Today on my way home, I was sleepy, so I had the Willum drive us home. I sat in the middle and used him as a pillow. (He's a sweetie and doesn't mind). When I was laying on him, I could smell him.
Here's the thing about Willum..
He smells AMAZING. Absolutely amazing. All the time.
He's the only guy I know whom I routinely sniff. He just smells so good and wonderful that I can't help it. One morning, he got in my car, and the whole truck was filled with the smell of the Willum instantaneously. It was very possibly one of the best drives to school in my whole life.
Anyhoo, so I was using Willum as a pillow and I sniffed him. He smelled like Willum.. with a little bit of school tainted in it. He laughed at me for sniffing at him. A few seconds later, he caught me staring at him, and just asked, "What are you thinking?"
So I very casually (as if it's a completely normal and sane question..) asked "Will. What do you think God smells like?" He grinned, and said "He smells like the rain.. ya know.. right after it's done and the sun is starting to come out."
The best smelling boy in the whole world. Forreal.
So, I started asking people what they thought God smelled like, and the answers go something like this: incense, rain, lilacs and butterscotch, a meadow the clouds and chocolate milk rolled into one, bacon, peaches, deodorant, creation, outside, and raw carrots mixed with cacti and ammonia.
My parents said "Nothing, He isn't human and therefore doesn't have scent glands" (typical Dad..) and "It varies from person to person."
Now: A short lesson in the science of sniffin' stuff. (Most of which was taken from HERE.)
Okay your smell is what is known as a chemical sense, meaning that it is triggered by chemicals in the air. The scent receptors (known as olfactory bulbs) in your nose go straight to a part of your body known as the limbic system. Your limbic system is what produces the reactions that you can't control. For instance, if you smelled your little brother's fart and you crinkled your nose because it's gross. It also helps control the endocrine system (i.e. making you sweat or releasing adrenaline to make your heart race). It has little to do with conscious thought.
Olfactory bulbs have the ability to trace scents (think bloodhounds), and every person has their own distinct scent.
Your sense of smell is 10,000 times more sensitive than your eyesight. It has strong ties to memory, and it's retention rate after one year is 65%, compared to eyesight, which drops to 50% after 3 months.
After learning all of these little tidbits, I really began to wonder about the scent of God. If you read yesterday's blog post, I quoted Exodus 33:20, which is when God tells Moses that he would DIE if he saw God. Now, if our bodies are 10,000 times more sensitive to odors, just imagine what the pure, concentrated scent of God would be like. (At this point, I think my brain blew out my ears, seriously)
Think back to the limbic system, and how it is outside the control of thought or will. It makes me wonder if (and I'm not saying this is true, just a thought) when we are exposed to the pure scent of God, "every knee will bow and every tongue will confess." If you look at the gospel, when Jesus comes in contact with people who are possessed by demons, you often (not sure if this happens every time.. didn't check) see the demons falling at the feet of Jesus and worshiping. I wonder if that was an automated reaction to being exposed to the scent of God, even when masked by human flesh.
Scent.. as you are already aware.. rubs off on people. You can catch the scent of something and carry it with you. You also probably know that scents can mix. Let's carry this back over to God's scent. What if we, Christians, are supposed to be "carriers" of God's scent.. so that others can trace it back to God? What if we have, either unconsciously or consciously, have mixed God's scent with something that just frankly STINKS? What if the smell of God has been so tainted by us, that when people get that whiff of Him, it brings up feelings of pain and hurt?
So, what do I think God smells like? I think He smells like fresh creation. I think you can smell Him when I crucify my own flesh. I think He smells like trees of kindness and gentleness and joy and self-control (and all those others). I think He smells like a vineyard, ready to be harvested. I think He smells like an upside-down kingdom. I think He smells like soaked fleece on dry ground. I think He smells like a dove's twig, promising life. I think He smells like a ram, saving the life of a child.
I sniff people all the time especially Amber. I love the way that about half way through scent became more of a metaphor than literal.
ReplyDeleteSo, I never have thought of that before. Really interesting. I like Will's answer about the rain, becuase to me it is the purest sent, but thats just my opinion. :)
ReplyDeleteOk, so...I don't know how common this story is, if it was just a Mormon thing, or if people tell it a lot, but when I was way younger, I was told a story about a little girl. She was born super premature, she was really weak and sick and underweight, and for a long time after she was born, she was in an incubator and her parents couldn't hold her or touch her. She made it through, though, and one day when she was a little older (like five ish? The story was told to me a long time ago), it was raining, and she asked her parents what that smell was. They, of course, told her it was the rain, but she just kept saying that wasn't it, so finally they asked her what she thought it was, and she said that it was the way God had smelled when he held her when she was a baby and no one else could. Totally probably not a real story, I wouldn't be surprised if it was one of those stories that Mormons just pass around because they like to have stories to pass around, but I don't care. I like it.
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