But I know there is someone in heaven who will come at last to my defense.

I will see him with my own eyes, and he will not be a stranger. My courage failed because you said,

Those of our people who have died will live again! Their bodies will come back to life. All those sleeping in their graves will wake up and sing for joy. As the sparkling dew refreshes the earth, so the LORD will revive those who have long been dead.

I felt the powerful presence of the LORD, and his spirit took me and set me down in a valley where the ground was covered with bones.

He said to me, "Mortal man, can these bones come back to life?" I replied, "Sovereign LORD, only you can answer that!"

I will not save this people from the world of the dead or rescue them from the power of death. Bring on your plagues, death! Bring on your destruction, world of the dead! I will no longer have pity for this people.

Jesus answered them, "How wrong you are! It is because you don't know the Scriptures or God's power.

Now, as for the dead rising to life: haven't you ever read what God has told you? He said,

"Your brother will rise to life," Jesus told her.

Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me will live, even though they die;

But the truth is that Christ has been raised from death, as the guarantee that those who sleep in death will also be raised.

For just as all people die because of their union with Adam, in the same way all will be raised to life because of their union with Christ.

Listen to this secret truth: we shall not all die, but when the last trumpet sounds, we shall all be changed in an instant, as quickly as the blinking of an eye. For when the trumpet sounds, the dead will be raised, never to die again, and we shall all be changed.

For what is mortal must be changed into what is immortal; what will die must be changed into what cannot die.

We believe that Jesus died and rose again, and so we believe that God will take back with Jesus those who have died believing in him.

And I saw the dead, great and small alike, standing before the throne. Books were opened, and then another book was opened, the book of the living. The dead were judged according to what they had done, as recorded in the books.

These, then, will be sent off to eternal punishment, but the righteous will go to eternal life."

Do not be surprised at this; the time is coming when all the dead will hear his voice

and come out of their graves: those who have done good will rise and live, and those who have done evil will rise and be condemned.

I have the same hope in God that these themselves have, namely, that all people, both the good and the bad, will rise from death.

"As they leave, they will see the dead bodies of those who have rebelled against me. The worms that eat them will never die, and the fire that burns them will never be put out. The sight of them will be disgusting to all people."

But you, LORD, are on my side, strong and mighty, and those who persecute me will fail. They will be disgraced forever, because they cannot succeed. Their disgrace will never be forgotten.

After all, the man who makes the pots has the right to use the clay as he wishes, and to make two pots from the same lump of clay, one for special occasions and the other for ordinary use.