in chapter 15, and we're towards the end of, or actually in the end section of that chapter. So I'd encourage you to have your Bibles open for that. Before we come to God's Word, I'd like us to join together in prayer and ask the Lord's blessing upon His Word. Heavenly Father, we thank you that we are together. We thank you that we have your Word in front of us. Lord God, we want to praise you, we want to worship you, we want to do that as we listen to the sermon, as we listen to your word. Help us, pour out your spirit upon us, may you speak to us and be with us in this time. Almighty God, I ask that you would help me and enable me to open these scriptures and to explain these scriptures as you would have them explained, as you would have us to hear them. May your Holy Spirit help me and enable me to do that, because my wisdom and my thoughts is not what matters here. What matters is what you are saying to us through your words. So may we hear that. May you enable me to communicate that. And as we hear your word, may you speak into our hearts and our lives through the Holy Spirit. And may we not just hear these things, but may we be blessed by them. May they meet us at our point of need. And may it be to your glory we pray, in Jesus' name. Amen. Thank you, Ben. That was very providential, Ben, because that reminded me that the notice that I didn't say. Those of you that weren't around for the last couple of seminars when Conrad Menwe spoke on sexual purity, we were giving away the book that he wrote on sexual purity. And I very much recommend that any of you that didn't get that this time or a previous time gets that. The ushers will have it on the way out. It is free to everyone who's going to read it. And if you're not going to read it, you should. So it's free to everybody who's going to read it. There's a few copies of that left, and I'd encourage those that haven't had it to take it. There will be a copy in the diary. If you prefer a soft copy of that, then if you let Thank God know about that, and he will get a soft copy of that to you. Please don't take that soft copy and then make it your thesis and plagiarize it. That's not what it's there for. But please do take that soft copy or that hard copy and read it and be blessed by it. So we're in 1 Corinthians. We've been going through this as a series. We're in chapter 15. And chapter 15 is all about resurrection. That's what Paul's been teaching on. But as we enter this last section, I was thinking there's this word mystery comes up in this last section. And it seems as though we all like a good mystery, a good thriller. And it's estimated that the thriller, the drama, the mystery film genre is worth 20 to 30 billion US dollars annually. So I'm guessing that you guys here like a good mystery. We're entertained by a mystery. The world is full of mysteries. Have you ever heard of the Bermuda Triangle? Things just apparently disappear. I could have told you about my sock drawer. My sock drawer is a mystery because things just disappear in that as well. What about the curse of Tutankhamun? Apparently it's a mystery. If Pastor Andrew is here, he'd be getting very excited. This one, we've got some pictures if you'd like here, if we can go through. I hope I have. We've got the mystery of the Loch Ness Monster. The Loch Ness Monster is this thing here. It's seen every now and again in Scotland, in the Loch Ness, funnily enough. You've possibly heard of the Yeti. And these things are a mystery. We don't actually know what they are. It could be a big man with big boots. It could be a lost Scotsman wearing a funny snorkel. We don't know what they are. Maybe you've heard of Stonehenge, this mythical pile of stones in the UK. Or in Africa, you've got the great pyramids of Giza. These are mysteries. And they're things that we are fascinated by. Well, how about this one, this mystery here, this mystery that, well, Can anyone work that one out? I've got some nodding heads here. Do you know what this one is? Yes? Sorry? It's Fermat's Last Theorem. And it took 350 years to solve. So all of the nodding there that you know it, I guess you know it because you found the answer on Uncle Google. But if you're a real genius and you worked out yourself while you're sleeping or on your study one night, then that's amazing. But it was a mystery for 350 years, but it has an answer. And this is the thing with mysteries. Mysteries do have an answer. Mysteries do have a solution. That there might be a mystery to us at the moment, but there is something understandable about it. There is something real about it. A mystery doesn't mean there's not an explanation. In Cambridge's dictionary it says it's something strange or not known that is not yet being explained or understood. Not yet being explained or understood. And some of those world mysteries that I said, there have been theories about how they've come about, and some people have actually worked out things, and that theorem, x to the power n plus y to the power n equals z to the power n, that's been worked out. There was a mystery for all those years, but now it's being worked out. Well, this passage talks about a mystery. Paul talks about a mystery in verse 51. It's interesting his wording here. He says, a mystery, not the mystery, a mystery. So it would give the idea that there's lots of mysteries. The actual original Greek word here, mystoron, which is where we get mystery from, funnily enough, is used 27 times in the New Testament. So we've got over 27 different times that this word mystery is used in the New Testament and this is a particular mystery. Now this word mystery being used in the Bible should be no surprise to us. It should be no surprise to us that mystery is a word that is used in God's Word because When God gives us a glimpse of His glory, when God gives us a glimpse of His majesty, when God gives us a glimpse of what we call theology, of how God's Word works out, it is a mystery. Because we are human, and God is God. And so much of God's Word, as we read it, we think, how does that work? It works. And we praise God that it works. But there's a mystery to it because God is God and there is a solution and there is an explanation but in our humanity we're limited by our understanding. And so we could think of just the mystery of the Trinity. God is one and then God is three persons. God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. It's a mystery. We can think of the mystery of the sovereignty of God and our responsibility. God who knows everything. God who's planned everything. And then we who are told to live and die, as it were, by our own thoughts and choices. How do these things come together? We are limited by our understanding. There are mysteries in the Bible. But a mystery in the Bible doesn't mean it is untrue. It may seem unbelievable, but that's just because it's too big for us to process, because we are not God. And this is God's Word, and it's God speaking to us. And through Paul, in this verse 51, to the Corinthians, he brings a mystery to them. And the context of the mystery is to do with the resurrection. The resurrection of Christ, the resurrection of the dead in general. And the chapter before, or this chapter 15, as it's been open and we've been going through it, we've seen what Paul's been explaining. And Paul has been setting out the evidence, the factual evidence, that the Lord Jesus Christ rose from the dead. It's a fact. It happened. Yes, it's a mystery. How did it happen? How did it work out? What was going on there? We don't know that, but we know factually that the Lord Jesus Christ, His body, His remains are not in Palestine. Jesus has risen, and Jesus has sat at the right hand of God, and Jesus is alive, and He's in a body, in a resurrected body. And Paul went on to explain the importance of the resurrection because there were some people in Corinth who were doubting it. There were some people in Corinth who were saying, we don't believe in the resurrection of the dead. He says, if you don't believe in the resurrection of the dead, then Jesus didn't rise. And if Jesus didn't rise, then there's no hope. Our salvation is underwritten. Our salvation is underlined by the fact that Jesus died and rose again. His death paid the price. His resurrection showed that the price was paid in full and it was good enough for God Almighty the Father. And so he goes on and explains this. He goes on to explain what resurrection will look like and what the resurrection body will be. And he talks about a seed dying and growing and he gives these illustrations. And in verse 50 he tells the Corinthians this is a straight fact. He tells them that our human body the human body we're here in now, the flesh and blood is the wording that's used there in the versions you have in front of you there. I tell you this brothers, flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God. That's a bit of a negative isn't it? This flesh and blood, this body cannot inherit the kingdom of God. Now he's already told them that the dead will rise again and be given a new body, a resurrected body. And so he's thinking, ah, that works for them. Because he explains why he says the perishable doesn't inherit the imperishable. Now this has become very, very vivid and very, very real to me. Those of you that worship regularly with us will know that I wasn't preaching last week. And then the reason I wasn't preaching last week is I was recovering from the fact that the doctor had to patch me up. This perishable body was falling apart. And bits of it were protruding where they shouldn't protrude from. And I've been put back together and I've been patched up. And it just underlines the fact that this body is perishing. You are all young and you're all in your youth and you know that you probably look at yourselves and you think you're invincible, yes? I felt very, very mature today. I felt old as well, but I felt mature because I took the decision not to skateboard down here, yeah? A few years ago I'd have done that and it would have gone miserably wrong and I would have broken something, yes? And I would have underlined again that we are perishable, we fall to bits. I asked the internet at what age the human being is in their prime. And apparently it is 33. So those of you that haven't got there yet, put your hands up. Those of you that haven't got to 33, you've got a lot to look forward to. You'll get to your prime. Those of you that... Pastor Phil, we know that's not true. Once you go past 33, apparently, it's all downhill. The BBC have got these helpful slides. I wanted to show you a couple of these. This is about your fitness. And so your peak fitness for things like shot put javelin, which we do all the time, and sprinting, it's about 33. Long distance running, which obviously I do lots of, you can last a bit longer. But it's all downhill. What about information processing? This next one here. Information processing. Those of you, do your exams. Don't do academia for too long. It gets harder the older you get. Your brains can't process it. We start losing out and then we get to Pastor Andrew's age and we can see what's going on. What about knowledge? What happens to knowledge? This is interesting. You 30-year-olds think you have it all. It doesn't quite work out like that with knowledge. Knowledge, we gain lots more of it as we go through life. And then it drops off, yeah? But with all these slides, we see that it's dropping off. And so whether you think your prime of life is 33 or 55 or whatever, It doesn't really make any difference because we are in a body that is perishing. Our body is not fit for eternal purpose. Our body is amazing in this world. Our body is incredible. We are fearfully and wonderfully put together and I'm not despising our physical human body and what God has done. We can celebrate that. We can thank God for that. The fact that we can run. The fact that people can go on a skateboard. The fact that we can think and do things academically. The fact that we can work out these great equations. It shows that God is the creator. But our bodies are not fit for eternal purpose. Because slowly, slowly, or fast, fast, whichever way it is, we are perishing. We are falling to pieces. This is what Paul is saying. He's saying this body is not for eternal use. It's not going to be any good in heaven. It cannot inherit it. And this wasn't how God created us. We see this in Genesis. We see this in Romans. When God originally created us, we were made perfect. Adam and Eve were perfect. And Adam and Eve were designed to live and live and live. And there was no death in the world at that moment. But death came in as it tells us in Romans 5 verse 12. Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned. Friends, our bodies are perishing. We are incorruptible bodies, not because God made us that way, but because we sinned and we went against God. And Adam and Eve, in that beginning story, at the beginning of the world, as the federal head of all that's gone on, led the way. And just as sin came into the world through one man, through Adam, so death spread to all men. The reason our body is falling apart, the reason that there is death, is because of sin. And as this passage tells us here in Romans, all have sinned. All have sinned. And no one here can say, I haven't sinned. Because if you say you haven't sinned, you've lied. And if you've lied, you've sinned. And it's a complete circle. We've all sinned. We've all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. We all deserve to die. And we're in this flesh that is falling to pieces. You know the story in Genesis. You know what God said to Adam at the beginning. He said, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. That's Genesis 2.17. He said, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat. Everything else he could have. Everything else was for him. Everything else was for his delight and enjoyment. But not that one. For in the day you eat of it, you shall surely die. And they ate it. And you could say, well, they didn't die. Well, they have died. But what did happen at that moment in time is spiritually effectively they died. They had a relationship with God. They could talk to God face to face as it were. They were perfect and they were in perfect relationship with God before that day. And then when sin came in, when they rebelled against God, that broke down. And then a symbolism and a picture of that, and the reality of that was their bodies started to get old. And they themselves have died. And as we go through the scriptures, and as you go through very early on in Genesis, the genealogies are the list of people, and it says their name, and it says, and they died. And it says their name, and they died. And it says their name, and they died. But you see, this mystery in verse 51 answers the questions that these Corinthians were having. Because they had this wonderful thought and this great idea that if you died, your physical human body would finish, that was finished with, your spirit would wait for the Lord to return, and then you'd be given your resurrection body. But then there's this question, what about people who haven't died? What happens to the people who are alive when Jesus returns? All these dead people, they come alive and they're given their resurrection bodies and they can inherit the imperishable because they've got imperishable bodies, as it tells us earlier in that chapter. But what about the people that are left? They're left in these bodies that have been decaying. These bodies that might be broken. These bodies that might not be functioning very well. And what's going to happen to them? Because the perishable body cannot inherit the imperishable. There'll be nothing that corrupts or defiles in heaven. There'll be nothing wrong or broken in heaven. This wrong, broken body can't go to heaven. It can't be an eternal body. It isn't. It's perishable. And it's only the imperishable that can inherit that eternal life. And so, verse 51, he says, I tell you a mystery. This is the mystery. We shall not all sleep. Well, I think we do all sleep. I'd imagine you all slept last night. So what's going on here? Well, we have to understand what this word means. And if you've been with us here over the past few weeks, you'll have come across this word sleep before. And this word sleep is for the believers who've fallen asleep in the Lord. They have died. It's people who have died. And what Paul is saying is not everyone is going to die. But we all shall be changed. But's there. We shall all be changed. Not everyone will die. But we all shall change. This is the mystery. We shall be changed. And you can imagine the Corinthians trying to process this in their minds. They're thinking. It's been read out aloud