The believer is the Lord’s Garden, from where pleasant fragrance flows through his obedience to the Lord. However, when we neglect our spiritual garden, allowing sin to control us, it is like a natural and unattended garden where weeds of all kinds take over. The beautiful garden that once was, calling the attention of all who passed by, is now a garden of weeds, with no beauty to show forth, neither a fragrance to share; only regrets by all who passes through. A life short of love for others; empty of YAHSHUA’S love. Like a reservoir, his life does not reciprocate the love given him, for love is like jasmine flowers, spreading its fragrance to all. The more that we share, the more that we will have to give, as we receive in return. Love is two-way street; it is the fragrance God is expecting from us, while He blesses us with good things. Oh, I pray that the [cold] north wind and the [soft] south wind may blow upon my garden, that its spices may flow out [in abundance for you in whom my soul delights]. Let my beloved come into his garden and eat its choicest fruits (S.S. 4:16).
We are to God the sweet aroma of Christ (II Cor.2:15). For He has imparted His righteousness to us when we believed in Him. His righteousness is active in us when we apply it in our daily living. It interprets the holiness of God been available by the Holy Spirit through His work of sanctification.We must live to please Him, not ourselves. Our cross we must bear, always looking ahead to YAHSHUA, the Author and Consummator of our faith (Heb. 12:1); leaving all behind, we must press on to the price waiting for us. For if we have died with Him, we shall also live with Him; if we endure, we shall also reign with Him; if we deny and disown and reject Him, He will also deny and disown and reject us (II Tim.2:11b-12). Paul said, I do not consider, brethren, that I have captured and made it my own; but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize to which God in Christ YAHSHUA is calling us upward (Phil. 3:13-14). Our Lord will never reject the fragrance that flows from us to Him. As a matter of fact, the Bible says, “Then those who feared the Lord talked often one to another; and the Lord listened and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before Him of those who reverenced and worshipfully feared the Lord and who thought on His name, and they shall be Mine, says the Lord of hosts, in that day when I publicly recognize and openly declare them to be my jewels. And I will spare them, as a man spares his own son who serves him. Then shall you return and discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him who serves God and him who does not serve Him” (Mal. 3:16-18).
Behold, the Lord’s eye is upon those who fear Him, who wait for Him and hope in His mercy and loving-kindness (Ps. 33:18). Our way is not hidden from the Lord. The acts of obedience to Him, He accepts as a sweet aroma and in due time, He will recompense all those who fear Him. Whatever we do, whatever we say, must be to bring glory to His name. Let not the good things we do point out to our doings, but let it rise as a fragrance to Him. We are not of ourselves; for we have been purchased with His precious blood. Paul’s letter to the Romans chapter 12:1-2 says: I appeal, to you therefore, brethren, and beg of you in view of the mercies of God, to make a decisive dedication of your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and well pleasing to God, which is your reasonable service and spiritual worship; do not be conformed to this work,, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, so that you may prove what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God, even the thing which is good and acceptable and perfect.
In conclusion, being “the sweet aroma of Christ” illustrates the transformative power flowed to the believer; it emanates the presence of the Lord by our conduct toward others; Paul said, Walk in love, just as Christ loved us and gave Himself for us as a fragrant sacrificial offering to God (Eph. 5:2). Followers of YAHSHUA are bearers of spiritual fragrances, as we share our life to the needy and to the lost world.
Here is a poem from my heart to yours to ponder about your life as the Lord’s Garden:
My Garden of Weeds
I planted a garden
So, I thought to be
A garden of flowers
Day after day I watched
It grow into a garden
So, I thought
A garden of flowers
Weeks of rain and sunshine
My garden I thought to be
A garden of flowers
Became a garden of weeds
Everywhere a weed
Taking away the breath
From my flowers!
Oh! Eve, I exclaimed
your first weed
Planted in God’s
Perfect garden
Has spread to my garden
The garden I thought
To be a garden of flowers
Uprooting the weeds
From my garden
One day I heard
My Lord saying, child,
Your life is like a garden
Created to be a perfect
Garden in My sight
But the seed of a weed
Entered your soul
No longer a perfect garden
Your life became
A garden of weeds
Like briars and thistles
Sin pierced your soul
You cried to Me
I came and took away
Your thorns and wore
Them as My crown
And made you
A garden of flowers
Sanctified to be My bride
I betrothed you
With My eternal love
And with a ring
I marked you to be Mine
Until I fly you home
There, you will be
My perfect Garden!
THINK ABOUT IT!
Light from the Word 