Where, Then, Is The Sting?

Oh death! Where is thy sting? 
Dread venom of lowest hell,
Brewed in the bitterness of hatred,
Where is thy sting,
Distilled from violence of rebellion,
Compounded of saddest separation?
This is death’s sting, and yet
Where, oh where, death, is thy sting?
 
Where does the sting incise,
Where pour out its poison,
Ghastly, grisly, doom-dealing, deadly?
In it the shame and pain of
Fruitless remorse, dull anguish,
Dry tongue cleaving, tears destroyed
In lethal cynicism, passion against God,
Rustlings of memories bringing horror,
And the incoming, ravaging darkness—
This is death’s sting.
Yet where, oh death, is thy sting?
 
How then the irrevocable loss
Of the holy, heavenly being—
Man brilliantly lit by God,
Pulsing in glory? How, where, is this loss?
Down in the mocking strata of death,
The leering, gaping grin of the grave,
The stench of corruption, glory-failure
And no-being in God. This is the sting.  
Yet, oh death, where, where is thy sting?
 
The sting is in him. Look up
(All ye that pass by). Look and see.
Do not let the divine drama pass over you,
Be over you, be gone. Look up!
 There, writhing with the sting. Oh yes,
Human enough to suffer and divine
Enough to bear. Look up and see,
All ye who pass by. See where death’s sting 
Was and is no more.
 
If a man stay and look, he will see.
If he pass by, then in a moment
He will pass by love, and will never see.
He will miss the miracle
Hid in the grim gallows. He will bypass
Love reaching out with cool arms
To embrace the sin-fevered.
He will pass by, not knowing
Where the sting has gone.  
  
Where is death’s sting? In him:
Annulled and made void: nothing.
Its poison absorbed, destroyed.
Death tried to conquer. This it could not.
This sting in man is death, fiery,
Anguish and flame of hell,
But in him—after the suffering—
Exploded myth of destruction.
In him the fire of death
Blazed to expending, and expended.
Then death, where is your sting?
 
Ask not, ‘Where is the deathly sting?’
For it is destroyed, absorbed into nothingness
By love’s holy power. Now
It is only life, life flowing,
Life in quality replete, surging up
Out of the empty tomb. Christ’s grave,
Empty through grace, is the wide room
Of man’s new spirit. Man is in life.
Man is enthroned in the heavens,
Having entered into his glory
Through man’s suffering. Man is high.
Gone then is death’s sting. 
Void in the victory—the ancient 
Annulled victory of the grave. 
Oh, death, where is thy sting?

From The Spirit of All Things, by Geoffrey Bingham, pp.90-92

David: Psalm 51

Thou requirest truth
In the inward parts:
Not merely on the lips,
Where man may mutter anything,
And seal his subterfuge,
Making it truth for him
And those who hear.
  
Thou requirest truth
When man is truly man:
Down in the depths beneath,
 Where You alone may see:
Man senses but he does not know
That truth is the truth
That You require.
  
I, David, was a man of joy,
Of pleasant power,
Of daily purity.
True, I too was tempted,
But should I fall
Would know I fell
And cry to You for help.
  
When then I fell
And said I did not fall,
When kept within
The hellish sin I did
And made it joy, not sin,
The fires began
That ran into my soul.
  
At nights they burned,
By day they flamed,
Hot coals that dried
Or sweated me
Until the power had gone,
That once I knew
In doubtless joy.
  
When Nathan came
His piercing eyes
Looked to the depths
(His eyes were Yours);
The holy flame
Burned even more.
I was undone.
  
The mercy cried
Was mercy come,
The lava fled
Its burning core,
And I was freed—
The flame was gone
By mercy’s love.
  
The truth required
In inward parts,
The purity
Within the heart
Have come again.
No greater gift
Was ever given.
  
Here then I weep
For grace and sin,
The wasted hour,
The splendid grace:
Both show me truth
Is what I need,
With wisdom.
  
Teach me, then, Lord,
Of sin’s deceit,
The sludge of sin
That full defiles.
Give me the love
Of purity,
The only truth.
  
Now sings my heart,
The heart so pure
The miracle of love
Has made again.
The man destroyed
Is made anew
For purity.
  
