Smell Like Christmas

     One of the things I love about Christmas is all the wonderful smells. Cookies baking, spiced cider, peppermint candies, and evergreen trees are some of my favorites. When we moved to Arizona from Oregon, we quit buying "real" Christmas trees because they were expensive and dried up too quickly.
     But my stepson posted on Facebook the other day that he helped a friend remove an evergreen tree from his yard in Oregon. Afterwards the two went out to eat. When the waitress arrived to take their order she exclaimed, "You two smell like Christmas!" (Their smell came from the pitch, bark and branches rubbing against them when they removed the tree.) I don't think there is a better compliment!
     As Christians though we can actually "smell like Christmas" daily by "rubbing up against Christ" through prayer, reading our Bibles and spending quiet time away from the world, "listening" to the guidance of the Holy Spirit for our lives. Christ is the reason we celebrate Christmas and His fragrance is even better than all the smells of Christmas combined.

A large evergreen in the center of the photo and hundreds on the mountains to the left 

along the Rogue River in Oregon.

^{2 Corinthians 2:15} For we are to God the pleasing aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing.