Parallel Bible results for "1 corinthians 15"

1 Corinthians 15

The Message Bible MSG

1 Friends, let me go over the Message with you one final time - this Message that I proclaimed and that you made your own; this Message on which you took your stand

2 and by which your life has been saved. (I'm assuming, now, that your belief was the real thing and not a passing fancy, that you're in this for good and holding fast.)

3 The first thing I did was place before you what was placed so emphatically before me: that the Messiah died for our sins, exactly as Scripture tells it;

4 that he was buried; that he was raised from death on the third day, again exactly as Scripture says;

5 that he presented himself alive to Peter, then to his closest followers,

6 and later to more than five hundred of his followers all at the same time, most of them still around (although a few have since died);

7 that he then spent time with James and the rest of those he commissioned to represent him;

8 and that he finally presented himself alive to me.

9 It was fitting that I bring up the rear. I don't deserve to be included in that inner circle, as you well know, having spent all those early years trying my best to stamp God's church right out of existence.

10 But because God was so gracious, so very generous, here I am. And I'm not about to let his grace go to waste. Haven't I worked hard trying to do more than any of the others? Even then, my work didn't amount to all that much. It was God giving me the work to do, God giving me the energy to do it.

11 So whether you heard it from me or from those others, it's all the same: We spoke God's truth and you entrusted your lives.

12 Now, let me ask you something profound yet troubling. If you became believers because you trusted the proclamation that Christ is alive, risen from the dead, how can you let people say that there is no such thing as a resurrection?

13 If there's no resurrection, there's no living Christ.

14 And face it - if there's no resurrection for Christ, everything we've told you is smoke and mirrors, and everything you've staked your life on is smoke and mirrors.

15 Not only that, but we would be guilty of telling a string of barefaced lies about God, all these affidavits we passed on to you verifying that God raised up Christ - sheer fabrications, if there's no resurrection.

16 If corpses can't be raised, then Christ wasn't, because he was indeed dead.

17 And if Christ wasn't raised, then all you're doing is wandering about in the dark, as lost as ever.

18 It's even worse for those who died hoping in Christ and resurrection, because they're already in their graves.

19 If all we get out of Christ is a little inspiration for a few short years, we're a pretty sorry lot.

20 But the truth is that Christ has been raised up, the first in a long legacy of those who are going to leave the cemeteries.

21 There is a nice symmetry in this: Death initially came by a man, and resurrection from death came by a man.

22 Everybody dies in Adam; everybody comes alive in Christ.

23 But we have to wait our turn: Christ is first, then those with him at his Coming,

24 the grand consummation when, after crushing the opposition, he hands over his kingdom to God the Father.

25 He won't let up until the last enemy is down -

26 and the very last enemy is death!

27 As the psalmist said, "He laid them low, one and all; he walked all over them." When Scripture says that "he walked all over them," it's obvious that he couldn't at the same time be walked on.

28 When everything and everyone is finally under God's rule, the Son will step down, taking his place with everyone else, showing that God's rule is absolutely comprehensive - a perfect ending!

29 Why do you think people offer themselves to be baptized for those already in the grave? If there's no chance of resurrection for a corpse, if God's power stops at the cemetery gates, why do we keep doing things that suggest he's going to clean the place out someday, pulling everyone up on their feet alive?

30 And why do you think I keep risking my neck in this dangerous work?

31 I look death in the face practically every day I live. Do you think I'd do this if I wasn't convinced of your resurrection and mine as guaranteed by the resurrected Messiah Jesus?

32 Do you think I was just trying to act heroic when I fought the wild beasts at Ephesus, hoping it wouldn't be the end of me? Not on your life! It's resurrection, resurrection, always resurrection, that undergirds what I do and say, the way I live. If there's no resurrection, "We eat, we drink, the next day we die," and that's all there is to it.

33 But don't fool yourselves. Don't let yourselves be poisoned by this anti-resurrection loose talk. "Bad company ruins good manners."

34 Think straight. Awaken to the holiness of life. No more playing fast and loose with resurrection facts. Ignorance of God is a luxury you can't afford in times like these. Aren't you embarrassed that you've let this kind of thing go on as long as you have?

35 Some skeptic is sure to ask, "Show me how resurrection works. Give me a diagram; draw me a picture. What does this 'resurrection body' look like?"

