Lord, we again come with thanksgiving in our
heart.
It's just good to come before you, grateful
for who you are and all that you've
done for us, what you're doing.
We thank you, Lord, especially on a night
like this with folks wrapping up voting all
across the nation.
We are so thankful that we have received
a kingdom that cannot be shaken.
We're so glad that our citizenship is in
heaven.
And Lord, many of us grieve and mourn
over our country as we see a continual
wasting of the tremendous spiritual heritage you've given
to us.
And we just cry out that though we
deserve judgment, we plea for mercy and just
ask you yet to bear with us long,
Lord, as a nation and convict hearts even
this night.
May it not just be a night of
political defeat or victory, but a time for
a spiritual reevaluation in hearts.
Lord, just convict hearts.
Use this time to turn your saints to
prayer and those who are putting their hope
in man to soon see man is a
vain hope.
And we just thank you, Lord, that you're
the one who raises up kings.
And we just grieve that it seems that
you've seen fit that our nation get what
we deserve.
And we love your mercy, but we know
that your justice and your chastisement must often
be worked out too.
And we just bow before you.
We rest in you.
We put our hope in you.
And even as the days look darker and
darker, as the godless prevail in many arenas,
we just pray that you would raise up
a standard among your people of righteousness and
absolute truth and eternal values and in and
above all a recognition of the Lord Jesus
Christ as the King of Kings and Lord
of Lords.
And we're glad that we can come aside
tonight, Lord, and seek things above and look
at the everlasting kingdom, things that will never
be blown away, taken away, or change off
us.
And we just thank you for that.
And we ask you to pour out your
spirit tonight and build us up in these
shaky last days.
Build us up in the things that count,
that with a heavenly perspective we might be
of use here on earth as you soon
return.
And we thank you for your word.
What a solid foundation.
And we want our lives built on it
and by it, Lord, in Jesus' name.
Amen.
Study number seven, characteristics of new covenant life
and service.
By way of introduction, second Corinthians chapter three,
verse six.
Second Corinthians three, verse six.
One of the fundamental central passages we return
to periodically in this course, just to keep
the perspective biblically before us of what we're
studying.
Characteristics of new covenant life and service.
Second Corinthians three, six.
A.
Speaking of God who also made us sufficient
as ministers, that is, servants of the new
covenant.
We're going to launch in this study into
some verse-by-verse exposition of second Corinthians
starting in chapter two and through two or
three chapters.
Reason being, this is a major extended section
of the New Testament about the new covenant.
Hebrews is another section of the New Testament
that has major sections on the new covenant.
Galatians also does, and elsewhere it appears constantly.
But this is one of the major sections
of scripture in the New Testament, especially about
the new covenant.
And this is just to remind us the
context in this section of second Corinthians.
It's talking about life in the new covenant.
New covenant servants.
Serving God under the terms of the new
covenant.
Remembering from study number three especially that the
new covenant is a covenant of grace.
You might want to add some verses back
to your outline in the introductory section here
of study number seven.
Verses we've touched upon, but bring back in
focus and perspective what the new covenant of
grace is really about.
So this new covenant characteristics of living study,
and really go now for a few weeks
on this subject, will just be more sharply
in focus.
Gospel of John, remember chapter one, verse 14.
John chapter one, verse 14.
And the word became flesh and dwelt among
us, and we beheld his glory, the glory
as of the only begotten of the Father,
full of grace and truth.
The Father had a word on his heart
for man, and the only way to express
it was to send his son as the
word.
What God wants to say to us, he
said in his son.
Of course, all that's revealed in the written
word.
And the word incarnate, Jesus Christ, God the
Son, he came full of grace and truth,
full of God's grace and God's reality.
And then verse 16, and of his fullness
we have all received, and grace upon grace.
We who are followers of the Lord Jesus
Christ, now what we have received from God
is of his fullness, of the fullness of
Jesus Christ.
He came full of grace to concentrate on
the aspect of our study in this course,
and now we have all received of that
fullness.
That's what life in Christ is.