to them. They're scratching their heads. We shall not all sleep. But we all shall be changed. What's going on? And in verse 42, Paul goes on to explain it. He says, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye. The twinkling of the eye is a very, very short space of time. The original for twinkling is the word that we get there for atom. A tiny, tiny, tiny nanosecond. In the twinkling eye at the last trumpet, for the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised imperishable and we shall be changed. And this is a mystery, friends. This is a mystery. When the Lord Jesus Christ returns, those that have died, they will rise and they'll be given imperishable bodies. But in a twinkling of eye, in a nanosecond, before we can think, anyone that is alive at that time, anyone who has not fallen asleep in the sense of died, their bodies will be changed. That's the mystery. That is the mystery. Have you seen a body changed like that? My surgeon has changed my body. I've got a little smiley face here. Yes. It's a scar. I didn't change it positively, other than I got rid of what was there before. But we don't see things change just like that, do we? And this is what's going to happen. This is a mystery. Paul talks about it in 1 Thessalonians in chapter 4 and verse 16. 1 Thessalonians chapter 4 and verse 16. He says, For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command. with the voice of an archangel and the sound of the trumpet of God and the dead in Christ will rise first and we who are alive we are left we will be caught up in the air in the clouds with them to meet the law in the air and so we will also be with the Lord it's going to happen one day Jesus is going to return And we don't know when that is, but we know it's going to happen. We know that it's going to be an absolutely incredible day. And we know there's going to be a trumpet. And when that trumpet happens, please don't be standing over a grave. Because it's going to burst open. And this person's going to go up. And you go, where are they going? And then minutes later, you're going to think, I like this body. Because you'll be rising. And maybe the toothache that you had, or the gangly arm that was falling off, or the depression, it will have gone. It will have gone. Because the perishable will be changed and will become imperishable. Perhaps you're struggling to think about this. Perhaps you're thinking that is just a mystery too big. How can this be? How can this happen? I just want to take you in your minds back to day four of creation. Day four of creation. Students of the Bible, what happened day four of the creation? Well, day four of the creation is when God just casually, in 24 hours, put the whole universe together. Yeah? Cyprus is fantastic at night time, yeah? And if you can ever get yourself out of Lefkosha and into somewhere where there's no light pollution, and just lie on your back and look up, you will see stars. And then as your eyes get used to it, you'll see more stars. And as your eyes get used to it, you'll see even more stars. And then probably you'll see some shooting stars coming across. And then maybe if you go out to the Carpus way and you look, you'll see the whole of the Milky Way there. This universe that we occupy a minuscule part of is as far as scientists and astronomers can tell, is 94 billion light years apart. I can't get my head around 94 billion light years, but that's big. That's huge. That's just vast. And God, in a 24-hour period, took that, and that's the known bit, it might be bigger than that, we don't know, but that's at least what it is, And he took that and he threw 200 billion trillion stars into that place in a 24-hour period. Done. And what was his resources? His voice. He spoke it. So friends, if you are concerned about your body changing in a twinkle of an eye, think about who's doing it. This is it. This is our God. This is our God. And how God is saying to us in that final day, the dead shall rise and they will become incorruptible and their bodies will be perfect. And those that are there in a twinkle of an eye, their bodies will be changed. It's a mystery for sure, but God can do it. And the marvelous mysteries of this creation, and just that moment to think of the vastness of the universe that God put together in 24 hours. In Romans 1 20 it tells us, for the invisible attributes. What we can't see, the eternal power, the divine nature of God, have been clearly perceived, clearly seen, ever since the creation of the world. The things that have been made, so that they are without excuse. Friends, as we look on, we see the stars. As we look on and see the mountains. As we look on and just think of the amazing nature of how our hands can physically work, and think of our eye, and think of our sight, and think of all of this, this creation screams out that God has made it. And this God who has made the whole of creation is underwriting our resurrection. And yes, it is a mystery. How does that happen? How does God do it? We don't know, but we know that He does do it because He is God. And as He is God, we are without excuse. So when Jesus returns, it will not be a problem that some people are living. Just as it won't be a problem that some people will be in their graves. Because all will be changed from mortal to immortal in a split second. And those who are asleep will get their resurrection bodies, which are imperishable. But friends, what we have to remember, and what we have to realize that's going on here, is he starts this verse 50 with, I tell you this, brothers. Brothers. Jesus, Paul, sorry, Paul