36 If you look at this question closely, you realize how absurd it is. There are no diagrams for this kind of thing.

37 We do have a parallel experience in gardening. You plant a "dead" seed; soon there is a flourishing plant. There is no visual likeness between seed and plant.

38 You could never guess what a tomato would look like by looking at a tomato seed. What we plant in the soil and what grows out of it don't look anything alike. The dead body that we bury in the ground and the resurrection body that comes from it will be dramatically different.

39 You will notice that the variety of bodies is stunning. Just as there are different kinds of seeds, there are different kinds of bodies - humans, animals, birds, fish - each unprecedented in its form.

40 You get a hint at the diversity of resurrection glory by looking at the diversity of bodies not only on earth but in the skies - sun, moon, stars - all these varieties of beauty and brightness. And we're only looking at pre-resurrection "seeds" - who can imagine what the resurrection "plants" will be like!

42 This image of planting a dead seed and raising a live plant is a mere sketch at best, but perhaps it will help in approaching the mystery of the resurrection body - but only if you keep in mind that when we're raised, we're raised for good, alive forever!

43 The corpse that's planted is no beauty, but when it's raised, it's glorious. Put in the ground weak, it comes up powerful.

44 The seed sown is natural; the seed grown is supernatural - same seed, same body, but what a difference from when it goes down in physical mortality to when it is raised up in spiritual immortality!

45 We follow this sequence in Scripture: The First Adam received life, the Last Adam is a life-giving Spirit.

46 Physical life comes first, then spiritual -

47 a firm base shaped from the earth, a final completion coming out of heaven.

48 The First Man was made out of earth, and people since then are earthy; the Second Man was made out of heaven, and people now can be heavenly.

49 In the same way that we've worked from our earthy origins, let's embrace our heavenly ends.

50 I need to emphasize, friends, that our natural, earthy lives don't in themselves lead us by their very nature into the kingdom of God. Their very "nature" is to die, so how could they "naturally" end up in the Life kingdom?

51 But let me tell you something wonderful, a mystery I'll probably never fully understand. We're not all going to die - but we are all going to be changed.

52 You hear a blast to end all blasts from a trumpet, and in the time that you look up and blink your eyes - it's over. On signal from that trumpet from heaven, the dead will be up and out of their graves, beyond the reach of death, never to die again. At the same moment and in the same way, we'll all be changed.

53 In the resurrection scheme of things, this has to happen: everything perishable taken off the shelves and replaced by the imperishable, this mortal replaced by the immortal.

54 Then the saying will come true: Death swallowed by triumphant Life!

55 Who got the last word, oh, Death? Oh, Death, who's afraid of you now?

56 It was sin that made death so frightening and law-code guilt that gave sin its leverage, its destructive power.

57 But now in a single victorious stroke of Life, all three - sin, guilt, death - are gone, the gift of our Master, Jesus Christ. Thank God!

58 With all this going for us, my dear, dear friends, stand your ground. And don't hold back. Throw yourselves into the work of the Master, confident that nothing you do for him is a waste of time or effort.

New Living Translation NLT

1 Let me now remind you, dear brothers and sisters, of the Good News I preached to you before. You welcomed it then, and you still stand firm in it.

2 It is this Good News that saves you if you continue to believe the message I told you—unless, of course, you believed something that was never true in the first place.

3 I passed on to you what was most important and what had also been passed on to me. Christ died for our sins, just as the Scriptures said.

4 He was buried, and he was raised from the dead on the third day, just as the Scriptures said.

5 He was seen by Peter and then by the Twelve.

6 After that, he was seen by more than 500 of his followers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have died.

7 Then he was seen by James and later by all the apostles.

8 Last of all, as though I had been born at the wrong time, I also saw him.

9 For I am the least of all the apostles. In fact, I’m not even worthy to be called an apostle after the way I persecuted God’s church.

10 But whatever I am now, it is all because God poured out his special favor on me—and not without results. For I have worked harder than any of the other apostles; yet it was not I but God who was working through me by his grace.

11 So it makes no difference whether I preach or they preach, for we all preach the same message you have already believed.

12 But tell me this—since we preach that Christ rose from the dead, why are some of you saying there will be no resurrection of the dead?

13 For if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised either.

14 And if Christ has not been raised, then all our preaching is useless, and your faith is useless.

15 And we apostles would all be lying about God—for we have said that God raised Christ from the grave. But that can’t be true if there is no resurrection of the dead.

