Bible Passage: 1 Corinthians 15:51-57
Pastor: Joel Jenswold
Sermon Date: April 20, 2025

Bulletin – Easter Sunday

In the name of, and to the eternal glory of, Jesus,

Are any of you here today Marvel fans?  The Marvel movies or Marvel comics?  If you are, maybe you are familiar with one of the super-villains in the Marvel franchise.  The villain I am referring to is named Thanos.  Thanos first appeared in a comic book back in 1973.  Thanos is generally a bad guy.  In fact, Thanos wants to kill half of all living things in the cosmos.  The creators of Thanos derived his name from a Greek word: thanatos.  “Thanatos” means “death.”  Thanos is really the perfect name for a villain whose goal it is to kill people.

“Thanos” (or Thanatos) is not just a villain in comic books.  “Thanatos,” death, is a real.  Paul uses this Greek word, and forms of it, in our text today.  Death really is a horrible villain in this world.  But Paul isn’t writing a comic book or movie script.  Paul is writing God’s eternal truth.  Let us marvel today as Paul writes of The Villain, the Victor, and the Final Victory.

Death very clearly is the villain in our text.  Two times in our text Paul will refer to this perishable body (v. 53, 54) and this mortal body (v. 53, 54).  “This” body!  This one right here!  It is mortal and perishable.  “Mortal” means it can die.  “Perishable” means it is subject to corruption and decay.  “Perishable food” is food that will rot and decay over time.  These are the bodies that we have.  They get old.  They wear out.  They die.  We put them in the ground and they decay.  People can try to beat this villain, death.  You can exercise three times a week.  You can avoid unhealthy habits like alligator wrestling or eating a dozen brats for lunch every day.  You can take your cholesterol medicine and medicine for high blood pressure faithfully like you’re supposed to.  But in the end I still have “this mortal body.”   “This perishable body.”

Why?  Why must it be this way?  Why are we all the target, the victim of this relentless villain?  The answer is simple.  Sin.  If we look for the first appearance of this villain in the Bible, we have to look a long way back.  Back to the Garden of Eden.  Back to the 6th day of creation when God gave Adam some very special instructions about one of the trees in the Garden.   You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die. (Genesis 2:17)  The only thing that would unleash the villain, death, was sin!

We know the sad story.  Adam and Eve ate the fruit.  Hey, we should go ask Adam and Eve why they listened to that rotten devil and disobeyed God!  Oh, that’s right.  We can’t.  They’re dead.  They died.  Their bodies long ago decayed and turned back to dust.  The villain came.  “Thanatos” got them.  They became mortal and perishable.  Don’t look now, but Thanatos is coming for us, too.  St. Paul wrote to the Romans, Sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin.  And in this way death came to all men because all sinned. (Romans 5:12)  “Thanatos” comes to all men because of sin.  Remember?  This mortal body.  This perishable body.  Every cemetery that exists is evidence of the horrible efficiency of this villain!

How do we defeat this villain?  We don’t.  Jesus does.  To defeat this villain, we must understand the enemy.  Paul helps us in our text:  The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. (v. 56)  The deadly “sting” that causes death is sin.  That is the “scorpion’s tail.”  And here is the powerful “venom” that makes the sting deadly:  the law.  God’s law.  It is a rule God has set.  He said to Adam, When you eat of it you will surely die. Elsewhere God has said, The wages of sin is death. (Romans 6:23)  To defeat death, to defeat Thanatos, you have to get the stinger.  You have to deal with sin.

And that is what Jesus did.  He took a “sting.”  He took sin upon himself.  And the power of God’s law kicked in.  It said to the holy, innocent Son of God, “You will surely die! The wages of sin is death!”   And he died for the sin of the world.  But here is the thing.  Jesus took the “sting” as a proxy.  He took your sting.  He took your death.  And because he had no sin of his own, death couldn’t keep him.  It had to give him back.  And so on Easter, Jesus rose from the dead!  The victory is won!  He is the Victor over sin.  He is the Victor over death!

And that is not all!  Paul says, Thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ! (v. 57)  Jesus is the Victor, and he gives us the victory.  That victory over death and the grave!  It’s ours.  This is what Paul is describing at the beginning of our text.  Paul describes what will happen on the Last Day when Jesus returns.  At his return, the bugle of God will sound Revile, and the dead will be raised. (v. 52)  Just like Jesus came alive again and came out of his grave, so will we!  And the resurrected believers and those believers alive at the coming of Christ will be changed.  Our bodies will then be imperishable and immortal.  Bodies that will never and can never die and decay again!  This is the final victory!

At the graveyard it feels like Thanatos mocks us, doesn’t it?  You ever been out to the graveyard?  As a preacher, I have done committal services for old men and old women.  I have done the committal of a young mother who left a husband and young daughter.  I have done committals for toddlers and infants.  Sometimes it looks like Thanatos wins.  He just seems to “gulp” down anyone and everyone.  But on the Last Day, at the last trumpet, at the resurrection of the dead, we have the final word!   Death is swallowed up on victory.  Death, where is your sting?  Grave, where is your victory?  (v. 54-55)

In the Marvel comic universe, if you ask the question, “Who defeated Thanos?” you will get different answers.  Some will say Drax.  Some will say Thor.  Who cares?  It’s just fantasy.  But where it really matters, in real life, if we ask, “Who defeated Thanatos?  Who defeated death?” the answer is and ever shall be only one, Jesus Christ!  Jesus wins!  And thanks be to God!  He gives us the victory through our risen Lord, Jesus Christ!

Amen.