Us receiving out of this fullness, this overflowing
abundant reality of the grace of God available
in Jesus Christ.
And it's grace upon grace.
It's one layer of grace after another layer
of grace.
It's one aspect of grace after another aspect
of grace.
One lesson of grace after another lesson of
grace.
One growing in the grace episode with God
after another.
It's grace upon grace.
We start out saved by grace, and then
step by step we walk by grace, and
inch by inch we grow by grace.
And as the fruit comes, it's a product
of the grace of God at work.
It's just grace upon grace right out of
his fullness.
That's what we've received that gives us a
life in ministry.
That's what the new covenant is about.
Receiving of the fullness of the grace of
the Lord Jesus.
One layer upon another.
Acts chapter 20 by way of introductory review.
Acts chapter 20 verse 32.
So now brethren, I commend you to God
and to the word of his grace which
is able to build you up and give
you an inheritance.
The great ability of God's grace revealed in
his word, the word of his grace.
Able to give us that everlasting inheritance, heaven
our home, eternal life in Christ, join heirs
with Christ.
All of that ours the moment we are
saved by the grace of God.
That inheritance becomes ours by grace through faith.
But that's not all God's grace is able
to do.
If that's all it did, we'd forever have
reason to love, serve, rejoice in the Lord.
But our God is a great God and
this is so great a salvation.
And his grace is not only able to
do all that, it's also able to build
us up, strengthen us, mature us, develop us.
Surely we all want to grow in Christ,
want to be strengthened in Christ, want to
be more like Christ.
We want to get built up in the
faith.
Well, the word of his grace is able
to build us up.
His word describing an offering and making real
his grace as the Holy Spirit shows it
and applies it in our lives is able
to build us up.
That's what the new covenant of grace is
all about.
Not only being forgiven and given new life
by grace, but growing in that new life
by the grace of God working on us
and in us and through us.
Romans 6.14, strategic verse to be reminded
of at this juncture in our study, just
starting the second half of our course.
Romans 6.14, for sin shall not have
dominion over you.
What is it that can possibly keep sin
from dominating our lives?
For sin shall not have dominion over you,
for you are not under law, but under
grace.
Not under law, but under grace.
The grace of God can liberate us from
the dominion, the rule, the domination of sin.
So this is not only forgiveness from sin,
it's victory against sin ruling us.
It's not just a cleansing and forgiveness, it's
being enabled to live out from under the
control, the dominion of sin.
What could possibly do that?
Who could possibly do that?
Only God can make that a reality and
the means he uses is his grace.
Remember again, verses like this remind us that
grace is not only God's willingness to forgive
us, that is infinitely precious and glorious and
life-changing that we start out, but God's
grace is not only his willingness to forgive
us, it's his powerful provision to transform us
and change us.
Hebrews 13, remember, verse 9.
Hebrews 13.9, it is good that the
heart be established by grace.
Again, a verse not about justification, that is
starting out with God and being declared innocent,
not guilty, but a sanctification verse, a verse
about life being developed in Jesus Christ.
It is good that the heart, the inner
life, be stabilized, established strong and firm.
How?
By grace.
Grace anchors us down in the reality of
the person and the work of the Lord
Jesus Christ.
So that's the covenant we're talking about.
That is the arrangement for living that we're
talking about.
We're new covenant servants.
We serve God under the new covenant, under
this new and living arrangement, new and living
way.
Now with that in mind as just a
reminder of perspective, we're going to look at
characteristics of new covenant life and service.
In other words, we're going to let the
Lord tell us through the scriptures how God
marks and shapes and develops and uses our
lives as we walk with him in the
terms of the new covenant.
We'll look at the terms along the way
and as we walk in those terms, God
is building these characteristics into our lives.
Characteristics of new covenant life and service as
we live and serve, live under and serve
God under the new covenant.
God marks us with these characteristics, the new
covenant.
Remember Luke 22, Jesus said this cup is
the new covenant in my blood.
That shed blood of Jesus Christ purchased an
arrangement for us with God where if we
walk by the terms of that arrangement, we'll
see what kind of lives that produces.
