture for our own benefit and our own sense of what is fair and what is right.

Whether we like it or not, the fragrance of Christ that is all over us is indiscriminate. We don’t have the right and we don’t get to choose who is impacted by the fragrance and aroma of Christ. We don’t have any say in who senses life to life and who sense death to death. We can’t have the attitude when we come into contact with someone that we view as Satan incarnate and then desire for them to smell eternal death from us. We don’t determine who deserves God’s grace because none of us did.

When we choose who we share Christ with and who we don’t share Christ with, we fall into this category of peddling the word of God. We are to always instead, speak in Christ in the sight of God, in the presence of anyone that God gives us the privilege to share with, even if in our human sensibility we think they deserve hell and the lake of fire.

Let’s tie in what I opened with. The heart of Jesus is gentle and humble. This applies to each one of us when whether we are currently in a time of tremendous spiritual growth in following Him, or we are in a mighty struggle with sin or wrestling with our past failures. This same gentle and humble heart of Jesus can heal any wound, forgive any sin, and save any soul.

If you are not a true child of God, not saved, this gentle and humble heart of Jesus invites you to trust Him right now. Repent of your sins, confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that god raised Jesus from the dead. Respond to the sweet aroma that is filling your spiritual senses right now.

If you are already a true child of God and have experienced God’s amazing grace in salvation, let the gentle and humble heart of Jesus to permeate your life. Don’t let Satan’s lies and guilt control you any longer. Make amends with anyone that you have harmed, confess your sin to God, and embrace the gentle and humble heart of Jesus into your heart. You have been freed from sin, so leave those chains behind and savor the sweet-smelling aroma of Christ once again.

Let’s pray.