I haven’t been to a parade in … a really long time. But I remember as a kid my favorite part about parades was, well, what every kid’s favorite part is—the candy thrown out into the crowds! Free candy!!!
Unless you were at the back of the crowd, in which case you probably didn’t get any candy…and I was that kid sometimes.
Life can feel like that. Gifts and goodness sprinkled around, but sometimes, you’re the kid in the back missing out on all of it. Reaching for it and hoping for it but coming up short. Or maybe you’re lucky enough to grab something, one thing, and you look down and it’s a pack of gross Smarties. Sometimes you get dealt what looks like a bad hand.
Right now, life is disrupted for really every single one of us, in some way. Things are difficult, in varying degrees, we feel alone, we are missing friends and community. And maybe social distancing has nothing to do with it for you- maybe you were missing community way before everyone was told to practice “social distancing.” I get it.
And now, here we are. Nothing you’re living through right now is going away as soon as you want it to. Settle in. We may be here awhile. And right now, in our current situation, it could be weeks or months before we get out of here.
But this isn’t a new thing. Sure, most everyone alive today hasn’t lived through anything like the coronavirus pandemic. And likely none of us will ever find ourselves in this same situation again—and maybe our kids won’t either.
BUT.
In the past, you’ve found yourself in a slump. Or if you haven’t, you will. None of us escape it. Trials are part of life.
You’ve had a hard spot with a difficult kiddo, or you’ve suffered some kind of environmentally unfriendly state in your marriage. Or something else that seems insurmountable and wears the same “no end in sight” badge you may be looking at right now.
And if you’re really lucky you might be going through our current quarantine and another difficult thing or two.
Guess what, though?
In every battle, there’s a victor.
Back in ancient Roman times, there would be Roman military parades after a battle/war. During these parades, there would be garlands of flowers for the victors, fragrant oils poured on their heads, incense would be burned to the gods. These were smells of victory. But to those captured by the victors, these smells, though they smelled the same, were the smell of death. They knew at the end of this parade, they would die. The same smells evoked completely different emotions from different people.
To the victors, these were the smells of life. To the captives, the smell of death.
Paul would have been well aware of this when he wrote 2 Corinthians. In Chapter 2, verses 14-17 we read:
But thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumphal procession, and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere. For we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing, to one a fragrance from death to death, to the other a fragrance from life to life. Who is sufficient for these things? For we are not, like so many, peddlers of God’s word, but as men of sincerity, as commissioned by God, in the sight of God we speak in Christ.
Paul splits humanity into two groups—those who are being saved and those who are perishing. The saved, proclaiming Christ, are putting out the same message to all, it is just perceived differently by different hearts. The truth remains, those of us in Christ are his ambassadors. We know who the victor is. Believer, you are led by the Lord Jesus Christ. You spread the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere.
Look around…dare I say, breathe in. What fragrances are around? Do you see the people who seem to be handling this social distancing with grace and even vigor, and find yourself bitter or irritated? Outside of our current situation, when someone else achieves something you’ve hoped for or dreamed of, or when you see a family with a picture perfect life and kids who seem to never fight or get in trouble or have a list of successes that would put most adults to shame, does your heart war with that? Do these victories in other lives smell like defeat in yours? Let it not be so. This isn’t the point at all- in the jealousy or irritation or discontent we feel, we are the ones putting off an aroma that is not of Christ. And that’s pretty rank.
Thanks be to God– in Christ, we are victorious. We can all smell the garlands our brothers and sisters present, and we can breathe them deeply, because of Him. He is our triumph, in any trial. Not only can we smell these victory garlands, we can spread them.
And there will be people who don’t love it. But oh, for those of us in Christ, it is essential. Spread it. Share it. Wear those garlands, pass them out.
Flowers and oils have varying degrees of scents, and this week, the aroma of Christ has been wafting around my heart and the perimeter of my home in different ways. It has smelled like…nothing, mostly. Sweet nothing. The sweetest nothing. The garlands thrown around me this week have looked like this:
1.A bouquet of lilacs left on my front patio. They’re my favorite flower and their fragrance is abundantly sweet, and sweeter still is the fact God has given me a friend who knows this love of mine and generously bestows garlands of these beauties upon me.
2.Toilet paper. Two packs, left on my doorstep, a generosity. I’ll run string through those cardboard tubes and wear that garland with joie de vivre, because that right there is a gift.
3.A Walmart delivery worker and a Fed Ex employee signing my name for me, keeping me safe and keeping themselves safe.
4.A sweet new board game for my kids, porch delivered by a dear friend.
5.A friend’s face at my window as she picked up a carton of eggs from my porch. That brief interaction through a windowpane smelled especially sweet that day.
6.Laughter and tears shared in Zoom calls and Marco Polo chats with women from our church. Honestly, this distance has allowed for more communication in some ways, and it is sweet to my soul.
7.A sweet email from one of my kid’s Sunday School teachers, checking on that kiddo.
Paul continues in 2 Corinthians 3:1-6
Are we beginning to commend ourselves again? Or do we need, as some do, letters of recommendation to you, or from you? You yourselves are our letter of recommendation, written on our hearts, to be known and read by all. And you show that you are a letter from Christ delivered by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts. Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God. Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God, who has made us sufficient to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.
These are fragrances from life to life, y’all. These small things are letters written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God. Not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts. These are God’s people, being Christ’s ambassadors to me, to you, to everyone. And to me, the fragrance in this Family is sweet.
You are not alone, sister. Life looks different right now, but even when it didn’t look like this there were days and seasons that seemed impossible. Breathe deeply. Can you smell it? Can you see the garlands all around you? Life to life. Christ on display. I pray this week you are loved well, and do some garland tossing yourself.
Behold, how good and pleasant it is
when brothers dwell in unity!
It is like the precious oil on the head,
running down on the beard,
on the beard of Aaron,
running down on the collar of his robes!
It is like the dew of Hermon,
which falls on the mountains of Zion!
For there the Lord has commanded the blessing,
life forevermore.
Psalm 133 ESV
© Alisha H. Cary 2020
This is lovely, thank you Alisha 😁 I pray you stay well.
Thank you, Lois! Good to hear from you!!