The Fragrance of Messiah, Part 3

Greetings, friends and new listeners. Welcome to this program of the R. G. Hardy Ministries. I'm Sharon Notts, and I'm so happy you've joined us today because we know faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. Today's message is The Fragrance of Messiah. I know this title has a pleasing sound, but I assure you there is a soul-stirring, eye-opening alarm of the Holy Spirit contained in this anointed package.

As real Christians, we are both fragrant and foul-smelling because our gospel is a gospel of life and death, as you will understand in The Fragrance of Messiah. We've got to find a way that in the face of that kind of hatred, our human instinct is to rise up and give them back the same thing. But when we do, we've fallen into the snare of the enemy. We have let the enemy trick us. We've done exactly what he wants us to do. The Bible's not going to go away, so he's going to try to silence us or discredit us.

Amen? You know, you heard about the break-ins and all with the thief and all, and we had put out posters with his picture on it and all, and you heard about how they were able to nab him thirsty and arrest him. And you know, Friday night, Brother Lonnie stood up to say something about it, and I tell you, what he said really touched my heart because he said he was talking about the testimony about how that it wasn't just him or Duane or anybody else that was involved, but he took the spotlight off himself and put it on the church. He said it was because the church and the believers in Christ prayed. It was because of the prayers of the saints that this guy was caught. And I thought, now there, that's the right attitude.

That's the attitude. He took the spotlight right off of himself, and he began to share it with all of those who were praying that this man would be caught. He said it was because the saints prayed that he was caught. Amen? And then he went on to say that he's praying that this guy gets saved.

Amen. He didn't say, I hope he falls down, breaks his neck and goes to hell. He didn't say, I hope that somebody shoots him. He said, I hope that he shows up in my class at the city jail. I hope he turns up in my class so that I can share Jesus with him. Amen. And he quoted because Jesus said, we are to pray for our enemies.

Give honor where honor is due. What he said, and he was on the spur of the moment. He didn't know he was going to be called. What he said shows the attitude that we should have about all of these things, because after all that, even though he touched the house of God and he touched holy ground, that's true. He did do that, but he's still a soul that Jesus died for. And when you're on drugs and you are demon possessed, you don't have all that theological understanding. And if you've never been in church your whole life and you don't know anything about God, you do not have the fear of God on you. Now I know God forbid if someone that's been raised in church was to backslide and go out there and get on drugs and have to have their money to get their fix.

They have to, they got to find a way and they will steal out of their mother's pocket book. I dare say they would have enough fear of God on them. I don't think they would come and burglarize the church. I don't think, but you see these people that don't have any fear of God, no knowledge of God, they don't know any different and they are a soul that needs to be saved.

Amen. And so since he did this to four churches and really five because one time he got that little tiny church up there on Hollinsbury road. Since he did that to all these churches that we need to pray that it turns out so it's a punch in the devil's face.

It would really be up to black eyes that somehow this young man could be led to Christ and get delivered from crack cocaine and he wouldn't have to rob anybody. You see, we're to be the perfume of life to those that are turned over, to those that are reprobate, to those who do not want to come to the knowledge of the truth. We smell like a rotting corpse, but to those who were seeking, seeking truth, seeking God, and sometimes they don't even know what they're seeking for.

They're just seeking to them. We are the perfume and the fragrance of life. Turn back to second Corinthians where we were, but flip over to chapter four. These are some of my favorite verses in the whole Bible. Second Corinthians four chapter four at verse seven, but we have this treasure in earthen vessels that the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us. We are troubled on every side.

Oh yes, it's going to get worse yet not distressed. We are perplexed but not in despair. Oh, we are persecuted but not forsaken and sometimes we are even cast down but not destroyed. Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus. That means we suffer with him.

