“Thank God! For he made us his captives and continues to lead us along in Christ’s triumphal procession. Now he uses us to spread the knowledge of Christ everywhere, like a sweet perfume—an aroma of grace and life. Our lives are a Christ-like fragrance rising up to God as a sacrifice of praise and adoration.” (pp 2Cor.2:14-15)
Lord Jesus, this is a most stunning description of what it means to know you. When you melted us with your mercy and conquered us by the Gospel, you placed us in your “parade of grace.” A parade that will carry us all the way into the new heaven and new earth—arriving right on time with passengers from every generation, continent, and nation. Oh, how “we love a parade”—especially this one.
You took us captive and now we’re captivated with your beauty, goodness, and truth. Everything glorious about you claims everything broken about us. None of the participants in this parade boasts, “We win, we win, we win!” Rather, our joyful song and shout is, “The Lamb has triumphed over all things, including me!”
Jesus, increase our “smitten-ness” with yourself. We’ll never over-love or over-do it with you. We’ll never be too preoccupied with you—too enamored, astonished, undone, dazzled and delighted. When it comes to you, there’s no such thing as balance, moderation, or reasonableness. For you made and redeemed us to love you with everything we have and are.
May our lives increasingly be fragrant with grace, humility, and kindness—offering a sweet perfume rising to heaven’s courts, but also in our families, workplace, and culture. Since grace always runs downhill, keep us low; and since you’re always running towards us in the Gospel, keep us expectant. Hallelujah, and So Very Amen.