So I’m out for my morning prayer-walk yesterday when I meet a lady on the sidewalk striding in the opposite direction. We smile and exchange our “good mornings” as we pass by one another. Just as soon as I’m shoulder to shoulder with her I detect a strong fragance. She’s obviously wearing perfume. Now, she’s sporting work-out clothes and is obviously exercising. It’s not like she was on her way to work. Still, before she left the house she apparently felt like it would be nice to spritz herself … perhaps more than once. A good ten yards past her I could still detect her fragrance. It’s like for several seconds I was moving through her aromatic jet stream!

In this case, I didn’t mind. Frankly, the fragrance was a nice one. But the idea that though she had moved on I could still smell where she had been arrested my attention. I thought of the following words penned by the Apostle Paul:

But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumphal procession in Christ and through us spreads everywhere the fragrance of the knowledge of him. For we are to God the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing. To the one we are the smell of death; to the other, the fragrance of life. And who is equal to such a task? (2 Corinthians 2:14-16)

At the risk of greatly oversimplifying what Paul was doing in this passage, I want to point out how that he speaks here of Christians bearing the “aroma of Christ” and of spreading everywhere the “fragrance of the knowledge of him.” It makes me wonder: When I’m in someone’s presence, what kind of aroma, spiritually speaking, am I giving off? To what degree am I redolent of a wise, courageous, compassionate Jesus? Do my words and actions remind people of Christ, or is it just me they see? And, after I’m gone, what kind of spiritual aroma, if any, lingers? Is it the smell of death, or the fragrance of life?

Common wisdom says that most people who wear perfume or cologne tend to overdo do it. But when it comes to bearing the aroma of Christ can this ever really be the case? Can we ever do too good a job of spreading everywhere the knowledge of him? I don’t think so.

Oh, and by the way, I suspect that the only real way to put on Christ’s brand, is to spend time with him. Which begs the question: Did we spritz today?

Something to think about.