Amen. That the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body for we which live are always delivered unto death for Jesus sake that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh. So what here we see here is that we have a treasure in our earthen vessels. The flesh profits nothing, Jesus said, and Paul is likening us to those terracotta pots that you put flowers in in the spring and how many know they break easily. They're cheap. You can get them for a couple bucks, but when you go buy those some of those things that are made out of ceramics and all that fancy stuff they cost a lot of money. The point that Paul was making was the potter in his town in the city of Corinth and when I went to Greece we actually went to a potter's house in Corinth in Greece. He was one of the busiest people in the whole town in the whole city because people were always breaking their pots and dropping their pots.

Amen. They did everything in those earthen pots and they were cheap. You broke a couple pots it's not going to cost you a year's wage. It's just going to cost you a few pennies.

Go down to the potter's house and get some more. He was making the point. He was making a point not that we have no value that we're worthless, but making the point that it's as though we're just those cheap little vessels. However, once you put a treasure in it, once you put Estee Laudet in it, once you put some of those other things that they don't put those fancy high expensive colognes and perfumes in them little cheap things that no they put them in expensive things. Because once you put the treasure in the pot, the value now is not about the pot, it's about the treasure.

It's about the treasure. And he said we have this treasure, we have this anointing, we have this perfume in us. He said it's the excellent power of God.

Is that what it said? That the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us. Amen. When we have this anointing, this excellent power of God in us, we are able to withstand all this opposition that we face. Troubled on every side, that means north, south, east, west, wherever you turn, you think you got over this battle, boom, here's another one. Here comes the devil out of this door and you take care of him and boom another door opens and here comes another one. We are troubled on every hand but we're not in distress.

Because when you're in distress, you put out an SOS and you say and I'm going down, I'm sinking, it's all over. But we never have to say that. We're never going down. We're never sinking. Amen.

No, it doesn't. We've got the anointing on the inside. And no matter how the opposition against us may seem so incredibly huge, we have that anointing. That sustains us. So we're troubled on every side but we're not in distress. We're perplexed.

But we're not in despair. Come on, you don't understand everything. Don't try to understand everything. Don't try to have a theological answer for every question because sometimes you don't know.

And trying to manufacture something that sounds theologically impressive can just get you all balled up and off the wrong track and missing the whole point. Sometimes God shows you and sometimes he doesn't. Sometimes he shows you up the road when it really doesn't even matter anymore because it's all right now. You've been through the storm.

Amen. And he lets you know later what he was doing to men. But you're not always going to know why everything happens the way it does and when it does. Except to know this, that in this world you shall have tribulation, Jesus said in John 16, 33.

And that Peter said in 1 Peter 5, 7, and 8, you have an adversary, the devil, Diablos, the enemy, the slanderer, the accuser of the brethren who goes about seeking whom he may devour. So sometimes you are perplexed, but you're not in despair because when you're in despair, it means you've given up. You're hopeless.

A Christian is never, ever, ever hopeless. You can be so discouraged. You can be depressed. You can be oppressed.

Does God want you to have any of these things? No, but it happens sometimes. Sometimes things come along in life that punch you in the gut. And you in that season can be so down, but you are never, ever hopeless.

You're never hopeless. In the midst of the worst time of your life, inside, deep down, your spirit knows, hope thou in God. Hope thou in God. Oh my soul, why are you cast down?

Why are you so disquieted and within me? Hope thou in God. A Christian always has hope. Persecuted, hunted down.

We're getting it everywhere you turn. It's only going to get intensified, but we're not forsaken because Jesus said, if you suffer with me, you're going to reign with me. And the one scripture says, I can't remember where it is right now, but Paul wrote that we actually fill up the sufferings of Christ. Fill up the sufferings of Christ. All that Jesus went through, all that he suffered, but we got to add our portion to it. We've got to suffer with him.

Amen. Arm yourself with these, with these thoughts. Arm yourself with your, with the mind that you're going to suffer with Christ, Peter said. And Paul said, all they that live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution, but we're not forsaken because he said, I will never leave you and I will never forsake you. We're cast down and that literally means to be knocked down. Now some people will say, well, you'll never get knocked down, but that's not what this, that's not what this verse says.

