Let's read these words again.
Ephesians 5, be ye therefore followers or
imitators 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 sweet-smelling savor."
I've entitled this message, A Sweet-Smelling Savor. Now, God doesn't have
a nose as such, he's spirit. And this is not talking about
an aroma, but this is talking about the satisfaction that God
has with the offering and sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ, a sweet
smelling sacred. I've heard it said that Ephesians
can be divided into two sections. The first three sections are
doctrinal and the last three chapters, the first three chapters
are doctrinal and the last three chapters are practical. That's
foolishness. If it's not doctrinal, it's not
practical. And if it's not practical, it's
not doctrinal. This is the Word of God, and
we're in the midst of these chapters four, five, and six, and this
is eminently doctrinal and eminently practical. Something that is
not practical, I repeat, is not doctrinal in the first place,
and something that's not doctrinal is certainly not practical. practical. You know, I've heard preachers
talk about some sorts of preaching. They say, well, that's doctrinal.
Okay. Uh, but does that mean it's not
to be put into practice? Now we considered a couple of
weeks ago, verse one, be there for followers or imitators of
God as dear children. Now, You can't be an imitator
of God if you don't know him, if you don't know what he's like.
It's impossible to be a follower of God if you don't know him
and what he is like. Verse two, 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 sweet smelling savor. Now the most outstanding characteristic
of every believer without exception is love for the brethren. There's nothing more important
than this. The Lord said, by this shall
all men know you're my disciples. by your love one to another. The Lord said, in as much as
you've done it to the least of these, my brethren, you've done
it to me. And in as much as you've done
it not to the least of these, my brethren, you've done it not
to me. Now, can I emphasize greatly
enough, this is the mark This is the badge of discipleship
that the Lord gives. Love to the brethren. And look what kind of love, walk
in love as Christ also hath loved us. Now before I get into Christ
loving us, I'm gonna have to ask this question, who is the
us? That is incredibly important. You can't really understand the
love of Christ if you don't understand who the us is. Who is the us that Christ has
loved? And if this is not brought out,
we make the love of Christ meaningless. That's how important this is.
Who is the us? Now most people would say, well,
it means everybody, all men without exception. Well, let me say this,
if he loves all men without exception, and some of those men that he
has loved are not saved, that makes his love meaningless. It's
not even real. It didn't do these people any
good. So to say that God loves all men without exception is
to make the love of God meaningless. And that's what most preachers
say. God loves you, and I do too. God loves all men, wants
to save all men. There's no truth to that. Jacob have I loved, but Esau
have I hated. That's what God said. Thou hatest
all workers of iniquity. I can't understand God's love
if I don't understand who it is that he loves, who is the
us. Let me repeat this. I want this
to sink in with us. If Christ's love and offering
and sacrifice is for all men, but some of those men are not
saved, That makes salvation by works. That makes salvation ultimately
dependent upon us. And what we're left with is the
absence of the gospel. Now that's how important this
is. Who is the us? Well, look in chapter one and
he tells us who the us is. Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ
by the will of God to the saints. which are at Ephesus. To the
faithful in Christ Jesus, that's who the us is, the saints. The
faithful in Christ Jesus. Grace be to you and peace from
God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed be the
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us.
This is the us he's speaking of. With all spiritual blessings
in heavenly places in Christ. Now the us is those he's blessed
with all spiritual blessings. They have every single one of
them. And they were all given in Christ.
Who's the us? Look in verse four. According
as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world,
that we should be holy and without blame before him. The us is the
elect, those He chose in Christ before the foundation of the
world. I mean, they're identified. Clear as can be. Who is the us? According as He has chosen us
in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should
be holy and without blame before Him. That's who the us is because
of the work of Christ for them. They are holy and without blame. There's nothing to blame me for.
I'm holy in God's sight through the work of Christ. Who's the
us? In love, having predestinated
us under the adoption of children. That's the us, having predestinated
us under the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according
to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of the glory of
his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved. The
us are those he's predestinated. The us are those who he has made
accepted. Oh, I love that. Don't you? Made
accepted in the beloved. In whom, he says, verse 7, we
have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins according
to the riches of his grace. The us are those who have the
forgiveness of sins. Now I could go on with every
word up to where we're at in chapter 5, and I could just give
examples and examples and examples of who the us is. The us is the
elect. The us is those who believe. The us are those for whom Christ
died. The us are those that God has blessed with every spiritual
blessing in heavenly places. Now, the importance of this is
because all the us are saved. None of these us's are ever lost
because of the work of Christ for them. These are the ones
he loved. These are the ones he gave himself
for Those, and let me, let me say
this too. Well, am I one of those uses?
Well, let me, let me ask you two questions. Number one, are
you a sinner? Have you answered that question?
Are you a sinner? I can answer that one. Yes, I
am. Number two, do you look to Christ
as all your salvation? You're relying completely on
Him only. That's the evidence of being
in us. Simple enough. Well, how did Christ love us?
Back to our text in Ephesians chapter five. and walk in love as Christ also
hath loved us. Now, how did Christ love us?
Well, he made this statement in John chapter 14, as the father
hath loved me, so have I loved you. Now, I wouldn't believe
that if the word of God didn't teach it. That seems too good
to be true, doesn't it? as the Father hath loved me."
And I want you to think about the love the Father has for the
Son. He loves Him because He's altogether
lovely. He loves Him because He's beautiful. He loves Him because He's perfect.
He loves him because there's no spot in him. He's the one
God calls my fellow, the man who is my fellow, equal with
God. That's how he loves his son. And the Lord says, as the father
had loved me, so have I loved you. That's true of every believer. Now, the only way we can get
a hold of this is by faith. There's no other way. But that's
how the Lord loves. You know, he says, there's no
spot in me. There's no spot in me. Thou art altogether fair. That's how the Lord loves his
people. He looks at every one of his people and he sees no
fault, no blemish, no spot. You know, people talk about unconditional
love. There's no such thing. God doesn't
love me unconditionally. God loves me because I'm in Christ
and I'm lovely to the Father. That's how he loved us. What about the forgiveness of
his love, the acceptance of his love? I could go on and on and
on, but that's how we're to love one another, as he loved us. And walk in love as Christ also
hath loved us Now look at this next line, and hath given himself
for us. An offering and a sacrifice to
God for a sweet smelling savor. Now here is what his love did. It says he hath given himself
for us. He did this willingly. He did
this because he wanted to. He did this voluntarily. He had
given himself for us. Brother Mahan used to give this
as an illustration of this thing of him giving himself voluntarily
and something that I've not given in many years. Maybe some of
you've never heard it. There was a one room schoolhouse. And kids from six to 18 were
in this one-room schoolhouse out in the country. And every
time a teacher would go there, those big boys would end up running
him off. There were some big old country boys that just would
not behave, and they would give the teacher such a hard time,
he couldn't stay. And finally one teacher came
and said, here's what we're gonna do. You're gonna make the rules.
You're gonna make all the rules, You're going to make the punishment
for breaking those rules. And that's how this school is
going to operate. And you know, that was different.
They said, OK, we'll do this. And they started making rules.
He got up in the chalkboard. He made all the rules. He wrote
them down as they gave them out. And one 18-year-old boy by the
name of Billy said to his teacher, I think there ought to be rules
against people stealing lunches. If somebody steals a lunch, they
ought to be beat upon the bare back with 10 lashes of the rod. And he said, that seems strong.
He said, no, sir. People ought not steal anybody's
lunches. I think that ought to be the
rule. So they got all the rules down. And things went very smoothly
in that school like had never gone before. Nobody breaking the rules. Everybody
seemed to be respectful and so on. But finally, some weeks later,
Billy comes up and says, teacher, Somebody stole my lunch. And the teacher looked at the
class and said, who did it? Fess up. Nobody do it. Nobody want to get 10 lashes
across the bare back. I understand that. Nobody admitted
to it. And so the teacher said, if you
don't confess, everybody in this room He's going to get 10 lashes
across the bare back. And there were sounds for a moment.
