Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting? The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labour in the Lord is not in vain. (1 Corinthians 15:55-58)

     Some of you know that while I was on vacation earlier this month, Lynn and Hannah and I spent a week in Virginia. I've been to Virginia before and have always loved it, and so when Lynn suggested it I leaped at the idea. We decided to do things differently this year, though. Our previous trips had been to Williamsburg and – briefly – Richmond. Those trips were in the B.H. Era (Before-Hannah) and we had to take her wishes into consideration, too, and Hannah wanted to go to the beach, and so we decided that we would stay in Virginia Beach this summer. I have to say that I liked Virginia Beach, but I have to confess that we didn't spend much time at what's called the Oceanfront (which is the main tourist beach) or on the Boardwalk. We made one stop there and agreed that it reminded us too much of Niagara Falls! But we were fortunate that on the first day we were there we discovered Sandbridge Beach. Sandbridge was a bit of a hike from our hotel, but it was nice. There were no hotels along the beach (in fact, there were no hotels at all in the Sandbridge area) so the beach wasn't crowded with tourists and tourist traps. It was just a beautiful sandy beach with nice waves that you could enjoy in relative peace with lots of elbow room. Lynn laid on the beach, Hannah mostly played at the water's edge or in the shallow waters after the waves had broken. I was more adventurous, walking out into deeper water, letting waves crash over my head. We had a great time. We went to Sandbridge on our last night in Virginia. The waves were heavier than they had been – which actually made it a more enjoyable experience. Then all of a sudden, as a particularly large wave crashed over me, I felt a very painful stinging sensation on my left shoulder. It wouldn't go away. I looked at my arm. I was going red from my shoulder to my elbow, my arm was both burning and itching and I was developing some reddish white welts. I had done enough reading in preparation for our trip to know what had happened – I had been stung by a jellyfish! I wasn't worried. You hear horror stories, but my reading had told me that as long as you had no unusual reactions to bee stings you probably wouldn't have an unusual reaction to a jellyfish sting. And the burning and itching and redness and welts were all part of the normal reaction to a jellyfish sting – so, no, I wasn't worried. But I was in pain! If you've ever been stung by a bee you'll know that a bee sting hurts. Having now been stung by both, I can tell you that if you multiply the pain of a bee sting by about 3 or 4 times you'll have some idea of what the pain from a jellyfish sting is like. Ouch! I took Tylenol back at the hotel but still didn't sleep well that night because the burning and itching really didn't let up until the next day. Jellyfish stings hurt – and they hurt for a while!

     Stings are interesting. It isn't really the actual sting that causes the problem – it's what happens right after the sting. It's the venom. Apparently, to put it in simple terms because I couldn't pronounce all the scientific words I read, when a jellyfish stings it releases millions of microscopic bubbles into your skin, which immediately start to swell and burst, releasing the venom – and they don't all burst at once, which is why the effects linger. Delightful little creatures God made! But it did make me think of this Scripture: “the sting of death is sin and the power of sin is the law.”

     Using my experience, I could paraphrase it this way: “the sting of the jellyfish is the bubbles and the power of the bubbles is the venom.” In the same way death stings, but what hurts is not death itself (because we know as Christians that death isn't the end) and it's not even really sin but what gives the sting its power is the law, because the law reveals sin and makes us aware of it. Now I won't argue that we shouldn't be aware of it, but I believe that the primary responsibility of a Christian is to live a life that seeks to show both love for God and love for those around us. That's how Jesus summed up the law. Love is the hallmark of Christian faith. It's what we're about. We love because God loves us; we forgive because God forgives us; we don't judge others because God by His grace has freed us from judgment; we don't wrap the millstone of rules around the necks of our neighbours because God has set us free by grace. Please understand: I don't want to diss the law and turn it into a bad thing, because the law isn't a bad thing -  except when we use it for the wrong purposes. The law causes the pain of a sting when we use it to take away the freedom God gives to God's people. This is a trap that the church has often fallen into over the centuries; and it's a trap that the church still repeatedly falls into in so many different ways. Almost from its very beginning, the church has been warped so that it begins to function as a moral agent, trying to control people's behaviour, rather than as a spiritual community trying to transform people's hearts. As a moral agent, the church stings because it proclaims judgment and punishment, but as a spiritual community, the church soothes because it creates relationships based on love and respect centred on the example of how Jesus Himself lived.

     Paul wrote in our short passage today “... thanks be to God. He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” The victory God gives us is the victory over the sting of death, which is sin revealed by the law. That doesn't mean that we should ignore the law or excise the Ten Commandments from our consciousness or just go out and live however we choose to live as if it doesn't matter, but it does mean that we should honour the law by applying it as Jesus applied it: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, and you shall love your neighbour as yourself.” The law is no longer a set of rules for us to follow; it's not a list of things we're not allowed to do. The law – as Jesus Himself understood it – is the means by which we enter into loving and faithful relationships with those around us – both God and others. The law now teaches us, but it doesn't control us. It can't, because we live in the light of God's grace, brought to us by Jesus. The law or the truth (that which God has revealed to us) is what sets us free. It doesn't enslave us behind a moral code that inhibits us from enjoying life, it liberates us to live in wholeness and faithfulness so that we're enabled to live an abundant life.

     Again in Paul's words, it's that freedom that allows us to stand firm and commit ourselves fully to the work of the Lord.  We're freed to do our best for God rather than being required to be perfect for God. That's a piece of liberating good news that a lot of people have a desperate need to hear because I know of a lot of people who have something in their past that they just can't let go of and that they just can't believe that God will let go of, so they live in a state of unforgiveness – not forgiving themselves and not believing that God forgives them -  and they're burdened by guilt for things that God's grace has already long taken care of, and you can't really be fully committed to the work of a God of grace if you haven't claimed the grace of God for yourself. Approaching the table to receive Holy Communion is one of the ways we let go of the past. We surrender ourselves and everything about our life or our past that hinders our relationship with God and we seize the new life that God offers – and we appear at the Table knowing that God – by divine grace – accepts us. That's called good news. Thanks be to God, indeed, for “He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”