was speaking to believers. Paul was speaking to Christians. Paul was speaking to them. And so friend, at the end of this world, as a believer, if we are dead or alive, the perishable shall put on imperishable. And then we also know that those that don't know the Lord Jesus Christ, they will rise again too. And as the passage goes on, and as Pastor Andrew will be preaching over the next little while on that, we realize that there is a judgment, and there is a reality. But today, and this passage is particularly speaking to believers. And so friends, there is some great truth here, and there's some great encouragement here. But it's only a truth and an encouragement to you if you know Jesus is your Savior. This divides the room. Therefore, some of us hear that with regard to death, there is victory. And that's the second word. Paul moves from this wonder of this mystery. And he applies this truth to the Corinthian believers. And he uses this metaphor. And he uses this picture language that we can all understand. He uses the word victory. Victory. We all love a winner, don't we? We all like winning. And the Olympic Games, I was very, very thankful for the timing of my surgery. It meant that I had to just lie in front of the television and watch the Olympics. What a hardship. I thank God for how that worked out. I enjoyed that. And I was excited to see my fellow countrymen winning medals, yeah? When they got a gold medal and they won the race and the national anthem of God Save the King was played, my heart swelled. It was almost as if I had been victorious myself. We've got some pictures of this to remind me. And I know the Americans did very well as well, and other countries too, but obviously for me it was our English friends there, But then there were some people that looked like they were going to get gold and they didn't, yes. I was shouting at the television, why didn't you do it? And I was unrighteously disappointed when my fellow countrymen didn't win gold. As if I'd done anything in the first place to deserve it. But we like victory, don't we? We like winning. We like to be on the winning side. I heard some Australians and they were working out how in actual fact that they won the Olympics because they realized that all these other countries were bigger than them and had more population than them. And after they did their maths, they put themselves. And it's funny, isn't it? Because that's what we do. We always want to be the winner. We always want to be at the top. There's always a reason why we should be at the top. In military terms, for there to be a victory, there needs to be an enemy. And death has been referred to as the final enemy. Benjamin Franklin famously said, in this world, nothing is certain except for death and taxes. Well, he didn't quite get it right because there's some very clever people who avoid paying taxes. But no one can avoid death. When someone is born into this world, the only thing that we can say of certainty is death will come to them. The current mortality statistics are as follows. At this moment in time, each day, there is 166,859 deaths. Or to bring that to something more manageable for our minds, in an hour's time, 6,952. Or if we look round and see the size of this congregation, in every minute, in every minute, 116 people die. Or to put it another way, as every second of this world passes, two people die. And it would seem from those statistics, it would seem from that reality, that death is the winner. It seems like death is a winner, doesn't it? Death is certain. Death is inevitable. Death happens. And death, each second, is taking two people from this world into an eternity. And we could say death is one, but Paul doesn't say death is one. Paul in verse 54 says, when the perishable puts on imperishable, and when the mortal puts on immortality, then it shall come to pass the saying that is written, death is swallowed up in victory. Paul is saying to these Corinthians, look, death is real. But there's something else going on here. Because death, perishable, puts on imperishable. And mortal puts on immortality. And when that happens, death, although it is real, is swallowed up in victory. Paul knows his Bible so, so well. And he's quoting from the prophet of Isaiah in chapter 25. In chapter 25 verse 8 it says, And he will swallow up death forever. And the Lord will wipe away the tears from the faces. And the reproach of his people he will take away from all the earth. For the Lord has spoken. He will swallow up death. He will wipe away tears. Friends, death is abhorrent. I know some of you recently have suffered bereavement of loved ones. For me, this last few years, there's been far too much death in my own experience. And it's painful. And it's dastardly. But it's inevitable because it happens. And it leaves people in tears. But this verse is saying, death is swallowed up in victory. This verse that is pointed to back in Isaiah is saying, the Lord will wipe away tears. It's not the end. Death is not the end because of resurrection. And death is swallowed up in victory. Friends, the times that you've mourned and wept over the body of your believing loved one, being lowered into the grave, it's not the end of the story. It's not the end of the story. Because death is swallowed up in victory. As you fret and think about your own death as a believer here, if you're trusting in the Lord Jesus Christ, if you know Him as your Saviour, no matter how your death occurs, if it's peaceful or violent, if it's in a few days or in a century's time, no matter how or when, it is not the end of the