February 8

O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? - 1 Corinthians 15:55.

THE apostle here combines these two enemies together, because it is hardly possible to treat them separately. We find this figure employed even in the Jewish Scriptures. There Isaiah says, “He shall swallow up death in victory.” And thus God says by Hosea, “I will ransom them from the power of the grave, I will redeem them from death; O death, I will be thy plagues: O grave, I will be thy destruction, repentance shall be hid from mine eyes.” Thus the apostle says, “He hath brought life and immortality to light by the gospel.” “Thanks be to God, who giveth us the victory, through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Now, as to this victory over death, we may remark that he certainly conquers death who is not and cannot be injured by it, and to whom it is therefore expressly harmless. This is the case with every Christian. The apostle tells the believing Corinthians that death was stingless with regard to them; that it stung once, and a dreadful sting it was; that it stung our Surety, who took our place for us; but, though it stung him, it left its sting in him, so that there was none for the Christian. The sting of death Was sin; he bore our sin in his own body on the tree, and put away sin by the sacrifice of himself; and then, as Dr. Watts says,-

“If sin be pardon’d, I’m secure;

Death has no sting beside:

Thy law gives sin its damning power,

But Christ my ransom died.”

Yes, and that is not all: he who conquers death will be improved by it; he rises with a much better body than he lay down; the body will not be a burden-it will not be a clog-it will not require as now the greater part of our time in providing for its support-it will want no such provision-it will never want a surgeon’s knife, or a physician’s medicine, or the milliner’s ingenuity, or a machine to drag the dulness hither and thither. Oh, what a change! so that the spirit itself, our spiritual body, will be an advantage to the soul. It will be reunited with the immaterial universe-from which it was severed before for want of a suitable organization-reunited to the immortal universe. Oh, what a world will that be which it will enter!-what sounds will charm it!-what fruits will it taste!-what abundance will be there! The model of the Christian’s future body is that body which shone above the brightness of the sun at noonday, when it appeared on Mount Tabor-that body in which the Saviour will judge the world in righteousness-that body which he will wear forever, and through which we shall hold our communion with him. Once more. He has conquered death who rises above the apprehension of it, and realizes all this joy and all this blessedness even now.

The first Christian could say, with the apostle, “We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body and present with the Lord.” Verily, this looks like overcoming. “Thanks be unto God, who giveth us the victory, through our Lord Jesus Christ;”-the victory over death and the grave.