I know, dear Lord,
The cost is Yours.
Sin’s suffering
Is mine alone,
But Yours the pain
Messiah takes
Unto the death.
  
Broken I go,
Though healed.
Wisdom I know,
Though foolish.
You have unmasked
The sin that binds,
And set me free.
  
Freedom thus bought
Is freedom prized
And holiness
Is gift most high.
Man breathes eternity
In holiness
And knows You true.
  
This is the wisdom required: 
This is the gift of God 
Set in the inward parts, 
True purity in peace
And holiness in joy.

From The Spirit of All Things, by Geoffrey Bingham, pp.72-74

Lord, You Are My Love

Lord, You are my love,

You alone I love, and all my loves

Are in the loving of You. Yet You

Came first in your love; In Your

Mysterious predestining, fixing my life,

Planning my destiny before the world began.

 

You are my love and when I wake—

Time and again in the many nights—

There is sometimes the faint line of dread,

Sometimes the inner terror of the Holy One,

And I fear lest I have offended You.

Then Your love comes—reassuring—

And in Your word, and on my knees,

And in the secret places

Of my secret heart, there is a tryst—

A man and God affair

Of love inexpressible. I weep

And seem to hear You too,

Not weeping as I, but with me, for me,

And the pain becomes a precious pain,

A rich suffering in joy,

And I am one with You.

Oh Triune Lover, persistent One

Who never leaves me night and day

But moves within my dreams, and lives within

My daily awakenings, hear of my love.

More than faint intimations

Are the visitations and the ‘never-leavings’

That I have known these years of all my life.

Sometimes my thoughts of leaving You grow strong

And with the thought bewilderment fast grows,

And, like the Psalmist, in my heart I cry,

‘Whither, Lord, shall I go from Thy presence?

Thou art not only the Eternal One

Being the Everywhere I’d go, but of Thee

And from Thee, I am what Thou have made me.

Separation intolerable

My inner spirit dreads.

Such loneliness apart from Thee

Is more than Hell itself, yet Hell’s substance

That void the rebellious know’.

Why in this night—this early morn—

Do I speak to You, speak thus?

Why does this moan escape my lips?

Why does my heart complain

When all You’ve ever shown

Is holy love to me? Ah, yes,

The rub lies there, the hurt, the pain,

That You are holy, You are pure,

And I am not. Strange truth and fact

That though You holy be and I am not

Your love enwraps my soul and spirit

Like a protecting mantle, a healing cloak

That cleanses as it loves, loves as it purifies

And makes me one with You,

Your inner heart to mine and mine to You.

This is the mystery—the pained alternation

Of love and fear, of fear and love—

The mystery that’s my life

From when conceived until this now

And ‘til the death that’s life

Releases me from pain and joy

Of the present mingling.

The present mingling is the grace

And love that I and God are one.

This is the dread that comes to me—the commingling

Of human flesh and Your dread Deity

Catching me up to all eternity

In a resistless love. Why then

Do I moan in the deep night

At the painful delight of present union,

Future joy and ecstasy—not Dionysian but pure

As love makes serene for ever?

Why should my heart complain

Except its shame should make me long

For the Then to be Now—the Then I dread

As now I dread, and yet adore?

Ah Lord! I love You deep,

Deeper than all my secret heart,

Deeper than Heaven and Hell themselves.

Your love once captured me

Even before I saw the Tree:

But all the time the Tree was there

With You, in You, for me, for them.

One word from You is spoken not

But in the Cross, and by the Cross,

And through the Cross, and from its self

Till Christ in all his love—

And Spirit-love along—

Ushers my trembling heart to You

Till all Your Fatherhood Embraces me for ever.

Dear Lord there’s no complaint,

Only the plaint gentle, the tender plea

That I may tell with power You give,

The everlasting love—the mercy full—

That lifts to love’s most holy height

And there retains for ever

The transformed spirit.

Lord, I plead,

Never release me from the noble call,

That dignity most high—that ministry

That makes the heart of me melt to be

One with Your love forever;

One as I tell Your love, in quivering tones

From depths that measure cannot know,

Your depthless, breadthless, heightless love

That captures me for ever,

And in its capture captures all

Its utter holiness had planned

For time and all eternity.

From All Things of the Spirit, by Geoffrey C. Bingham, p.97-99.