God marking us, building these characteristics into our
lives.
The first one we'll look at, back in
2 Corinthians, chapter 2, is this matter of
being led in triumph.
Who doesn't want to walk about in a
victorious Christian life?
Surely everybody wants it.
Sometimes we may think it's far beyond our
grasp.
We all have those moments where it seems
like everything's screaming out, defeat, even tonight, but
led in triumph, led in triumph.
That's one of the characteristics of new covenant
living.
Chapter 2, verse 12.
Furthermore, when I came to Troas to preach
Christ's gospel and a door was opened to
me by the Lord, I had no rest
in my spirit because I did not find
Titus my brother, but taking leave of them,
I departed for Macedonia.
Now thanks be to God who always leads
us in triumph in Christ.
Interesting few verses.
They end with a note of triumph, but
they don't sound circumstantially victorious.
Paul had a good opportunity to minister the
gospel of Jesus Christ in Troas, but he
became agitated within, unrest within, something missing he
sensed.
I had no rest in my spirit.
Why was he in turmoil within?
Even though he had this great opportunity, the
door was open, but he wasn't just blessed
and excited about that.
Despite the open door, he had this unrest
in his spirit because he didn't find Titus
his brother there, his spiritual partner in the
ministry.
Titus wasn't there, and even though the door
seemed open, he left that area and went
on to Macedonia.
A little side note, this is kind of
a reminder of the importance of life in
the body of Christ.
It's too easy to have this American, pushing
westward, pioneer, individualistic perspective in the Christian life.
It's just me and God.
Well, there's a real true sense in that
old saying that God and one is always
a majority.
God and none is a majority actually, but
that isn't how God has arranged life to
be worked out here on earth.
We are the body of Christ, and something
like this can have a major impact in
what is or isn't happening.
Yeah, there was an open door.
Yes, Paul was there, but he had no
peace about it.
Something was wrong.
He was expecting, anticipating they were going to
partner up in this open door.
Titus wasn't there.
I mean, even the Lord sent out the
disciples two by two, and even two can
feel very isolated in this world, but it's
not just a feeling or a sense of
aloneness.
It's so often the body dynamic is missing
when there's just one.
That relational life that God uses so much
is not functioning in fullness, so no rest.
He left the area, but notice what he
says right on the heels of describing that.
Now, thanks be to God who always leads
us in triumph in Christ.
In other words, don't look at this as
an ultimate defeat.
It didn't look victorious.
It didn't feel victorious.
What do you have to say about that,
Paul?
Now, thanks be to God who always leads
us in triumph.
When God is allowed to lead, and I
think the assumption is rightly implied here, that
Paul was following the guiding of the Lord.
Whenever the Lord is allowed to lead, whenever
we're walking with him on his terms, when
he's in charge and we're not, and it's
his wisdom and dynamic and not our best
guess and our own hyped-up motivation, when
he's leading, there's only one kind of leading
he does.
He always leads us in triumph, and it's
his triumph, not ours.
It's the victory that he won in Christ.
See, now thanks be to God who always
leads us in triumph in Christ.
Those who are in Christ and let the
Lord do the leading, they're always led in
triumph.
It's too easy to try and measure victory
circumstantially, and sometimes we totally miss it.
You know, Jesus out in the wilderness and
the enemy tempting him, that's victory?
Jesus was always led in victory.
He never was leading.
He always did the will of the Father.
He always walked in victory.
In dry places, face-to-face with the
enemy, if the Lord led you there, you're
on victory ground.
You know, it's not a circumstantial matter.
It's a relational, spiritual, follow, trust, depend matter.
Thanks be to God who always leads us
in triumph in Christ.
A complete triumph is in Christ over sin,
over Satan, over the world, the flesh, and
the devil.
It's all there in Christ.
Through Christ's life, death, burial, resurrection, ascension, and
then him imparting that to us, victory is
always available to us.
It's a victory to be enjoyed by those
who are in Christ and abiding in Christ,
drawing upon that victory, resting in that victory,
walking by means of that victory.
