Tammy Faye Bakker stared out from my television screen, her long, dark eyelashes coated with what The Wittenburg Door once cattily described as “industrial strength mascara.” “Ooh!” she gushed, “The Christian life is just so great that I think I would become a Christian even if it wasn’t true!”
She had just been interviewing people with inspiring stories, and yes, Tammy Faye, the Christian life did sound pretty great as described on the air. But although I was touched by her enthusiasm, something about her declaration—“… even if it wasn’t true”—troubled me. It seemed somehow wrong, but I couldn’t put my finger on why.
I finally located the source of my discomfort in 1 Corinthians 15, the Bible’s central chapter on resurrection from the dead. There, the apostle Paul stakes his faith on the truth of Jesus’ resurrection. With remarkable bluntness he argues that if Christ had not been raised, his own preaching would be useless, as would our faith. Furthermore, he continues, except for the resurrection “we are to be pitied more than all men.”
Paul goes on to explain why Christians would deserve pity for clinging to a faith that had no basis in truth. Why endanger ourselves every hour? he asks. For example, it would make no sense for him, Paul, to fight wild beasts in Ephesus for a phantom faith. Hedonism offers a far more appealing life, and Paul candidly proposes that “If the dead are not raised, let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.”
(Unlike many television evangelists, Paul seemed to believe that the Christian life brings, not health and wealth, but a measure of suffering. In 2 Timothy 3:12 he writes, “In fact, everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted” [NIV].)
Later, long after I saw Tammy Faye on television, I came across yet another intriguing passage in Paul’s writings. Two sentences bring together the upbeat exuberance of Tammy Faye’s guests and the blunt realism of 1 Corinthians 15. Paul wrote the church in Corinth, “For we are to God the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing. To the one we are the smell of death; to the other, the fragrance of life” (2 Cor. 2:15–16, NIV).
According to Paul, the same fragrance can convey vastly different aromas, depending on the nose. To the unbelieving world our exercise of faith has the redolence of death about it. It intrudes with an unsettling reminder of mortality, and of another world that sits in judgment of this one.
Among unbelievers, personal examples of denial and sacrificial love may provoke begrudging admiration for “the Christian ethic.” But, as Paul said, undiluted hedonism has far more appeal. Think about what attracts a receptive audience in America today: Lee Iacocca, not an inner-city pastor, heads the bestseller lists. And the occasional PBS documentary on a Christian “saint” like Mother Teresa can hardly compete with “Wheel of Fortune” or “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous.” To the one, we are the smell of death.…
The smell of death hangs like a cloud over Mother Teresa—literally, for it is among the dying she has chosen to serve Christ. Even now she is opening hospices for AIDS patients. The wisdom of the Cross appears foolish to the world, and Paul admitted it would appear foolish to him, too, were it not for an event that occurred two days after the crucifixion.
Believers—those people convinced that the resurrection really happened—gain, so to speak, a new set of olfactory receptors. Beyond the stench of Good Friday they can detect the startling fragrance of new life.
For this reason, and this reason only, the Christian faith is worth pursuing. To expand Paul’s argument, if there is no resurrection, why restrain sexual or even violent urges? Why care about the poor and deformed? Why seek humility and servanthood while others seek ego strokes? Why give money away when you can hoard it? Such a life is to be pitied, not envied. It gives off the aroma of death—to all but those with sanctified noses.
We are approaching the fragrant season, a time of great rejoicing to those of us who live in northern cities. For too long I have walked past dirty snowpiles that serve as traps for dog droppings, litter, and particles of automobile exhaust. Now the ground is growing soft again, and even on vacant lots in Chicago the rich fragrance of earth is breaking free.
Spring is on the way, its approach heralded by a thousand scents. The dense, sweet smell of lilacs will soon grace the grim alley behind my home. In a few months, roses will overtake all other scents there. And then will come the pungent aroma of honeysuckle that never fails to transport me back to boyhood hikes in the Georgia woods.
By no accident, the church calendar, too, is now into a fragrant season; early celebrants of Easter combined remembrance of the earth’s resurrection with that of Christ’s. I think again of Paul’s metaphor of smell: “For we are to God the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing. To the one we are the smell of death; to the other, the fragrance of life.”
The aroma of death never fully dissipates. We die daily, said Paul, and our acts of self-denial will surely seem morbid, even masochistic, to some. But beyond that fragrance is the springlike scent of new life, and the only path that leads there is the path of the Cross.
A smell, any smell, is a mere hint, a gaseous announcement of something more substantial. And that is why we can be to God the aroma of Christ. Because of Easter, his fragrance becomes ours.
Listen, Christians. Can you hear the sound of laughter from the other side of death? Breathe deeply of a fragrance like no other. Let it fill your lungs this spring, this Easter.
