What is that I smell?

WHAT IS THAT I SMELL!

I did not need to see the road kill.  The odor was quite pungent even with the car windows up and cruising at 40 miles per hour.  There was no mistaking that a skunk was nearby.  This one lay dead in the middle of the road.  How long it had been there was irrelevant, the smell was still in the air.  Although, a noxious irritant, a smell known by all, it was the appropriate waffling fume one would expect from a dead skunk.  Any other smell would have been aberrant.  You expect stink from a skunk.  The stench even after death is offensive to all who pass by.  Do not look down on this odious little one.  Skunks are not the only creatures that leave an aroma behind.

2 Corinthians 2:15-16 

15 For we are to God the pleasing aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing. 16 To the one we are an aroma that brings death; to the other, an aroma that brings life. And who is equal to such a task?

While attending a funeral today, I ran into Deacon Marshall from Nineteenth Street Baptist Church, the home church of my departed parents.  After a pleasant greeting, his next words were, "I still hear Brother Bruce Hall's voice in my ear.  I hear him speaking to me every day."  My father has been gone for over four years and yet his influence is deeply felt in the hearts and minds of those he mentored, ministered to and fed.  Every so often my husband Russell notices a certain tone in my voice or the way I offer advice that reminds him of my mother,  Katie Hall.  The way I relate to my husband and children is a reflection of her calm, gentle demeanor steeped in wisdom.  Though now with the Lord, they both have left a lasting aroma.  It was through humble obedience to God's word, the leading of the Holy Spirit and  submission to God's will that allowed Bruce and Katie Hall’s very essence to be inviting, uplifting and life changing.  It was a sweet smell that drew the saved closer to God and those who did not know Christ stand convicted of willfully turning away. What kind of smell will you leave behind?   Skunks give off the smell they were designed to give, how about you?