Remember verses like in our outline, Romans 8,
37.
Remember that?
Oh, how that hits here so beautifully.
Romans 8, 37.
Great victory verse.
Romans 8, 37.
Yet in all these things, we are more
than conquerors through him who loved us.
In all these things.
What kind of things?
Verse 35.
Tribulation, distress.
Anyone experiencing any distress?
Doesn't mean that you're in a place of
defeat necessarily.
If you're striving and leading and handling it
all, yes, you are.
But Jesus was in great distress in the
garden of Gethsemane.
No defeat there.
Great distress on the cross.
No defeat there.
In fact, turn what looked like the worst
defeat in the history of creation into the
mightiest victory that could ever be won.
Distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril, sword.
Those are pretty heavy things.
Verse 36.
Killed all day long, accounted as sheep for
the slaughter.
Doesn't sound like victorious Christian living, but here's
the truth.
Yet, or nevertheless, in all these things, right
in the middle of all those circumstantial messes.
It's too easy to think of victory as
a circumstantial issue.
No, victory is a relational issue.
God's always the conqueror and the victor.
In him we're more than conquerors.
Just where are we looking?
Where are we trusting?
Who are we following?
Who's in charge?
Yet, in all these things, we're more than
conquerors.
Not on our own and not circumstantially, but
through him who loved us.
And then, First Corinthians 1557.
But thanks be to God who gives us
the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Spiritual victory is a gift given by God,
received with thanksgiving and faith.
Thanks be to God who gives us the
victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Victory, a gift from the Lord to be
enjoyed with thanksgiving and by faith.
What a tremendous word this is.
This is a characteristic of New Covenant servants.
When we're walking in the New Covenant, the
way the Lord has designed it, and we'll
concentrate in a little while on the specific
term spelled out right here in the immediate
context, which basically, again, is walking by faith
in humility and letting God work by his
grace.
We're always led in victory.
It's just characteristic.
It isn't something we have to pump up,
cause to happen, or be sure circumstances don't
rip us off.
It's far deeper.
It's far higher.
It's far more real.
It's far more eternal.
It's far more relational.
That victory is there in the victor.
We're in him.
If we're trusting, walking, depending.
Here's just one of the characteristics of New
Covenant servanthood, life and service.
We are led in triumph.
What a blessing to find the victory isn't
something you have to constantly reestablish, but there's
a constant one there that we can always
walk in.
Praise the Lord for that.
You take a night like tonight when a
nation that's had a Christian heritage votes for
many leaders who are publicly committed to things
God has said are sin, unacceptable, abomination, and
all of that, and you go, man, what
a defeat.
For whom?
God?
For those who walk against God, even if
they win offices, for them it's a defeat.
But for every believer who walks through it
all in the terms of the New Covenant,
in humble dependence and obediently looking to following
and letting the Lord work, right through all
that mess, they're being led by the Lord
in his victory.
There are great things of God to be
done in times that are circumstantially very discouraging,
circumstantially very much produce grief, mourning, and groaning,
and that's fine.
Jesus groaned, Jesus wept, but he never stepped
out of victory.
Now, we do, but we don't have to
all the time.
We can more and more see that God
wants to build this characteristic into our life.
When we walk the way he wants us
to walk, here's one of the characteristics of
that life.
He just leads us in triumph.
How many things in our lives can we
say, this went on, that looked good, this
was great, but then this fell apart and
I had to kind of head for Macedonia.
Well, it's okay if we can add this
to it, but thanks be to God who
always leads us in his triumph in Christ.
And we can, we can, praise the Lord.
So, one of the glorious characteristics of New
Covenant life and service is being led in
triumph.
Here's another one, being a fragrance of Christ,
a fragrance of Christ.
How would you like to be able to
have a spiritual aroma going forth from your
life all the time, every place, to God
and to believing and unbelieving people alike?
That'd be a pretty good walk, wouldn't it?
Do you know that's one of the characteristics
of life and service under the New Covenant?
That's just what it produces.
Whenever we're walking in it, that's what happens.