And all of a sudden, this little boy named Johnny comes up and
said, teacher, I stole lunch. He had tears in his eyes. And
he said, I was hungry. I haven't eaten for two days.
And I had to have something to eat. I stole the lunch. And the
teacher said, well, take your shirt off. And he was crying,
took his shirt off, little skinny ribs showing. And he leaned across
the desk for the teacher to start whipping him. And all of a sudden,
somebody said, teacher, don't whip that boy. And it was Billy,
the one whose lunch was stolen. He came and said, don't you whip
that boy. And the teacher said, I have to. He stole the lunch. And he said, I'll take his place. And he took his shirt off big
strap and muscular young man and got across the desk. And
the teacher gave him those 10 lashes in Billy's place. He did this willingly. Billy
was crying the whole time. Oh, thank you for doing that
for me. Now that one problem with that story. I like that
story. One problem with that story.
You know what it is? Billy didn't steal the lunch.
Is that justice? If Billy didn't steal the lunch?
No, it's Johnny that stole it. Johnny's gotta pay. Billy's the
one who shouldn't be punished. Johnny's the one who should be
punished. And we know that that's right. Now, I love the story
of the willingness to be a substitute. I love that part, but that's
not justice. That is not justice. If I am guilty of a crime, and
the judge says, well, I'm not going to charge you with it.
Is that just? No. No. If I'm innocent, and
I'm going to be charged with a crime, is that just? No. No. Now here is the difference in
Christ's substitution. Look what it says in verse 2
once again. He hath given Himself for us. as a substitute, an offering
and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling savor. You see, the reason the Lord
Jesus Christ could take the punishment of the sin is because he took
the sin. He bear our sins. I don't know of anything that
makes me more troubled, yet more happy
than that. He bore my sins in his own body
on the tree. He became guilty of the commission
of those sins. He never sinned. He knew no sin. He did no sin. But God took my
sins And he gave them to his son, and his son took them on
willingly. He gave himself. He delivered himself up to the
very justice of God. He said, I'll take Todd Knappert's
sins. And because of that, he took the punishment of those
sins. He gave himself for us. And notice it says he gave himself
an offering and a sacrifice to God. An offering is whatever
is offered. And a sacrifice is something
that has been slain. The sacrifice tells us what the
offering was all about. He himself presented himself. He presented his own blood. to
God as an offering and a sacrifice. Now understand this, for God
to do something for me or you, he first had to do something
for himself. See, God's just, and He cannot, He will not accept
somebody like me or you. His law has got to be honored. The threats of the law have to
be honored. His justice has to be satisfied. And I'm like that.
I'm glad He's like that, aren't you? What if God were not just?
