We Are To Be A Fragrance of Christ unto God (a comment upon a recent top-tier work by one of our writers)

"..and walk in the way of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God" Ephesian 5:2 NIV

FaithWriter Jennifer Woodley's most recent work "Sacrifices Pleasing to God" (5/02/24) really gave me a much greater view of what our obligations to God for Christ's sacriface for all entails and of the seriousness of it all. I was prompted to, as I hope many of you weretoo, to look at just where I fit into that aspect of God's plan of salvation and found myself definately needing to do a great deal more.

Thank you Jennifer, your well chosen and Spirit-Driven words of wisdom and knowledge are for our benefit and are truly appreciated!

Jennifer is a top-tier FaithWrier and well deserves more Faithwriters commenting upon her consistantly great work and, more importantly and hopefuly to be prompted by the Holy Spirit to apply principals to yourself and see how you balance out with those scriptural principals.

Here is what I took away from my research into the sacriface and fragrances God from both the OT and NT and humbly offer it to others like myself:

"For we are a fragrance of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing; To the one we are the smell of death to death; and to the other the smell of life to life." 2 Corinthians 2:15-17 NASB

Just as the wonderful smell of fresh baked bread both pleases and comforts us, we ourselves are to be the wonderful fragrance of Christ unto God.
To better understand this concept of fragrance, in the OT required system of sacrifice, it wasn’t simply the fragrance of the burnt offering and Aromatic incense* themselves that pleased God, but what it represented: the constant prayers of his people. The prayers were the true savory fragrance rising up to God into His nostrils, pleasing and accepted by Him.

Coming forward to the church age, Christians are to be as much as Christ as they can strive to be and this is the fragrance that God favors today.

So in all our words and actions, if we strive to be Christ like and to serve the Father and the Son, we shall be"a fragrance of Christ unto God".

* Aromatic incense - In Exodus 30:34, Moses was tasked with making incense by taking the fragrant spices of gum resin, OCHA, galbanum and pure frankincense, all in equal amounts, and then continually burning them on the Golden Alter inside the Holy of Holies.

Rik Charbonneaux is a retired NE Iowan who loves all of God's Word and all of His creatures.