Look, verse 14.
Now, thanks be to God who always leads
us in triumph in Christ and through us
diffuses the fragrance of his knowledge in every
place.
For we are to God the fragrance of
Christ among those who are being saved and
among those who are perishing.
To the one, we are the aroma of
death leading to death, and to the other,
the aroma of life leading to life.
And then he bursts forth, and who is
sufficient for these things?
Who can live like that?
Well, God will answer that just a few
verses later in this very part of the
letter.
What a tremendous issue, this being a fragrance
of Christ.
It produces effective witness in every place when
we walk in the terms of the New
Covenant.
Now, notice, thanks be to God who always
leads us in triumph in Christ and diffuses
through us the fragrance of his knowledge in
every place.
Who's doing the diffusing of this fragrance here?
See?
Thanks be to God who always leads us
in triumph and who through us diffuses.
This is a work of God.
This isn't some religious cologne we spritz on
or something, you know.
Don't we wish it were like that?
That's, you know, any way you look at
it, religious formalism and legalism, you know, will
put on a tone, put on an attitude,
put on a costume, put on a perfume,
you know.
Who is that brother?
Worship leader for Ray Steadman for so many...
John Fisher wrote a musical called The New
Covenant, and one of the songs in there
is about evangelical veils production.
Pick up one now at a great reduction,
you know, all about all these things that
people religiously kind of pose in and put
on and act like they got it all
together.
If there's going to be a fragrance of
Christ going forth out of our lives, it's
got to be God diffusing the fragrance.
God has to be at work sending that
forth.
It's not something we apply or something we
produce.
It's something God diffuses, or it could be
translated, manifests through us.
God does this.
God's showing and displaying and making evident the
presence of himself in our lives.
The Lord God diffusing the fragrance of the
knowledge of him in every place.
The knowledge of him, the sweet fragrance that
a person knows God.
And this can be done in every place
that we know.
There's something about a person's life that has
a sweet spiritual fragrance, a sweet heavenly aroma
when they know the Lord.
It draws us to them.
If we know and love the Lord, it's
like, I like that.
It's really the fragrance of Christ.
It's Christ likeness with a kind of in
your spiritual olfactory senses, you know.
And look at this.
The way this works is this, verse 15,
for we are to God the fragrance of
Christ.
We are the fragrance of Christ.
Our lives as new covenant servants becomes this
fragrance, takes on this fragrance, this spiritual aroma.
We have a Christlike fragrance about us.
You know, I guess you could say you
hang out with the hogs, you'll smell like
a pig, you know.
Hang out with Christ, you'll have a spiritual
aroma about you, you know.
Folks will know where you've been hanging out.
I used to go a lot of places
before I say that One whiff, people knew
where I'd been.
Oh yeah, you've been over there.
Oh yeah, doing that.
Well, it works in the spiritual realm even
more profoundly.
Walk rightly with Christ and we become, for
we are the fragrance of Christ.
Boy, you talk about having our lives marked
by God.
That's not some cheap imitation perfume, you know.
This is the presence of God.
In our lives and a knowing, growing relationship
with Him.
And God is diffusing the fact, the spiritual
aroma, this fragrance that He is in our
lives.
But notice, first where the fragrance goes.
For we are to God the fragrance of
Christ.
The natural, even the natural thinking of a
born-again Christian so often thinks, oh yeah,
that fragrance of Christ.
Yeah, that's what's got to get out there
to the lost.
Well, yes, but that's jumping a couple steps
ahead of God.
That fragrance goes out in three directions mentioned
here.
First one mentioned is to God.
Then in a moment we'll see the second
one mentioned is to other believers.
Then the third place mentioned is to those
who aren't saved.
The number one object of ministry is always
God.
He's the one to be served, to be
glorified, to be worshipped.
Ministry is first unto God.
And this fragrance, which is so critical, and
it's to be one of the characteristics of
New Covenant life and service.
When we're walking rightly with God in the
terms of the New Covenant, this fragrance is
there wafting out to people.
It isn't something we have to make happen.
