A Sweet Smelling Savour

A Sweet Smelling Savour
We read in Lukes gospel about a conversation that I would love to have been in on. It was shortly after the discovery that the tomb of the Lord Jesus was empty. Two disciples were making the seven mile trek from Jerusalem to the little village of Emmaus. As they walked their minds were preoccupied with sadness over the cruel death of their master and the mystery of the empty tomb. As they ambled along the road in their grief, a stranger joined himself to them and began to question them about their sorrow. Though later they would recall how their hearts burned within them as he spoke to them, they never imagined their companion was the risen Christ himself. Luke writes: "beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself."
Such a lesson from the Master reminds us of an old saying concerning the relationship of the Old Testament scriptures with those of the New Testament: "The New is in the Old enfolded and the Old is in the New unfolded...the New is in the Old concealed & the Old is in the New revealed." In the words of Jesus as he spoke to those Jews who did not believe in him: "You search the Scriptures, because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is these that bear witness of Me and you are unwilling to come to Me, that you may have life." Keeping this important truth in mind helps us to more fully understand and appreciate many things we find in both the Old and the New Testament that often otherwise would hold little meaning to us.
One such Scripture is found in Paul's second letter to the church at Corinth in chapter two verses 14 & 15: "Now thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savour of his knowledge by us in every place. For we are unto God a sweet savour of Christ, in them that are saved, and in them that perish. While this is admittedly very poetic language, its power is largely lost on us without the benefit of what the Old Testament has to say about the sweet savour offerings that the apostle Paul is alluding to. And the Scripture has much to say.
The first mention of this sweet savour takes us back to the very first book of the Bible. Not long after Noah set foot once again on dry ground we read in Genisis chapter 8 that Noah took of every clean animal and of those that soared in the heavens and offered them as a sacrifice unto God: verse 21 says, "the LORD smelled a sweet savour; and the LORD said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake; for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done." Think now again about the conversation Jesus held with those disciples on their way to Emmaus. He began with Moses, remember. It well may be that he spoke to them about this savour of this sacrifice of the clean and the heavenly that moved upon God's heart to extend mercy to the race of men in spite of the fact that his "heart is evil from his youth."
As we proceed in the Bible to the book of deliverence...the book of Exodus two more important truths are revealed to us about this sweet savour. In chapter 29 it is revealed that before Aaron and his sons could serve God as priests they must be consecrated. As sinful men they could not serve God acceptably without the sin being atoned for. In placing their hands upon the innocent victim they displayed their identification with it. The blood of the sacrifice was placed on the altar...in Deuteronomy we read "the blood is the life," and in Hebrews it is explained that for this reason, "almost all things are by the law purged with blood; and without shedding of blood is no remission." So that when the sacrifice of consecration was offered on the altar for these that would be set apart to serve God we are told, "it is a burnt offering unto the LORD: it is a sweet savour, an offering made by fire unto the LORD."
In the same chapter of Exodus it is later revealed that there was to be a sacrifice every morning and every evening where God meets with His people to speak with them. Once again it is made very clear that another privledge, this one of meeting with God is established not on man's merit or goodness but rather wholly on the "sweet savour" and what it represents: "And the other lamb thou shalt offer at even... for a sweet savour, an offering made by fire unto the LORD."
The book of Hebrews in the New Testament reminds us that all of the elements of worship in the Old Testament were types and shadows; symbols and figures of corresponding realities that exist in heaven: "It was therefore necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with these (animal sacrifices); but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these." Remember the Lord's talk with those disciples on the way back to Emmaus, "beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself"....the "better" sacrifice.
As we move further into the writings of Moses we find that both the offerings of peace and the offerings specifically for sin shared in these important features, underscoring the important truth that not only our privledge to serve and to meet with God are based upon the sweet savour reaching unto God, but also that there can be no peace with God and no atonement for sin without it. The hands of those in behalf of whom the sacrifice is to be offered are layed upon the victims head symbolizing that the offerer is identifying with the victim....the blood is placed upon the altar...and the consuming fires of judgment are applied to the substitute: "the priest shall burn it upon the altar for a sweet savour unto the LORD; and the priest shall make an atonement for him, and it shall be forgiven him." Remember again the words of Jesus as he spoke to those who were brought up in these very traditions: "You search the Scriptures, because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is these that bear witness of Me and you are unwilling to come to Me, that you may have life."
But when Jesus spoke to those disciples making their way home he also spoke to them out of all the prophets concerning himself. So it is not surprising that the prophet Ezekiel reveals that ultimately, when the God gathers his ancient people from all over the world into the land he originally promised them, that their acceptance will, as always, be based upon that sweet savour: "I will accept you with your sweet savour, when I bring you out from the people, and gather you out of the countries wherein ye have been scattered." The same is true for us who look to be gathered from the four corners of the earth when Jesus comes again...we understand, as Paul makes clear, that God, "Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ...(and that)... he hath made us accepted in the beloved. (i.e. in Jesus, the sweet savour)... In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace..."
So now we are in a far better position to more fully appreciate what Paul said in 2nd Corinthians where we began how in the preaching of the cross...in the preaching of the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world...in the preaching of Jesus that God, "always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savour of his knowledge by us in every place. {15} For we are unto God a sweet savour of Christ..."......It is afterall in Him and Him alone that our forgiveness, our acceptance, our peace with God, and our privledge to approach "boldly" the throne of God and to serve Him in the "new and living way" all reside. "Be ye therefore," Paul writes in the Ephesian letter, "followers of God, as dear children; And walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweetsmelling savour."