Sometimes you get a blow. You know, somebody can just come up and give you a blow in the shin and knock you down, give you a blow in the kneecap and knock you down. It's not going to kill you. You're not going to die.

Your knee may hurt and you may hobble around, but you're not going to die. Sometimes we're knocked down, but we are never destroyed because we're bearing in our body and we're taking on our selves the sufferings of Christ. But we can do it because we have the excellent power. We have the anointing in our earth and vessels. And through all of that, we put out such a sweet fragrance of the spirit of God and the love of God that in the midst of all the maligners and haters and back fighters and all those people that call us monsters and all the things they say about us in the midst of all that, here is a seeker. Here is a seeker. Here's a seeker of truth.

Here's someone that their soul is longing for something. And you are so filled with the love of Christ and the wisdom of God. You open your mouth with wisdom on your tongue is the law of kindness. Proverbs 31, 26, Proverbs 18, 21, life and death are in the power of your tongue and they that love it will eat the fruit thereof. You know who to speak what to and how to speak it. Proverbs 15, one through three, it says, how good is a word spoken in due season?

And the Messiah said in Isaiah 50, he said that the Lord is God has given me the tongue of the learned that I may know how to speak a word in due season to him that is weary. The scripture says it's like apples of gold and pictures of silver. The scripture says it's like nails and golds fastened by a master craftsman. I'm talking about an expert carpenter who can build beautiful furniture and he knows where to put the nails so you don't see them and the screws so you don't see them. So all you see is the beauty of the work. But yet when you open the door, it doesn't all fall apart.

It's still strong, but it's beautified. Amen. That's what, how God's word is in the lips of someone who's filled with his wisdom. The Bible says heaviness in the heart of a man will make it stoop, but we can speak a good word to make it glad. And that's what we need the Holy Spirit to do in us and through us. Amen. So that people are drawn to us because we smell so nice.

We smell so good. Now, you know, maybe this is more of the ladies than the men. I don't know.

Probably. But when we have our times, we shake hands and we hug one another. And if you hug someone and they really smell nice, you linger just an extra second.

You do. You just hug them a little, you know, just a second or two extra. And if you're like me, you'll say, you smell good. What are you wearing?

I want to know what you're wearing because I want to get it so I can smell good too. Amen. You just want to linger there a little bit. And that's the idea that we're aiming for in the spirit. We want the sweetness of Christ to just emanate from us. So they want to linger. They want to linger around you a little bit.

They want to stay a moment and kind of ask you a question or two. They want to be around you. They don't even perhaps know why, but they're picking up your spiritual scent. They're picking up the fragrance of Christ.

Amen. And that anointing is flowing out of you. Some of my favorite verses that speak of the anointing, I'll quote them 1 John 2.20 and 2.27. But you have an unction from the Holy One and you know all things, but the anointing which you have received of Him abides in you, teaching you all things. Now the word unction in verse 20 and the word anointing in verse 27 are the same Greek word, kryzma, kryzma.

And you know what it means? The literal meaning means to smear on. Now we are used to spraying. We're used to spraying on our cologne. And sometimes men put it on their hands and do this sort of thing.

But the Greek word means now you can buy perfume in a little balm or a little salve, in a little thing like that, real perfume. And that's very potent. So you only need a little dab, a little dab. Well, do you?

You take the little dab and you put it right here on your wrists behind your ears. You put it there. You say, why? I don't know that it's a good reason for it, I'm sure. Somehow or another it must last longer or go out more.

I don't know. But that's what you're supposed to do. Amen. And so you put that little dab there. And so that's what the word kryzma means. It's the kind that you smear on. And it literally refers back to the Old Testament when the priests were anointed for office. And they had to make up, you can look this up on your own, they had to make this anointing oil. It had cassia in it and cinnamon in it and myrrh in it and other things in it. And it was a special recipe. In fact, it was forbidden for anyone other than a priest to wear it. They weren't allowed to give the recipe out on Facebook so everybody could make their own and show up on the Sabbath with it on. No, only the priest could wear it. Only the priest could wear it.

