Death's Painful Sting

Death can often come suddenly. I recently attended a funeral for my close friend’s mother; it was a somber day as we remembered and buried a woman who was only in her 50s when she died. Tragically, it had seemed that an initial round of chemotherapy several years ago had worked only to find out a year later that the cancer had come back viciously and within two months this wonderful woman was dead.

Death can often be unsettling. That weekend a man was asking me how my week had gone, and I mentioned I had gone to a funeral. He responded, “It wasn’t cancer was it?” When I informed him it was cancer – brain cancer, he was visibly shaken and angry. He described how several of his relatives had died of cancer and how much he hated it. He relayed how he wanted to go out in a car accident, in a blaze of glory.

Each human being must wrestle with the reality of death. It jars us out of the grind and comforts of life and causes us to assess. As I was praying this morning, I was reflecting on these events, and I was struck by my own response to the reality of death. I can honestly say I don’t fear death. Death at times seems sudden, yet it does not unsettle me.

In this world, our bondage to sin brings a fear of death. As the Apostle Paul said, “The sting of death is sin.” (I Cor. 15:56) To be born again is to be freed from the power of sin and the fear of death. I know I have been freed from sin through faith in Jesus’ death and resurrection. Thus, I can say with Paul, “O, death where is your victory? O, death where is your sting?” (I Cor. 15:55)

Some will say like Clint Eastwood does in Gran Torino that Christianity just gives old ladies a hand to hold and a false security as they drift from this world. This idea is not my experience.

It is the overwhelming sense of God’s presence I in my life, the power of the word of God to change my life as I have followed it, and the testimony of people healed as I have prayed for them in the name of Jesus that remind me that I have indeed been born again. It is these marks of newness of life that grant weight to my hope in the resurrection of the dead, a full freedom from the pain of this world, and the joy of seeing Jesus in eternity.

Do you have that confidence? You can.