It's a consequence of walking rightly with God.
But that fragrance first goes to God.
He's the one who deserves it.
You know, way back He said, this is
my beloved Son in whom I'm well pleased.
It pleases the Father to bring forth a
kingdom of many brethren like the Son that
He loves.
It pleases the Father to bring forth a
kingdom of many brethren like the Son that
He loves so much.
And He, the Father, deserves and wants to
look on our lives now and in a
sense be able to say, oh yes, this
is my beloved Son at work, the one
I love.
This is the fragrance that delights the Father.
And that's what happens in living under the
terms of the New Covenant.
Instead of the dead letter of the law
being a stench to heaven in our lives,
the New Covenant brings us fragrance of Christ.
And it's the Father who gets the first
blessing and should.
Sure, we want others to see Christ in
us, but far more than that, we want
the Father to look down and see His
beloved Son.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, really, really.
The Father knew He was doing a work
in that man's life.
And yeah, the Lord's interested in that wisdom,
so the Lord first of all.
But notice, it's a fragrance of Christ to
God among those who are being saved.
Verse 15, among those who are being saved.
That's the second direction this fragrance goes, among
those being saved.
Speaking of especially those who know God, they're
in this great process of God's great salvation,
the saving grace of God.
But it could no doubt even apply secondarily
to those seeking God, those who want to
know God, willing to be saved, in that
evangelism process.
And though evangelism concludes in an event, it's
always a process.
Sometimes compacted down in rare occasions to a
short few minutes, where a person never heard
about the Lord, hears, and a few minutes.
That's a short process that comes to an
instantaneous moment of conclusion and birth.
But most of it, there were seeds sown,
and prayers watering, and God convicting, and God
graciously letting us stumble flat on our face
a few times.
There are a lot of things going on
in that process.
And so this could apply secondarily to those
being saved, in that drawing and responding work
of God.
But also to those perishing.
This would essentially, by interpretation and by direct
meaning, speak of those who don't know the
Lord, those who are lost.
But it even has an applicational implication to
those who know the Lord, but they're drifting,
they're walking according to flesh.
Not that they're perishing toward hell, but their
walk with the Lord is perishing.
They're not knowing life, they're walking in the
death of the flesh.
So these are mainly two categories, the saved
and the unsaved.
But by implication, there are those being saved,
those who are in the process of coming
to the Lord, and there are those who
know the Lord who are practically perishing.
Their testimony is being destroyed, they're being riddled
with doubt, they're all absorbed in self.
Experientially, that's a perishing experience.
It's time for revival, it's time for renewing,
it's time for repenting and laying aside something
and those things.
Now, verse 16 picks those two categories up
and elaborates on them.
To one of those categories, we are an
aroma from death to death.
That fragrance of Christ wafting out of our
lives, if we're walking under the terms of
the New Covenant, one of those categories, it's
an aroma of death to death.
Now, which category is that?
Those who are perishing.
It picks up the second category mentioned first
and elaborates on it.
To the one, that'd be the one just
mentioned, the perishing group.
We, if we have that fragrance of Christ
wafting out, we're an aroma from death to
death.
To the perishing ones, those who don't know
the Lord or even a drifting rebellious running
from God, child of God.
That fragrance of Christ, it's from death to
death.
In their deadness and their hardness of heart,
the unbeliever, that fragrance of Christ, you know
what it smells like?
Judgment.
Reminder of death and the cross and judgment.
And it reminds them of their death.
And if they're in that place of perishing
and they don't want to respond and they're
hard-hearted or rebellious, it's from death to
death.
They reject that aroma.
They don't want it.
Oh, man.
Reminds me of God.
Get out of here.
It's from death to death.
They reject that light and that fragrance and
they back into the darkness and the putrid
odors of the world, the flesh and the
devil, spiritually speaking.
One thing that's happening though, see, this witness
of the fragrance of Christ wafting out of
our lives in every place, is the phrase
here, in every place, whenever we walk under
the terms of the new covenant, which we'll
look at later on tonight, wafting out of
our lives is this fragrance of Christ in
every place.
