Cucumbers, onions, peppers, garlic, vinegar, sugar and spices. Yep! I needed them all as I pulled out my favorite pickle recipe. Each ingredient by itself isn’t very pleasant; one can even bring tears to your eyes as you prepare them. After icing the veggies for several hours, I then had to drain them, add all the other ingredients and bring to a boil. That’s when the aroma took over. Mmmmm! After a few weeks in the canning jars, they will be ready to enjoy.
God uses a lot of different “ingredients” in our lives to make us what He wants us to be. Sometimes He even allows us to go through some pretty icy conditions or boiling hot turmoil; but all for a purpose. He’s trying to develop in us an “aroma” that no one can resist–an “aroma of the Lord Jesus Christ.”
“And we know that all things work together for good, to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose: For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son…” Rom. 8:28,29
So, let’s ask ourselves: “What is my aroma like? Am I letting “all things” in my life to conform me to the image of Jesus?”