But guess what? Peter said, you are a chosen generation. You are a royal priesthood. You are a peculiar people and that word peculiar means you're a treasure.

You are a treasure. Yeah, the world thinks we're peculiar in the odd, crazy way. God thinks we're peculiar and that we're a treasure unto him, that we should go forth and show forth the virtues of Jesus Christ. So this unction that we received from the Holy One, this anointing that we received from the Holy One is like that anointing oil that is rubbed in that was put on the priest.

So in closing, here's the thing. The question that we have got to ask ourselves today is this, knowing that this gospel is ordained for some to life and to others to death. The gospel that we preach, the gospel that we show that we live before some is going to be the verdict of death. To others, it's going to be the gift of eternal life, the same gospel. We don't have two gospels, okay? We're not talking about two gospels. One gospel, two results. One gospel, two different groups of people. One gospel to one, they're going to be drawn to the sweetness, the fragrance of Jesus Christ. And even when they find out that they got to come out of the world and get rid of all their sin and all of that stuff, it doesn't even faze them. They are so in love with Jesus and they themselves then become filled with the love of Christ. But to the others, the same gospel, they gnash against it with their teeth. They ridicule it. They seek to silence it.

And if they do not have a radical change, and as long as the person's walking around and breathing, there's always an opportunity to have a radical change. Amen. Hey, God's in charge of that. It is our business to preach the gospel to whosoever will. And we don't get to say, okay, you're good and you're in and I don't like you, so you're out.

That's not how it works. We just carry the fragrance of Christ. And you know, sometimes I'm sure some of you that go administer at the jail or out on the streets, and I'm using a natural illustration here, and you get around a homeless person that hasn't had a shower in 10 weeks and they have body odor that's quite repulsive. And maybe they're also a smoker. They smell like a year old nicotine all over them. Maybe they smell like alcohol. I mean, you almost want to puke to get close to them.

And it's hard because, you know, you're just like want to get away from them. But yet you look in that face and you see a face of someone that the devil has just beat to pieces. And the compassion of Jesus Christ comes out of you.

It just comes out of you. I remember this a few years ago. This was several years ago that there was a backslider that came back to church. And this boy used to sing on the choir.

He was real active with the youth and I loved him and I was very close to him. But he backslid. When he backslid he went into homosexuality. And when he went into homosexuality then he went into alcoholism because I guess he was trying to deal with what was going on with him.

He eventually died of AIDS. But he came to church after being away for years and years and years. Someone convinced him to come.

I think it was me, but I'm not sure. So other people talked to him. But every time he would get really, really, really down he would call me.

It might be once a year. I wouldn't hear from him two years. But he would eventually call me because I never, ever beat him up. I always tried to get him back to God.

So one night he showed up in church. He reeked. He smelled so bad. It's just like everybody was, there was a whole empty area around him because he smelled so bad.

And this boy used to dress nice and was always clean and well-groomed and he really smelled bad. And even I was like, ugh, you know, because my stomach is real weird. I can just like gag easy. And I sure didn't want to gag around him.

But I can gag real easy when I have to clean up something, certain things, you know. So anyway, everybody was kind of like trying to be friendly but not get too close. And you know your wife Juanita, she saw him. She walked up to him. She grabbed that boy. She pulled him to her breast. She loved on him.

And I stood there convicted by the Holy Spirit. I watched as Juanita just grabbed him because she knew him and she loved him. And you know, I'm sure she had to smell him too.

But she just loved on him and hugged him. And that really said something to me. And God dealt with my heart about that.

And you know, after that I had to go and hug him too. Amen. And I'm giving you that natural illustration to show you it's the same way in the Spirit.

Sometimes people just turn you off, especially certain sins get under your skin and just turns you off. But you've got to be careful. You've got to show the love of Christ. You've got to let that anointing flow out of you because this Gospel will bring life or it will bring death.

There's no middle road. The anointing on your life and the fragrance of Messiah will bring the truth to those who want to know the truth. God knows the ones who want to know the truth. He knows the ones that are ready to get saved. Amen. And he's going to let them cross your pathway and you need to be ready because we all got to do our job.

