Today we learn another lesson from the Holy Spirit. This lesson is not for our benefit, it is all for God’s glory. However, we will get to learn deep, heart lessons from taking this course. The course is on making a sweet-smelling fragrance for God. We will learn what the ingredients are, how we mix them into our lives, and lastly, how they are expelled into the world to give off that beautiful aroma that God finds so wonderful to His senses. I must warn you, though, that this concoction is not made without some mistakes and these mistakes will hurt you, but they will not harm you (if you follow closely to the Spirit’s teachings). Hard work and sweat are some of the main ingredients in making this fragrance. It is no easy task. You will be tested in your faith, as well as your deeds. Despite the hardships, this delicately made fragrance is sweet to God. And if it is sweet to God, it will be sweet to all those who share in God’s glory. Those who do not know God will smell it and compare it to their own decaying stench. These dead men and women who do not know this fragrance will find wonder in it. They will want it, but will not get it without God. This fragrance can turn the dead to living repentance, and the children of God into stronger saints for their Master’s glory. If you are prepared for the challenge of this task, then let us closely follow the Spirit’s teachings to make a fragrance for God.
We start with a cup. This cup represents us; we are the cup. What we will have in our cup is wine. In the Old Testament this wine was poured onto the burnt offerings given up to God. After the wine was poured onto the burn offering, it would create a vapor that would be lifted up into the air towards God. This wine created a sweet aroma that filled the air and was pleasing to the Lord (Exodus 29:41; Hosea 9:4). This is the end result, however. This is not where we start. We start with a cup… we are the cup. So if we are a cup that pours out offerings to the Lord in order to create a fragrance for Him, we need to start with filling our cup. This is the first place of mistakes and hardships.
We want to fill our cup with sweet wine: the Word of God, good works, prayers of grace, forgiveness, etc. However, small amounts of bitterness enter into the wine’s taste as it is being fermented. It is part of the process, but with too much bitterness comes a terrible taste that ruins the wine. So we must take on this ingredient of bitterness with caution, for we still want to keep all the sweetness of God’s Word and good works in us. A bitter taste is not created without hardships, and it is how we deal with these hardships that will determine the amount of bitterness we let into our wine. We need it to be perfect if it is to be greatly pleasing to God. Listen closely, bitter taste is part of the process. Life does not taste sweet from soaking in all the rich juices of the grape. On the contrary, small amounts of a bitter taste must be added to give the right potency to wine. So welcome hardships and trials, for as they may taste bitter to you now, they will make for an excellent wine that will smell wonderful to God.
Stir in these hardships and trials into your cup along with the sweet wine of faith in God’s Word. The stirring of these two mixtures is very crucial, indeed. Properly stirring together trials and faith takes a long time, and mistakes are made. Lucky for us, when we stumble in our stirring, the Holy Spirit picks up the mixing rod for us and leads us back to the place where trials and faith make a most beautiful consistency. So keep stirring. The trials will keep coming, but as long as faith is continually stirred in with it, the wine will turn out wonderful.
Once the wine is properly mixed into our cup, we must not let it soak. If we let this sweet wine soak in our cup for a long while it will begin to tarnish and lose its purpose. We must not soak in the glory of this sweet wine. No, we are to pour it out as an offering to the Lord. Follow Paul as he says, “I urge you to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God; this is your spiritual worship” (Romans 12:1). We are not just taking communion with this wine, we are the communion. As we pick up our cross and follow our Lord Jesus (Matthew 16:24), we are to also pour ourselves out as a sacrifice just as the precious Lamb has done. Do not let the wine settle into your cup, for it will only rot. Pour it out on the heat of the fires and it will turn into a vapor of fragrance. We are so close to giving God the aroma that He craves from us.
Another very crucial part of the process comes as we pour ourselves out. Like making a short leap across a deep canyon, this process is not long, but mistakes will lead to serious consequences and some men will become too scared to take the leap. Pouring ourselves out as a drink offering unto the Lord is a risky process because it takes all we to make a sacrifice that will result in a denial of our own glorification. With any work that man sows, they want to reap the benefits of that work. This is not that kind of work. This is a lesson to please God, not man. So as we pour ourselves out, we must swallow the truth that we will not be glorified in this. Instead, we will be thinned out, worn out, and turned into a sweet vapor that the Lord will inhale. We will be pleasing to Him, and that is our reward.
So pour your cups, my brothers, and let yourselves be soaked upon the burnt offering. Be as Paul was to the Philippians (Philippians 2:17) and make God’s name great through the towns and cities that you reside in. Take this great sacrificial leap of faith and pour out everything you have labored over in Christ. Let your wine pour over the fires of hardships and pain. Let the wine sweat from your bodies and turn into vapor. Breathe in deep after expelling all of your energy and smell the freshly sweetened air. Then, and only then, can you rejoice and say, “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” (2 Cor. 2:14).
“For to God we are a fragrance of Christ...” (2:15). If we endure the trials, find grace in the mistakes, become pleasing in our attitudes of hard work, rejoice in our sufferings as well as our accomplishments, and if we follow the Spirit’s close guidance through it all, we will become that sweet-smelling fragrance that God cannot get enough of. “To some we are a scent of death leading to death, but to others, a scent of life leading to life” (2:16). Your fragrance to God will be well-pleasing. To His children of life, you will give a fragrance of an even richer life. And to those who are dying, you will bring to them a fragrance so sweet that their decaying noses will not be able to comprehend. Their minds will not register its sweetness, for they have never known anything so wonderful. These dead men and women will become curious, and through God’s grace, this fragrance may open up an opportunity to make a dead man come back to life. This fragrance is well-pleasing. It is our life’s fragrance; it is our sacrifice; it is the vapor of our love for the One who has loved us.
Word to the Word 
Adam, this IS an incredible Word.
Good Stuff!