Doesn't matter whether it's religious, irreligious, church or
work or home, it's just every place we
go.
And what happens is it has an impact
on everyone.
It blesses God and then we see here
it causes the perishing hard heart to back
off.
It's from death, from the death they're in
to death.
What it does, if they won't respond to
it rightly, they're not those being saved, you
know, coming into the saving grace of God,
it at least more clarifies where they stand.
Some of us had to be driven further
down and further back in darkness, alienation, rebellion
before we would break and yield and give.
Don't you remember as an unbeliever how you
get around some people that they just stunk?
And I don't mean they didn't shower.
I mean, they had this religious odor and
I don't mean dead phariseeism or anything like
that.
I mean, they smelled like Christ.
It's like, man, you know, guilty.
And you get that aroma of the holy
son of God from death to death.
And you could see those people coming and
you'd hide from them.
I had relatives like that.
My dad was a pastor.
We had people in our house all the
time that did that to me, you know,
aroma of death to death.
But praise God, it doesn't leave people where
they are.
And that's the worst thing.
If we're following God, we don't be left
there.
We want to be brought on more.
If we're alienated and distanced, we don't want
to just be left there satisfied.
We want to know what it is to
be alienated, separated.
And this fragrance does it.
It blesses God and it shows the reality
of their perishing.
It highlights their death.
And even if they won't respond, they're at
least driven back into that deadness and that
death.
But to the other, now here's the other
group, that fragrance of Christ is an aroma
from life to life.
An aroma from life to life.
Those being saved, those who know the Lord,
they're forgiven, born again, or convicted and humbled
in seeking God.
They smell that.
It's like, yes.
It's from life to life.
It smells like life, spiritually speaking.
And they're in life and they want life.
It smells like hope and peace and joy.
And it draws them on after more of
the Lord who gives them that life.
They want more life.
Amazing thing.
From life to life.
Ephesians 5, 1 and 2.
Remember this?
Ephesians 5, 1 and 2.
Therefore be imitators of God as dear children
and walk in love as Christ also has
loved us and given himself for us an
offering and a sacrifice to God for a
sweet smelling aroma.
Oh, that obedient, sacrificial life and even death
of Jesus Christ.
Oh, how sweet it was to the Lord.
Obedience, yieldedness, and the purchasing of salvation.
That same Lord Jesus lives in us now.
And the sense in which we are imitators
of God walking in love is that Christ
-like life.
It's not a copycat religious procedural imitation.
You know, where you got a little manual,
you know, and in this setting, Jesus always
said this, so we try to say that
or, you know, that setting always did that,
you know.
You would have some tough ones there.
You're like, what would Jesus do before this
dead person?
Well, he might raise them.
Go ahead, you know.
Not necessarily, you know.
But this is walking in love as Christ
loved.
This is real Christ-likeness.
It's not a cheap human imitation.
It's a reproduction of God at work in
and through us.
And that sweet fragrance of Christ again goes
forth to the Father and touches the saved
and the unsaved.
Some years ago, I had a vivid encounter
with this.
I've had it happen in my life, and
I've seen God do it through my life
with others along the way.
But one was so vivid, never forgotten it.
My wife, Dini, and I have been married
now a bit over 30 years.
And pretty early in our marriage, we were
going to trek back up to Indiana and
Minnesota where we were born.
I was born in Indianapolis, my wife in
Minneapolis.
And on the way, we stopped through each
town.
We were going to have a family reunion
with her clan in Minneapolis, and we went
to Indianapolis and hunted out this, what I
used to think was this huge, huge, three
-story brick home with a basement.
I thought it was like a king's mansion
there.
And, man, it had shrunk by the time
I got back to see it.
But the folks living in the home, we
told them I grew up in that house,
and they brought us in like we were
long-lost relatives.
The Lord blessed us.
We had some fun there talking with them
and visiting.
Then I went to my wife's place, same
thing, went to the house she grew up
in, went to the door and told them,
and they brought us in like we could
have been anything in this day and age.
And we had a great time.
And then we went to the family reunion.
