When I came to Troas to preach the gospel of Christ, even though a door was opened for me in the Lord, my spirit was not at rest because I did not find my brother Titus there. So I took leave of them and went on to Macedonia. 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. (2Co 2:12-17)

Here are some thoughts from this passage that have been spinning in my mind for the last few days:

1. We rely upon God’s gracious empowerment and faithfulness to open the truth and the word of the Gospel. We cannot make anyone believe anything but must rely upon the graciousness of God to make minds and hearts responsive to the truth.

2. We follow the conqueror of our souls and of our sin in joyous procession toward the consummation of all things in Him.

3. We are the aroma of sacrifice to the Lord through the cross of Christ. Our lives are a spiritual sacrifice of worship not of our own merit but of the merit of Christ. Romans 12:1, Leviticus 1:17.

4. As a sacrifice of worship we are unavoidably either the aroma of life to those who are living and are being called to life by the Spirit of God, or of death to those who are spiritually dead. There is no room for a lukewarm response to a faithful representation of the life of Christ in us.

5. Bearing this message of life and death is a sobering responsibility made possible only through God’s grace. No-one is sufficient for such things.

6. We have been commissioned by God for that very purpose. The commission of God is upon us to speak in and of Christ. That calling is by the mercy and grace of God.

7. Our only goal is the glory of God as revealed in His gospel. It is the only one worthy of the investment of our lives.

In his biography of George Whitefield, Arnold Dallimore, expressed a prayer for preachers to be raised up that would, like Whitefield, give themselves to preaching the glory of God. His words resonate with my soul as I meditate on this passage of Scripture and its implications:

“Yea…that we shall see the great Head of the Church once more . . . raise up unto Himself certain young men whom He may use in this glorious employ. And what manner of men will they be? Men mighty in the Scriptures, their lives dominated by a sense of the greatness, the majesty and holiness of God, and their minds and hearts aglow with the great truths of the doctrines of grace. They will be men who have learned what it is to die to self, to human aims and personal ambitions; men who are willing to be ‘fools for Christ’s sake’, who will bear reproach and falsehood, who will labor and suffer, and whose supreme desire will be, not to gain earth’s accolades, but to win the Master’s approbation when they appear before His awesome judgment seat. They will be men who will preach with broken hearts and tear-filled eyes, and upon whose ministries God will grant an extraordinary effusion of the Holy Spirit, and who will witness ‘signs and wonders following’ in the transformation of multitudes of human lives.”

Amen and amen.

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