The Scent Trail Continues

“One generation shall commend your works to another, and shall declare your mighty acts.”
Psalm 145:4

Yesterday I said goodbye to my dad.

Heather and I drove to Kentucky to see him one more time. To sit with him. To tell him we loved him. And ultimately, to be there as he passed from this life to the next.

Then we drove home in time for our daughter Ruby’s 18th birthday party.

A goodbye and a birthday.

One generation leaving.

Another stepping forward.

It is difficult to explain what that does to your heart in the span of a single day.

But somewhere between those two rooms, I found myself thinking about purpose.

And fragrance.

And the way a life can continue filling rooms long after the person has left them.

The last room

There was something beautiful about Dad’s room.

My sister had decorated it with the prettiest little lights. There were pictures and objects around him that told pieces of his story.

Vietnam.

Haiti.

Family.

Ministry.

He had been a Vietnam veteran, and years later he would give so much of his life to missionary work in Haiti.

Those two places were connected in ways most people would never know.

It was an orphanage he encountered in Vietnam that helped shape something in his heart that eventually found expression in years of serving children and families in Haiti.

Looking around that room, you could almost trace the path.

And then there was the smell.

Some kind of gourmand air freshener. Warm, sweet, almost chocolate.

For somebody who spends as much time thinking about fragrance as I do, of course I noticed it.

But it did more than smell good.

It made the room feel inviting.

Warm.

Cared for.

My sister had made a place surrounded by death somehow feel full of life.

And the staff had done something similar.

Dad had not been there very long, but you could tell they cared about him.

They were gentle.

Kind.

Present.

It mattered to me that, at the end of his life, he was in a room where people had learned to love him.

Did I fulfill my purpose?

My dad wondered whether he had fulfilled his purpose in this life.

I imagine a lot of us will ask some version of that question eventually.

Did I do what I was supposed to do?

Did I use the years God gave me well?

Did my life matter?

Did I leave anything behind?

Those are heavy questions.

And on the drive home, I kept thinking about his.

Then another thought came:

Maybe his purposes are still unfolding.

Maybe we misunderstand purpose when we think it has to be completely visible within the boundaries of our own lifetime.

We see the years we were given.

God sees generations.

We see the seed.

God sees what grows from it.

We see the people we directly touched.

God sees every person eventually touched by them.

That changes the question.

Maybe faithfulness is not always something we get to measure before we leave.

One generation to another

Psalm 145 says:

“One generation shall commend your works to another...”

I read that differently today.

One generation receives something and carries it forward.

Faith.

Stories.

Convictions.

Sacrifice.

A way of seeing people.

A willingness to go when God says go.

Dad carried something.

And then he handed pieces of it to us.

My siblings and I have each lived different lives, but his fingerprints are there.

Ministry became normal to us.

Service became normal.

Haiti became part of our family vocabulary and eventually part of my own calling.

And now there is another generation watching us.

That became impossible to miss yesterday.

Because after leaving the room where my father had just finished his earthly life, I came home to celebrate Ruby turning eighteen.

Eighteen.

A whole life in front of her.

And suddenly Psalm 145 was not theoretical.

It was my day.

One generation.

Then another.

Then another.

The scent trail continues

That is one of the things I love about fragrance.

You can leave the room and your fragrance stays behind.

Sometimes only for a moment.

Sometimes much longer.

The person is gone.

The evidence of their presence remains.

Maybe a faithful life works something like that.

Hebrews says something remarkable about Abel:

“And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks.”
Hebrews 11:4

Though he died, he still speaks.

That may be one of the clearest descriptions of legacy in Scripture.

A faithful life keeps talking.

It speaks through what was taught.

Through what was modeled.

Through sacrifices people remember.

Through stories children tell their children.

Through decisions someone else makes because they once watched you make yours.

Through ministries that exist because somebody first said yes.

Through people you may never meet.

The person leaves the room.

The fragrance remains.

And suddenly Dad’s question, “Did I fulfill my purpose?”, feels different to me.

Because I do not think all of his purpose can be measured yet.

Some of it is still walking around.

Some of it has his last name.

Some of it lives in Haiti.

Some of it is sitting in churches and ministries and homes.

Some of it is in grandchildren who may not yet realize what they have inherited.

Some of it has not happened yet.

His purposes are still unfolding.

What are we leaving in the room?

Grief has a way of making you look backward.

Yesterday certainly did that for me.

But strangely, it also made me look forward.

Because I came home to an 18-year-old daughter.

And someday, Lord willing, Ruby will tell stories about us.

Her children may carry things Heather and I cannot currently see.

Our faithfulness today may become part of somebody else’s courage tomorrow.

That makes the ordinary things feel less ordinary.

How we love.

How we serve.

How we talk about God.

How we treat people when nobody is impressed.

Whether we answer when God calls.

Whether our children see a faith worth carrying.

We may never know the reach of those choices.

And perhaps that is okay.

We were never asked to control the harvest.

We were asked to be faithful with the seed.

Yesterday

Yesterday I sat in a room filled with little lights, memories of Vietnam and Haiti, family photographs, and the faint smell of something sweet.

I talked fragrance with my brother.

I spent time with siblings I do not get to see enough.

I told my dad I loved him.

And I tried to soak in the final moments.

Then I came home.

There were different lights.

Birthday lights.

There was laughter.

There was an 18-year-old daughter surrounded by people who love her.

And somewhere between those two rooms, I think God gave me a picture I needed.

One generation goes.

Another comes behind it.

And the faithfulness of one can become part of the fragrance carried by the next.

Dad hoped he fulfilled his purpose.

I hope he knew that he did.

But I also wish I could tell him this:

Dad, I do not think God is finished using it yet.

The scent trail continues.

Through your children.

Through your grandchildren.

Through every person who learned something about serving because they watched you serve.

Through every life touched by an act of obedience whose final chapter you never got to see.

Maybe that is one of the gifts of a faithful life.

You do not have to remain in the room for the fragrance to remain.

Your life leaves a scent trail.

And sometimes, by the grace of God, that trail continues through generations.

Be fragrant.