The Kingsman lives in the present, but he does not live from the present. That distinction matters more than it might first appear.
Paul lands at the end of 1 Corinthians 15 not with a conclusion but with something closer to a war cry. He has spent the entire chapter building the case for resurrection — every objection answered, every implication followed to its end — and when he arrives at verses 50 to 58, what comes out is a shout of triumph aimed at death itself. Not a theory. A taunt. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting? That is not the language of someone who is still working things out. That is the language of someone who already knows the result.
And if the Kingsman is going to live and serve from resurrection reality, he needs to hear it in that key.
The first thing Paul establishes is that what we currently are is not what we are ultimately meant to be. Flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God. That is not a put-down of the body — Paul believes in bodily resurrection, and so do we. What he is pointing to is the gap between what is perishable and what is coming. What is sown in weakness will be raised in power. What is sown a natural body will be raised a spiritual body. That is not an upgrade. That is a transformation of an entirely different order — the difference between the seed in the ground and the full-grown wheat. Same lineage. Completely different expression.
I think about what that means for how I hold the things I tend to grip most tightly. The need to be seen. The need to feel secure. The approval of people whose opinion I’ve allowed to carry too much weight. When I consider the reality that I am a pilgrim — not a settler — those things start to loosen. I’m not detaching from life here and now. But there’s a difference between someone who knows where they’re going and someone who has decided this is as good as it gets. Resurrection recalibrates that.
Then Paul announces what he calls a mystery. In the New Testament, mystery does not mean something puzzling. It means something hidden in God’s purposes that has now been revealed in Christ. And what Paul reveals here is staggering: we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed — in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. One moment, this. The next — entirely otherwise.
What a remarkable image. The twinkling of an eye. Paul is not being flippant about the magnitude of what is coming. He is making a point about its nature. This will not be gradual. There will be no transition period, no slow acclimation. Death’s claim — gone. Decay’s reach — gone.
I know from experience how easy it is to let the weight of the ordinary days quietly erode the expectation that anything is ever really going to change. The same challenges. The same slow grind. The same disappointments that never seem to fully resolve. The mystery Paul announces is the answer to that erosion. The trumpet will sound. The change will come. Living from that reality — not as an escape from the present but as the governing truth about where everything is heading — reshapes how the Kingsman shows up. Every day.
And the taunt? The taunt Paul aims at death in verse 55 is built on something precise. The sting of death is sin. The strength of sin is the law. Death has legal purchase over us because of sin, and sin carries its sentence because of the righteous standard of God that human rebellion has violated. Left there, the case against us is airtight. But Jesus did not leave it there. At the cross, He cancelled the legal charge against us — Colossians 2:14, the bond that stood against us, nailed to the cross, taken entirely out of the way. At the tomb, He walked out. And in walking out, He changed what death is for everyone who belongs to Him.
That does not make grief painless. Jesus wept at Lazarus’ tomb, knowing exactly what was about to happen. We are not called to perform invulnerability. But there is a world of difference between grief carried with resurrection hope and grief carried without it. The Kingsman is not performing strength. He is drawing on a structural fact about reality: death has been defeated. Not deferred. Defeated. And that victory is received, not earned. Thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
So Paul lands it where it matters most: Therefore, my beloved brothers and sisters, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labour is not in vain.
That therefore carries everything. The body will be transformed — therefore. The trumpet will sound — therefore. Death has been defeated, and the victory is already ours — therefore, this is how you live today. Steadfast does not mean comfortable. Immovable does not mean unchallenged. It means you do not drift when it gets hard. You remain rooted in what you know is true, whether or not it feels true in this particular moment.
The work of the Lord is not a solo project. It is the shared, outward-facing mission of a people freed by Jesus and now investing that freedom into others. Into conversations. Into fellowship. Into showing up, staying present, and going again.
Your labour is not in vain. Not the quiet prayers that seem to disappear into silence. Not the conversations that don’t appear to move anything. Not the faithfulness that no one notices. In the Lord — permanently, irreversibly, resurrection-certainly — it counts. This is not just a doctrine about the end, it’s a governing truth about how you carry yourself from here to there.
That is what resurrection means for the Kingsman.
For His Name’s Sake
C. L. J. Dryden
Shalom
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