I'd gotten to know a little bit through
wedding and all.
Some of her relatives really liked them all.
They were sweet folks.
And one of the uncles who was a
deacon in the Episcopal Church there in Lake
City, Michigan, where the reunion was, was hosting
a lot of these things.
And he took me down into his basement,
and he showed me that he was the
deacon in charge of producing communion wine for
the services.
And I bought it.
I thought that's why he was doing that
down in his basement.
He had more personal reasons.
But no, he didn't know the Lord.
But an interesting thing happened with Uncle Dick.
We were having the biggest feast of the
get-together.
And he turned to me as we all
stood around this huge table with this amazing
kind of Midwestern country dinner, you know, just
your flesh would die to have.
And he said, Reverend Bob, would you pray
for us?
You are the professional here, you know, and
saying everything that I hate, that I already
hated as a young pastor.
I didn't know much, but I knew that
all that dead religious pretense and jargon and
titles and professionalism was the scourge of the
church, not a blessing.
So he's, you know, he's just nailing my
heart with all these words.
But, you know, not mean.
He was trying to be nice, you know,
and he was so easy to love, Uncle
Dick.
And I said, sure, Uncle Dick, I'd love
to pray.
I said, praying is one of my favorite
things.
So we just all held hands, bowed our
heads, and I just started praying, just like
I would with you guys here and my
wife at home.
I just started praying.
I started talking to the Lord.
I was full of joy, these people, you
know, and a chance to be with them.
And Dina and I praying for their salvation.
They didn't know that, but my heart just
overflowed, you know, it was just easy to
pour out.
And then we sat down and ate and
had a great time.
And after the dinner, Uncle Dick pulled me
aside a few hours later and he said,
he said, Bob, when you prayed there at
that mealtime, he said, you prayed like you
actually know God.
Isn't that great?
It hit me one day in this passage,
the fragrance of Christ wafting up.
In those moments when the Lord is our
life and we're not trying to make something
happen.
We're just walking in Him.
And Christ in us is our hope of
glory being expressed.
There's a, there's something different there.
And I said, well, Uncle Dick, I said,
I hadn't thought of it really, but I
said, yeah, I do know God.
You know, just boom, you know, Episcopalian deacon
eyes almost popped out of his head.
You know, the look on his face was
kind of like, you know, I was kind
of getting to like this guy, but this
is weird.
Well, the glorious thing is that very afternoon,
my wife and I sat down at the
card table in the living room, and they
were playing a lot of games at a
quiet time.
And with Uncle Dick and Uncle Bob, his
brother came, sat down and we shared the
gospel with them.
And they acted like they'd never heard it
in their lives and both gave their hearts
to the Lord.
And it was nothing but the fragrance of
Christ just boom, impacting their lives.
We didn't, you know, we prayed for their
salvation.
Well, that's all part of it too.
Praying is asking the Lord to work, trusting
Him to work.
And you've had encounters like that, where people
just knew that there was something about your
life that had to do with God that
was real.
That's the fragrance of Christ.
This is one of the characteristics of New
Covenant life and service.
When we're walking according to the terms of
the New Covenant, this just happens in our
lives.
Who wouldn't want to be in this kind
of position?
Everywhere they go, out of their lives comes
this heavenly spiritual fragrance of the Lord Jesus
Christ Himself.
Number one, it blesses the Father.
Number two, it encourages every Christian you run
into, draws them on in life.
And number three, it doesn't leave one single
unsaved person unimpacted.
It at least takes them from death to
death, a greater realization of what they don't
have and how much they need it.
What a tremendous way to walk.
Well, it's just one of the characteristics of
New Covenant living.
See, this is God who sends forth this
fragrance from our life, because it's God who's
dwelling in our lives.
And rightly related to Him, lets Him be,
and often we'd say be seen, but in
this sense, be sensed with a spiritual smelling
ability, a fragrance, a sweetness, a Christ-likeness.
What a tremendous thing.
This is really what we want anyway.
May the Lord just keep us aiming at
walking under the terms of His New Covenant.