No one can reach everybody. There's people you can reach and nobody else in the church can reach on your job, in your family, wherever it may be to show the love of Christ. Amen. So in closing this morning as we go into the new year, we need to ask the Lord to give us the sweet fragrance of Christ.

Would you stand on your feet? Amen. Hallelujah. Let us really prepare our hearts. Get in the scriptures. I would advise you to read the Gospels of Christ over and over. You want to know how to be an expert soul winner? Just read the Gospels and see how Jesus dealt with people and you'll learn how to deal with people too. Amen.

Because honey, when it was time to deal with the hypocrites, he called them snakes. He called them all kinds of things, but when he dealt with the sinner, even the worst of the worst, amen, that they said she should be stoned and he reached out in love and because of that, he won their soul. Do you want to be a soul winner? I want to be a soul winner. I love church people. I love every one of you.

I love the saints. I love the believers, but I want to win the sinner. Amen. Let's lift our hands to the Lord. Lord, we thank you this morning for your word that can be the water to cleanse us and for the anointing of your Holy Spirit that can inspire us, can illuminate us, enlighten us to the truth, and then can equip us with what we need to be excellent, compassionate soul winners for Christ. I pray in this new year, Lord, that we will see new souls and new lambs come into Faith Tabernacle or wherever you may send them. Lord, that through this ministry, through Faith Tabernacle members, through the radio ministry, through the internet ministry, through Faith's Acting Magazine Ministry, through the jail and prison ministries, through the street meeting ministries and the various classes and all of the outreaches and the fishes and loaves pantry ministry, that we will reach souls for Jesus. I pray, Lord, that you will just lead us in your word and give us, Lord, everything that we need and where we lack, show us our lack, where we need a little more finesse, show us, Lord. If we need more boldness, show us, Lord.

Teach us Holy Spirit. Let a new anointing and unction come upon us and rise up within us that we may be true soul winners, that we will stand with a spiritual backbone. We'll not apologize for the Gospel, for we're not ashamed of the Gospel, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believes. And he that believeth not shall be damned, but he that believeth shall receive eternal life through the free gift of Jesus Christ. We claim it, Lord, for those souls that you're going to let us come in contact with. In Jesus' name we pray and let the church say, amen.

God bless you. And I trust you are being supernaturally stirred by our message, the fragrance of Messiah. I know for myself it was a true eye-opener when I realized that not only does the Gospel of Christ that we live and preach have the power of life to those who accept it and death to those who reject it, but we as Christians are both fragrant and foul-smelling.

This is not a contradiction in terms. Apostle Paul said that we are both. To those who are seeking truth, we are as a beautiful fragrance that draws them to Christ. But to those who harden their hearts to the message of the Gospel, we are as the stench of death.

We smell like a rotting corpse. They don't want to be in our presence because we remind them of their sin and their damnation. Make no mistake, Jesus Christ will have an eternal impact on everyone who comes into contact with the Gospel. Those who reject him will seek to silence his message. And this means solacing us, his messengers.

They are looking for any fault to discredit us. And this is why we must respond by speaking the truth in love. Now this does not mean to excuse sin. God said, I am God and I change not. What he said is sin and his word is still sin today. God hates the sin, but he loves sinners and so should we. We are those who are real seekers of truth and to them we are the sweet perfume of life because we have the treasure of the anointing in our earthen vessels.

So knowing this Gospel is unto death or life, what manner of Christians should we be? You may order The Fragrance of Messiah on CD for a love gift of $10 or more. Request offer SK 167. Mail to Archie Hardy Ministries P.O. Box 1744 Baltimore, Maryland 21203 or order online at rgharty.org. That's rgharty.org. Again, send a minimum love gift of $10 to P.O. Box 1744 Baltimore, Maryland 21203. Request offer SK 167 for The Fragrance of Messiah. Until next time, this is Sharon Notts saying, maranatha.