story. Friends, this is what Paul was saying to the Corinthians and that's what God's Word is saying to us now. Death is no longer going to have its victory. Where is the victory? What has happened? Death has been swallowed up in victory. And Paul goes on to ask the question that God asks Hosea in chapter 13 and verse 14. God says to Hosea, O death, where are your plagues? O Sheol, where is your sting? And then Paul opens up in verse 36 and says, The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. It is not that death is without sting. Death is with sting. But the sting is this, friends, if you don't know the Lord Jesus Christ is your Savior, that's where the sting is. And we need to think about this. You see, death itself isn't so much the problem. The problem is sin. The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. Death, we can think of in this respect, is physical death. We will all physically die. It will happen to all of us. It's going to happen. So let's get our minds around that. What's the problem? The problem is if we die in our sins. Because the sting of death, the nasty part of death, the goad, the bit that hurts, is because of sin. Now yes, for sure, those of you that have lost believing loved ones, you are bereaved. You are missing someone. You may be lonely. You will be saddened. And that is real. But those that are trusting in the Lord Jesus Christ as their Savior, you will see them again. You will rise with them. And the sting is taken away, because the sting of death is sin. Sin is what brought physical death into the world, as we saw earlier. Sin is rebellion against God, in the same way as Adam rebelled against God. That one rule, he broke that rule. He wanted to do it his own way. And since then, man has been living in his own way, and our relationship with God has been shattered. And we are alienated from God. We are forsaken by God. We're not part of God. Romans 5.13, the first part says, Sin was indeed in the world before the law was given. Sin was there when Adam sinned. But then when the law was given, the law underlines what's going on. The law shows us where we have failed. Romans 4.15 says, For the law bringeth wrath. Our sins bring the wrath of God. And if we go back to Hosea 13, if we go back to what is said before, God asked the question, O Sheol, where is your sting? You see, I didn't read this before, but this is where the power of it all is. God says, I shall ransom them from the power of Sheol. I shall redeem them from death. Death, where is your sting? Shiloh, where is your power? Hell, where is it? And it's not there. And it's gone because death is swallowed up in victory. And death has lost its sting because the ransom has been paid. The price for our sins has been paid. God has done something amazing. You see, a Christian is not someone who's kept the law perfectly. No one can. That's impossible. A true Christian is someone who is trusting that Jesus has done it for them. They've been ransomed. They've been redeemed. That the price has been paid. They know that Jesus has paid the price. Jesus has taken the sting. When Jesus was on that cross, as those nails were driven through him, as he was there, breathing his last breath in the darkness of all that was going on, when he cries out, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? The sting of death. The wrath of God was being poured out upon him for the sins of his people. And that means that you and I can look death in the eye and say it no longer has a sting upon us. The victory has been won. It's been swallowed up by the blood of Christ. Sin means that we deserve to be eternally cut off from God. John in the book of Revelation he puts it like this in verse chapter 21 verse 8 but as for the cowardly the faithless or you could actually read that as for the fearful and the faithless and the fearful and the faithful along with the detestable and the murderers and the sexually immoral and the sorcerers and the idolaters and then the liars and their portion will be the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death. That's what we all deserve. That is the sting of death. That is the reality of dying without Christ. But Paul is screaming out to the Corinthians and he's screaming out to us today in verse 53, but thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. When I was watching our Olympians win their gold medals, yes? It was like I won it, yeah? I thought, me, I'm part of this. Well, I'm not. What did I do? I was sat on the couch, groaning and moaning with pains, but yet we were winning medals, and I was thinking of it as my victory. You see, this is the reality of what's going on here. You didn't die on the cross, Christ did it. He paid for the victory. It is His victory. But He gives us the victory. The victory is yours. You have become the victor. Victor, you have to forgive me. I didn't get the wonder of your name until really studying this chapter. Victor. The victory. The victory has been given to you. Friends, you are sat here this morning and you are not just on the winning side. You are winning. You are victorious. Death has lost its sting. Yes, you will die one day unless Jesus returns before. But that doesn't matter. Because what does matter and what has happened is Christ has paid the price and you've got your eternity assured. And this detestable, broken, sinful, failing body that cries tears through pain will be no more. And you will be perfect for eternity with no sin, no pain, no suffering, no tears, no being parted. You won't have to say goodbye to loved ones when you travel. You won't