The Sixth Sunday of Easter (NTA)

1 Corinthians 15:50-58

⁵⁰ I tell you this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. ⁵¹ Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, ⁵² in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. ⁵³ For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. ⁵⁴ When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written:

       “Death is swallowed up in victory.”

⁵⁵    “O death, where is your victory?

O death, where is your sting?”

⁵⁶ The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. ⁵⁷ But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

⁵⁸ Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.

Shouldn't this text be an antinomian's chief text. After asking where is your sting to death, you are told the sting of death is sin. So if death has no sting, then there is no sin. And if there is no sin, sin already has no power. The power of sin is the law, so therefore there must be no Law, because death doesn't have sting. Jesus Christ has claimed victory not over death (as St Paul is actually saying) but Jesus Christ has claimed victory over the Law.

Therefore, eat drink and be merry, the Law no longer has any place in your life. You are no free to be whatever your heart desires. It no longer matters how God designed you, nor how God has called you. It barely even matters that Christ died for your sins and rose again because death has no more sting and there is no more Law.

But St Paul is talking about the resurrection. Not today, hopefully tomorrow, when Christ returns. He will judge the living and the dead. It is then when the sting of eternal death and complete separation from God, will shame and condemn some, while others will no longer have to fear death, because they will no longer sin. It is not because of the removal of the Law. But because of the removal of sin. You are forgiven.