Well, we'd be afraid to, well, what a horrible world this would
be. But God is just. He never just lets sin go unpunished. He took the sins of God's people
and Christ willingly took them. That was what was going on in
the Garden of Gethsemane when he saw that cup and he said,
if it would be possible, let this cup pass from me. He knew
I was in that cup. It was the cup of the sins of
his people that he was going to drink in his own body on the
tree. But he said, nevertheless, not
my will but thine be done. And he took and drank of that
cup. He said, the cup which my father
hath given me to drink, shall I not drink it? He offered himself. And he himself was the sacrifice. And he presented to God his own
blood. You see, his blood wasn't so
much shed for you, shed for God. Now you get the benefit out of
it, but it was shed for God so that God might be just and justify
somebody like me or you. Turn to Hebrews chapter nine
for a second. Verse 12. Neither by the blood of goats
and calves, but by his own blood, he entered in once into the holy
place, having obtained eternal redemption. for us. Look in verse
24 of the same chapter, for Christ has not entered into the holy
places made with hands, which are the figures of the true,
but into heaven itself now to appear in the presence of God
for us. Nor yet that he should offer
himself often as a high priest entered into the holy places
every year with the blood of others. For then must he have
often suffered since the foundation of the world. But now, once in
the end of the world, has he appeared to put away sin by the
sacrifice of himself. He presented his own blood to
God. Look in Hebrews chapter 10, beginning in verse nine. Then
said he, Lo, I come, in the volume of the book, to do thy will. He taketh away the first, that
he may establish the second. By the witch will, by God's will,
we are sanctified, declared by God to be holy, through the offering
of the body of Jesus Christ, once for all. And every priest
standeth daily, ministering, offering oftentimes the same
sacrifices, which can never take away sins, but this man, after
he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down on
the right hand of God from henceforth expecting till his enemies be
made his footstool for by one offering. He hath perfected forever
them that are sanctified. He offered himself. He gave himself. as an offering
and a sacrifice to God. Now back to our text, Ephesians
chapter 5. Verse 2, walk in love as Christ
also hath loved us and hath given himself for us. That's the substitutionary
nature of what he's done. He gave himself an offering and
a sacrifice to God. This was to God. Who was looking
for the blood? God was. He didn't say when you
see the blood. He said when I see the blood, I will pass over you. This is to God. This is so God
can deal in grace and mercy with folks like me and you. And notice what this is to God,
a sweet smelling savor. It smells good to God. Now, like I said at the beginning,
God doesn't have a nose in the sense that he's spirit. He doesn't
have parts, he doesn't have body parts. I know the Lord Jesus
Christ does, but God is spirit. They that worship him must worship
him in spirit and in truth. And this is not talking about
a physical Roma, but what it represents. This sacrifice is
well pleasing, satisfying to God. He's not looking for anything
else. He's so infinitely satisfied
with the sacrifice of his son. Now, would you turn back to Genesis
chapter eight? This is the first time sweet savor is used. Genesis chapter eight, and this
is after Noah got off the ark. Verse 20. And Noah builded an altar unto
the Lord. I think it's interesting, this
is the first time we read of the word altar, Genesis 8 20.
This is after he got off, the land was now dry and they got
back out of the ark. And the first thing Noah did,
he built an altar unto the Lord and took of every clean beast
and of every clean fowl and offered burnt offerings on the altar.
And the Lord smelled a sweet savor. And the Lord said in his
heart, I will not curse the ground anymore for man's sake. For the
imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth. Neither
will I again smite anymore everything living as I've done. While the
earth remaineth, seed time, harvest, and cold, and heat, and summer,
and winter, and day and night shall not cease. That sacrifice
was a sweet savor to God. Now just on the side, just on
the side, this is not part of the message, You know why everybody's
worried about global warming and how we're going to destroy
the earth? We can't do that. The Lord's
promised it's going to be all the way to the end. The earth
is the Lord's and the fullness thereof. People worry about global
warming. We're going to ruin everything,
the ozone. Lord's promised this is gonna happen to the end. Harvest,
all these things. The earth is the Lord's. But
the point is that this is a sweet smelling savor, that it represented
the offering and sacrifice of Christ. And the Lord is saying,
even though men are this bad, they're evil from their youth,
I am satisfied. I am satisfied. 17 times in the book of Leviticus,
we read of the sweet smell and odor of the sacrifice that pointed
to the offering that Christ would offer up. Now listen to what
this sweet smelling savor means. If you're a believer, you smell
good to God right now. That's what Christ's sacrifice
accomplished. He's well pleased with you. Thou
art all fair, my love. There is no spot in thee. Holy and unblameable before him. Holy and unblameable and unreprovable
in his sight. without blemish, without spot
or wrinkle or any such thing, faultless, no guile and without
fault before the throne of God. Now that's what the offering
and sacrifice of Christ literally makes us. That means right now, every believer smells good to
God. He is completely satisfied with
you. You can't get any more loved,
any more accepted, any more beautiful than you are in Christ. Now here's
the point. However satisfied the Father
is with Christ, that's how satisfied He is with
you. That, my dear friends, is the gospel. this sweet smelling
savor he offered up. Turn with me to 2 Corinthians
2. 2 Corinthians 2. Verse 14. Now, thanks be unto God, which,
what's our next word? I'd like y'all to say it out
loud if you would. Always. Always. I don't know how many
times after I've preached and I felt, boy, this didn't seem
like anything happened. Didn't seem like the Lord's blessing. I go back to this verse. Thanks
be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ. You've heard preachers talk about
believers living defeated Christian lives. There ain't no such thing.
