Journey Through God's Word

¹“Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me.

²In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?

³And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also.

⁴And you know the way to the place where I am going.”

⁵Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?”

⁶Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

⁷If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”

¹Now I would remind you, brothers and sisters, of the good news that I proclaimed to you, which you in turn received, in which also you stand,

²through which also you are being saved, if you hold firmly to the message that I proclaimed to you — unless you have come to believe in vain.

³For I handed on to you as of first importance what I in turn had received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures,

⁴and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures,

⁵and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.

⁶Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers and sisters at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have died.

⁷Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles.

⁸Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me.

⁹For I am the least of the apostles, unfit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God.

¹⁰But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me has not been in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them — though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.

¹¹Whether then it was I or they, so we proclaim and so you have come to believe.

¹²Now if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can some of you say there is no resurrection of the dead?

¹³If there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised;

¹⁴and if Christ has not been raised, then our proclamation has been in vain and your faith has been in vain.

¹⁵We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified of God that he raised Christ — whom he did not raise if it is true that the dead are not raised.

¹⁶For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised.

¹⁷If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins.

¹⁸Then those also who have died in Christ have perished.

¹⁹If for this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.

²⁰But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have died.

²¹For since death came through a human being, the resurrection of the dead has also come through a human being;

²²for as all die in Adam, so all will be made alive in Christ.

²³But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ.

²⁴Then comes the end, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father, after he has destroyed every ruler and every authority and power.

²⁵For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet.

²⁶The last enemy to be destroyed is death.

²⁷For “God has put all things in subjection under his feet.” But when it says, “All things are put in subjection,” it is plain that this does not include the one who put all things in subjection under him.

²⁸When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to the one who put all things in subjection under him, so that God may be all in all.

²⁹Otherwise, what will those people do who receive baptism on behalf of the dead? If the dead are not raised at all, why are people baptized on their behalf?

³⁰And why are we putting ourselves in danger every hour?

³¹I die every day! That is as certain, brothers and sisters, as my boasting of you — a boast that I make in Christ Jesus our Lord.

³²If with merely human hopes I fought with wild animals at Ephesus, what would I have gained by it? If the dead are not raised, “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.”

³³Do not be deceived: “Bad company ruins good morals.”

³⁴Come to a sober and right mind, and sin no more; for some people have no knowledge of God. I say this to your shame.

³⁵But someone will ask, “How are the dead raised? With what kind of body do they come?”

³⁶Fool! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies.

³⁷And as for what you sow, you do not sow the body that is to be, but a bare seed, perhaps of wheat or of some other grain.

³⁸But God gives it a body as he has chosen, and to each kind of seed its own body.

³⁹Not all flesh is alike, but there is one flesh for human beings, another for animals, another for birds, and another for fish.

⁴⁰There are both heavenly bodies and earthly bodies, but the glory of the heavenly is one thing, and that of the earthly is another.

⁴¹There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars; indeed, star differs from star in glory.

⁴²So it is with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perishable, what is raised is imperishable.

⁴³It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power.

⁴⁴It is sown a physical body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a physical body, there is also a spiritual body.

⁴⁵Thus it is written, “The first man, Adam, became a living being”; the last Adam became a life-giving spirit.

⁴⁶But it is not the spiritual that is first, but the physical, and then the spiritual.

⁴⁷The first man was from the earth, a man of dust; the second man is from heaven.

⁴⁸As was the man of dust, so are those who are of the dust; and as is the man of heaven, so are those who are of heaven.

⁴⁹Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we will also bear the image of the man of heaven.

⁵⁰What I am saying, brothers and sisters, is this: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.

⁵¹Listen, I will tell you a mystery! We will not all die, but we will all be changed,

⁵²in 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 will be changed.

⁵³For this perishable body must put on imperishability, and this mortal body must put on immortality.

⁵⁴When this perishable body puts on imperishability, and this mortal body puts on immortality, then the saying that is written will be fulfilled: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.”

⁵⁵“Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?”

⁵⁶The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law.

⁵⁷But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

⁵⁸Therefore, my beloved, be steadfast, immovable, always excelling in the work of the Lord, because you know that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.

¹Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.

²And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

³And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them;

⁴he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.”

⁵And the one who was seated on the throne said, “See, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this, for these words are trustworthy and true.”

⁶Then he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give water as a gift from the spring of the water of life.

⁷Those who conquer will inherit these things, and I will be their God and they will be my children.

⁸But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the polluted, the murderers, the fornicators, the sorcerers, the idolaters, and all liars, their place will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”

⁹Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues came and said to me, “Come, I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb.”

¹⁰And in the spirit he carried me away to a great, high mountain and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God.

¹¹It has the glory of God and a radiance like a very rare jewel, like jasper, clear as crystal.

¹²It has a great, high wall with twelve gates, and at the gates twelve angels, and on the gates are inscribed the names of the twelve tribes of the Israelites;

¹³on the east three gates, on the north three gates, on the south three gates, and on the west three gates.

¹⁴And the wall of the city has twelve foundations, and on them are the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.

¹⁵The angel who talked to me had a measuring rod of gold to measure the city and its gates and walls.

¹⁶The city lies foursquare, its length the same as its width; and he measured the city with his rod, fifteen hundred miles; its length and width and height are equal.

¹⁷He also measured its wall, one hundred forty-four cubits by human measurement, which the angel was using.

¹⁸The wall is built of jasper, while the city is pure gold, clear as glass.

¹⁹The foundations of the wall of the city are adorned with every jewel; the first was jasper, the second sapphire, the third agate, the fourth emerald,

²⁰the fifth onyx, the sixth carnelian, the seventh chrysolite, the eighth beryl, the ninth topaz, the tenth chrysoprase, the eleventh jacinth, the twelfth amethyst.

²¹And the twelve gates are twelve pearls, each of the gates is a single pearl, and the street of the city is pure gold, transparent as glass.

²²I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb.

²³And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God is its light, and its lamp is the Lamb.

²⁴The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it.

²⁵Its gates will never be shut by day — and there will be no night there.

²⁶People will bring into it the glory and the honor of the nations.

²⁷But nothing unclean will enter it, nor anyone who practices abomination or falsehood, but only those who are written in the Lamb’s book of life.