The Sting of Death

 

One of my favorite lines from Scripture comes from I Corinthians 15:55, which says, “O Death, where is your victory? O Death, where is your sting?” Paul’s question to death personified was actually borrowed from the prophet Hosea; in the thirteenth chapter of his letter, Hosea asks four questions intended to serve as a call for judgment on God’s wayward people. 

 

Hosea was inviting death to come as punishment, but Paul forever changed the meaning of Hosea’s prophecy. Hosea summoned death, but Paul sneered at it. Hosea asked, “Come over here Death, where is your sting?” Paul asked, “Is that all you’ve got Death? Where is your sting?” 

 

When I think about a sting, I can’t help but think about a wasp or bee. Maybe its because I was stung so frequently as a child, or maybe because I am highly allergic to them, but at the mention of a sting I instantly hear buzzing in my ears. As a child there was nothing scarier than getting stung. I lived in fear of the stinger. But now that I am older I realize the sting is the end of the wasp. Once he stings me, he can never sting again. It may hurt for a minute, but I’ll live to see the other side (provided I take my medicine, of course). If a wasp stings me today, I can taunt that wasp by asking, “Where is your sting?” Its stinger is forever dislodged, and that wasp has done the worst it can do. 

 

Death is like that. I am not trying to minimize the sting of death because my family has taken its best shot recently. Death is hard on us because we miss our loved ones, but Paul helps us see to the other side of death. How was Paul able to transform Hosea’s summons into a sneer? The answer is found in the work of Jesus and the gift of salvation. In the next two verses the apostle wrote: “The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” 

 

This comes from Paul’s longest treatise on the resurrection of Jesus, and because of His resurrection, there will be one for us as well. Because Jesus walked out of the tomb, we will rise from ours. These bodies which are sown as perishable will rise as ones imperishable. Even now, our loved ones who have passed on are alive and well in the presence of the Lord, celebrating this victory and laughing in the face of death. Death stings us because we miss those who have departed, but if they were saved, death did them a favor. 

 

For those who are alive and well in the presence of Jesus, they can join Paul in taunting Death, asking, “Is that all you’ve got?” As a child I feared death as much as I feared a bee sting, but as a child of God I am no longer afraid of either. I know their sting is temporary, and Death has been swallowed up in Victory. Our weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes with the morning. When our time on earth is up, Death will have done all it can ever do to us, and we will be the ones found victorious.