16 And if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised.

17 And if Christ has not been raised, then your faith is useless and you are still guilty of your sins.

18 In that case, all who have died believing in Christ are lost!

19 And if our hope in Christ is only for this life, we are more to be pitied than anyone in the world.

20 But in fact, Christ has been raised from the dead. He is the first of a great harvest of all who have died.

21 So you see, just as death came into the world through a man, now the resurrection from the dead has begun through another man.

22 Just as everyone dies because we all belong to Adam, everyone who belongs to Christ will be given new life.

23 But there is an order to this resurrection: Christ was raised as the first of the harvest; then all who belong to Christ will be raised when he comes back.

24 After that the end will come, when he will turn the Kingdom over to God the Father, having destroyed every ruler and authority and power.

25 For Christ must reign until he humbles all his enemies beneath his feet.

26 And the last enemy to be destroyed is death.

27 For the Scriptures say, “God has put all things under his authority.” (Of course, when it says “all things are under his authority,” that does not include God himself, who gave Christ his authority.)

28 Then, when all things are under his authority, the Son will put himself under God’s authority, so that God, who gave his Son authority over all things, will be utterly supreme over everything everywhere.

29 If the dead will not be raised, what point is there in people being baptized for those who are dead? Why do it unless the dead will someday rise again?

30 And why should we ourselves risk our lives hour by hour?

31 For I swear, dear brothers and sisters, that I face death daily. This is as certain as my pride in what Christ Jesus our Lord has done in you.

32 And what value was there in fighting wild beasts—those people of Ephesus —if there will be no resurrection from the dead? And if there is no resurrection, “Let’s feast and drink, for tomorrow we die!”

33 Don’t be fooled by those who say such things, for “bad company corrupts good character.”

34 Think carefully about what is right, and stop sinning. For to your shame I say that some of you don’t know God at all.

35 But someone may ask, “How will the dead be raised? What kind of bodies will they have?”

36 What a foolish question! When you put a seed into the ground, it doesn’t grow into a plant unless it dies first.

37 And what you put in the ground is not the plant that will grow, but only a bare seed of wheat or whatever you are planting.

38 Then God gives it the new body he wants it to have. A different plant grows from each kind of seed.

39 Similarly there are different kinds of flesh—one kind for humans, another for animals, another for birds, and another for fish.

40 There are also bodies in the heavens and bodies on the earth. The glory of the heavenly bodies is different from the glory of the earthly bodies.

42 It is the same way with the resurrection of the dead. Our earthly bodies are planted in the ground when we die, but they will be raised to live forever.

43 Our bodies are buried in brokenness, but they will be raised in glory. They are buried in weakness, but they will be raised in strength.

44 They are buried as natural human bodies, but they will be raised as spiritual bodies. For just as there are natural bodies, there are also spiritual bodies.

45 The Scriptures tell us, “The first man, Adam, became a living person.” But the last Adam—that is, Christ—is a life-giving Spirit.

46 What comes first is the natural body, then the spiritual body comes later.

47 Adam, the first man, was made from the dust of the earth, while Christ, the second man, came from heaven.

48 Earthly people are like the earthly man, and heavenly people are like the heavenly man.

49 Just as we are now like the earthly man, we will someday be like the heavenly man.

50 What I am saying, dear brothers and sisters, is that our physical bodies cannot inherit the Kingdom of God. These dying bodies cannot inherit what will last forever.

51 But let me reveal to you a wonderful secret. We will not all die, but we will all be transformed!

52 It will happen in a moment, in the blink of an eye, when the last trumpet is blown. For when the trumpet sounds, those who have died will be raised to live forever. And we who are living will also be transformed.

53 For our dying bodies must be transformed into bodies that will never die; our mortal bodies must be transformed into immortal bodies.

54 Then, when our dying bodies have been transformed into bodies that will never die, this Scripture will be fulfilled: “Death is swallowed up in victory.

55 O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting? ”

56 For sin is the sting that results in death, and the law gives sin its power.

57 But thank God! He gives us victory over sin and death through our Lord Jesus Christ.

58 So, my dear brothers and sisters, be strong and immovable. Always work enthusiastically for the Lord, for you know that nothing you do for the Lord is ever useless.