Thanks and lessons from a skunk!!

Thanks so much for your prayers in regards to the preaching time the Lord allowed me this past Sunday. I figured that it was fitting for the worship pastor to teach a couple of Sundays on worship. I taught this past week on John chapter 4 and it is loaded with incredible truths. I loved the study time in John. Thanks again for your prayers!!

I bet you are wondering what lessons a skunk can teach? I admit often I am guilty of overspiritualization. I was going to look up that word in the dictionary, but my search came up empty. However, I just took the two words involved and allocated a meaning to it--the act of assigning a spirtual meaning to things that are not inherently spiritual. I have been accussed of that quite often, mostly in jest, however I am firm believer that all creation testifies of who God almighty is. As in all things in life there is a balance I am sure. The skunk episode that plagued our home for a couple of weeks sparked many thoughts in my mind. The smell was atrocious! There were several nights that it was so strong that we could not even stay in our house. Does the skunk have a predator? I mean who is going to mess with that dude! So my mind went to these verses which will solidify the trail on which my thoughts are going, "....and manifests through us the sweet aroma of the knowledge of Him in every place...." "For we are a fragrance of Christ to God...." (2 Cor. 2:14-16). "And walk in love just as Christ also loved you and gave Himself up for us, and offereing and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma" (Eph. 5:2). "....a fragrant aroma, an acceptable sacrifice, well pleasing to God" (Phil. 4:18). This language ultimately grows out of the O.T. and it was generally used to describe the sacrifice or offering to God (in the sense of Noah after the flood Gen. 8:21) or its connection to the some 50 uses in the Levitical sacrificial system and various burnt offerings (cf. Exod 29:18, 25, 41; Lev 1:9, 13, 2:2, 9, 12; Num 15:3, 5, 7, 10, 13-14). I am reminded none the less, how we are urged by God's mercies "to present [our] bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is [our] spiritual service of worship." We worship by offering our bodies to God as living sacrifices. The question of the day is, what do we smell like? May the offering of our lives today literally be "an odour of a sweet smell" to our High Priest and may the aroma of the life of Christ in us be manifest to all we come in contact with!