Do you hear that? There is no such thing. We are
always caused to triumph in Christ. Takes all the pressure off doesn't
it? and maketh manifest the savor
of his knowledge by us in every place. For we are unto God a
sweet savor of Christ. Not independent of him. We are
unto God a sweet savor of Christ. in them that are saved, and in
them that perish, to the one we're the saver of death unto
death. Now that's speaking of the justice
of God and the destruction of the wicked. And it is a saver
to God of death unto death. Let's put it this way. You know,
in heaven, and we don't understand this now, and we can't grasp
this now very well, or not at all. But in heaven, there won't
be any tears over lost people. Everybody will be praising God
for his justice. We can't see it now the way we
will then. We have this sinful nature that
prevents us from being as we will one day when this sin for
nature is put off. But there won't be any tears
over the lost on judgment day. There will be praising God for
his judgments. We're unto God, the sweet saver
of death unto death. But look what he says next. to
the one where the saver of death unto death and to the other,
the saver of life unto life. And Paul says what I feel right
now, who's sufficient for these things? Who's sufficient to deal
with these eternal realities? I'm not. All we can do is preach
what God says and trust God will take care of it all. Look in Philippians chapter four, saver of life unto life, that
person that is saved, that God has saved, smells good to God. Philippians chapter four, verse 15. Now you Philippians
know also that in the beginning of the gospel, when I departed
from Macedonia, no church communicated with me as concerning giving
and receiving, but you only. All these churches didn't try
to help Paul. The Philippian church was the only ones who
did. They're the ones Paul's talking about in second Corinthians
chapter eight. When he talks about the Macedonians, it was
these Philippians. This was in Macedonia. For even
in Thessalonica, you sent once again unto my necessity. Not
because I desire a gift, but I desire fruit that may abound
to your count, but I have all and abound. I'm full having received
of Epaphroditus, that's their pastor, the things which were
sent from you for an odor of a sweet smell, a sacrifice acceptable,
well-pleasing to God. Now, if you're anything like
me, and I know you are, You don't feel like anything you have done
could possibly be considered well-pleasing and acceptable
to God. You see such sordid motives.
You see such lack of love. You see such lack of zeal. You
see such self-promotion, whatever you've done. But such is the intercession
of Christ that that gift I give is a sweet smell to God. Acceptable and well-pleasing. And it's not because that's what
it is in itself. What it is in itself, I can get sent to hell
for. The best things. The good things. But when Christ
takes that as my great intercessor and presents it before the Father,
it smells good to the Father. a sacrifice acceptable, well-pleasing
to God. Now how can that be? Because
Christ hath given himself for us a substitution, an offering
He offered up himself and to sacrifice, the emphasis being
he offered up his death. He's alive now to do it. That's
because of his resurrection, but he offered up his death,
his blood. And what that is to God is a
sweet smelling savor. That means I smell good to God. It means
God is satisfied, utterly and completely satisfied, not looking
for anything else, because of the offering and sacrifice of
Christ. Let's pray together. Lord, how we thank you that thy son loved us and offered himself for us, gave himself for us, an offering
and a sacrifice, a sweet smelling savor unto thee. Bless this message for your glory
and our good. In Christ's name we pray.