be fearful of thinking, will I see them again? Eternity forever, no more separation. It talks about there being no sea in heaven. And whether there's sea or not, in that sense, it doesn't matter what it's talking about. There's no separation. Sea separates us, doesn't it? We're separated from our cousins because we have this pond, as we say in England, the Atlantic Ocean. With the sea, there's no more separation in heaven. And then that gut-wrenching moment when you look over the open hole, the grave, where your loved one has been laid. That moment will never, ever, ever happen again. That's done for. Because Christ has won the victory. Friends, can you thank God that you know that that victory is yours? That's the big question. That's a big question that we all have to ask ourselves right now. As you are sat here, as you leave in a moment of fused time, as you go through that door, will you go through that door victoriously knowing that Christ has paid the price for you and death holds no sting for you? Or are you going to go out the door thinking, I hope I don't get run over today? While I was finding those graphics about our life and our peak being at age 33, I read a fascinating article by a guy called Frank Swain on the BBC. And his article was about living forever. And he wrapped up the end of his article like this. How to live forever. that are well documented ways to try to avoid the Western world's two biggest killers. And the two biggest killers in the Western world is heart disease and cancer. And he went on to say through a combination of exercise, healthy eating, a moderation when it comes to alcohol and red meat. And so if you want to live a long time, cut out red meat, cut out alcohol, healthy eating, that means a lot of vegetables, a lot of beans, a lot more salad, no steak, and being exercising all the time. And then what he said, few of us actually manage to live by these criteria. Perhaps because we think a shorter life filled with rich food and wine is a worthy trade. A shorter life with chocolate pudding, profiteroles, pounded yam, with masses and masses and masses of palm oil, which apparently is a killer. It's enjoyable, but it's a killer. And it leads, he said, he says, which leads to the conundrum. If eternal life was possible, would you be willing to pay the price? If eternal life was possible, would you be willing to pay the price? And for so many people in this world, just to have a few extra years, they're not willing to pay that price. They want to have their cake and eat it. They want to have their fun and enjoy it. And as I thought about this, I was thinking, this question is quite a remarkable question. Because we know that eternal life is possible. This passage, this chapter 15 has been screaming out about eternal life. And so eternal life is possible. Are you willing to pay the price? And then we think, well no. The price has been paid. The Lord Jesus Christ has paid the price on the cross. But thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. And this is just amazing. This is astounding. We cannot pay the price. The price has been paid. But... Just in the sense that we don't earn it. Just in the sense that Jesus has paid the price. Just in the sense that we've been ransomed. There is this humbling, humbling truth. That for us to receive eternal life, we have to acknowledge that we've sinned against God. And we have to be willing to say that Jesus is Lord. And I think, tragically, maybe for some of you people here this morning, and maybe for some of you people watching online, that price is too great. You don't want Jesus to be your Lord. You want to have your cake, as it were, your pleasure, and you want to eat it. You want to enjoy this world, and you just want God for Sunday. Or you just want God for comfort. You just want God to provide you with the good things. Well friends, there is no victory in that. Eternal life is possible because Jesus paid the price. But the humbling truth is we have to come to this Jesus and say, there's nothing I can bring. There's nothing I can do. I need to be sorry for this mess that I've got myself in. But if we repent, if we believe, He will give us eternal life. And it's a victorious truth. And the question I want to leave you with is, do you know this for yourself? Or is the price too high? And if you eat too much cake and don't take exercise, you might live five years shorter than the person who runs marathons and eats like a vegan and has no joy in their food. But if you don't know Jesus as your Savior, you're not giving up five years of this life. You are paying for it for eternity. The sting of death will be blown upon you and you alone and it will be your fault and your responsibility for eternity. But, thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. I want you to pause for a moment, I will pause. I want us to think, can we say that for ourselves? Is that verse 57 our voice? Can we thank God who gives us the victory? Can you thank God who gives me the victory? Can you personalize that to yourself? And if you can, give thanks and praise God. And if you can't, your response is to ask Him into your life now. Please take a moment with yourself and your thoughts and the Holy Spirit to think that through. Almighty God, we pray that each and every one of us here may leave victorious, not because we've got the victory, but because you've given us the victory through the Lord Jesus Christ. Oh Lord God, humble us and draw us close to you. And may we be comforted by this, and may we know the blessing of it, now and forevermore, in Jesus' name. Amen.