Title: Pride of Saints
Contents
---------------------------
1. Let's try to know God (Hosea 6:3)
---------------------------
“Therefore let us know the Lord, let us strive to know the Lord; his coming out is as steady as the morning light, and he will come upon us like rain, and like the latter rain that waters the earth.
---------------------------
2. Those who know God have fragrance (2 Corinthians 2:14~16)
---------------------------
“Thanks be to God, who always triumphs over us in Christ, and through us in every place the scent of the knowledge of Christ. 15 We are the fragrance of Christ before God, both to those who are being saved and to those who are perishing.”
Paul compares the imparting of knowledge about God and Christ to the fragrance of Christ. Those who believe in Jesus have the smell of knowing Christ, that is, the fragrance of Christ (v. 15). The way to show the invisible God to unbelievers is to live in the fragrance of Jesus. When we become the fragrance of Jesus, unbelievers come to know and meet God. Unbelievers can see and experience God through us who first believe. Unbelievers come to Jesus when the fragrance of Jesus is blown away. The world smells the fragrance of Jesus from the saints. Therefore, we must live by fragrance. Do not forget in our dreams that we are the fragrance of Jesus. I hope that all of us saints will strive to know the Lord and be admired by living in the fragrance of Christ.
---------------------------
3. The saints should boast (Jeremiah 9:24)
---------------------------
“Let the one who brags boast in this, that he may have understanding, that he may know me, and that I, the LORD, are the doers of kindness, fairness, and uprightness in the earth; in this I take delight, says the LORD.
The moment we meet God, our pride changes. Paul did just that. He had a lot to be proud of physically. However, after meeting Jesus, he regarded all his boasting as excrement and lived a life of boasting only the cross of Jesus Christ. Like Paul, let's meet God in our lives, boast of Jesus, and live a life that smells the fragrance of Jesus. (December 12, 2004)