The Aroma of Death (Part 1 of 2)

What is the worst smell you can ever recall?  One that immediately comes to my mind is being close to a visitor in church one very warm Sunday morning in the summer. He bred a multitude of cats and stank of tom cat urine so badly that I struggled to remain close to him – and I love cats!

If you had been a visitor to a botanical garden in southeastern Brazil last Christmas you might have experienced the rare blooming Titan arum, the world’s smelliest and largest tropical flower. Also known as the ‘corpse flower’ because of a smell likened to rotting flesh, the flower has a lifespan of seventy-two hours, during which its smell and meat-colouration attract pollinators: carrion flies and beetles. I realise it’s not what you might have expected in today’s ‘Seed’ to start with, but please bear with me as this will make sense very soon.

The apostle Paul was writing to the Church in Corinth and speaking to them about recent events he had experienced in his ministry of evangelism. Despite all the difficulties and disappointments he had faced, travelling from city to city spreading the gospel, he was able to reflect on God’s goodness with praise and thanksgiving. Paul then compared this ministry of evangelism to the triumphal military parades that were common at that time across the Roman world.

Paul’s reference would have been quickly understood by his readers, with the apostle and his fellow servants depicted as victorious soldiers in a triumphal procession. During these Roman military parades, captives would be marched through the streets as garlands of flowers were carried and incense was burned to the gods. The aromatic perfumes were carried on the air as the spectators and those in the procession breathed in their fragrance. At the parade’s finale, many prisoners would be put to death. So, the aromas were very pleasant and life-giving to the victors but were the smell of death to those who had been defeated.

Humanity is separated into two groups: those on the path of life and salvation and those on the road to death and destruction. Christians who spread the gospel are members of God’s victorious army led by Jesus Christ. Believers are like the fragrance spread during the victory processions. Both the victors and those perishing smelt the same aroma. However, it had a different meaning for the two groups. For the victorious army and its people, the aroma would relate to the joy of triumph, but for the prisoners of war, the fragrance would be associated with defeat, slavery, and death.

What impacted me by this realisation that I am carrying with me the aroma of death to those who are perishing is that I shouldn’t take their rejection of me personally and my desire to share Jesus with them. Why? Because that is the smell of death, and they can’t bear it. Instead, I should continue to pray for them that their hearts may be softened to be able to smell the aroma of life and be drawn to Christ instead of away from Him