There are quite a few.
The one that's been in my mind for the last couple months is 1 Corinthians 15:58,
"Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain."
It's part of the chapter that I hadn't focused much on until recently when N.T. Wright highlighted it several times in his work Surprised by Hope.
The context for the passage is the hope of the resurrection of the dead, the Apostle having argued intensely for the resurrection, and what the resurrection of the body means, he follows that up with this benediction and reminder: That the work we do here in the world is not meaningless.
At the same time, by coincidence, I was also listening to Atlantic City by The Band, and the chorus stood out to me,
"Everything dies, baby, that's a fact
But maybe everything that dies some day comes back
Put your makeup on, fix your hair up pretty
And meet me tonight in Atlantic City"
It's what I have in bold that stood out to me. I'm aware that there's nothing religiously significant about the song, it's just that the lyrics happened to pop out at me around the same time I was listening to Surprised by Hope.
That line, "maybe everything that dies some day comes back" is one I really like here.
The question of whether anything in this life matters is a serious one, and in a way gets deep into our own existential sense of self and place in the universe.
Does death win? Does entropy win? Is it really the case that everything that once was, never will be again? Are lives snuffed out forever? Will the sun consume this planet before decaying into a small white dwarf, and then finally decay to nothing when in the trillions of years in the future the universe finally succumbs to heat death, and entropy wins?
Our relationships? The joys of seeing our child's first smile? The wondrous feelings we have looking at the sunset? The love we shared with our significant other as we watched the sun come up together? The laughs we shared with friends while watching silly movies? All the ways my dog annoys me and makes my life better because of it? All of our art, our music, our paintings. Is it all destined to become bone, ash, and ultimately the decaying atoms of an old dead universe? Is that it? Is that really it?
Jesus rising from the dead answers that question with a resounding NO. That isn't it at all. Death doesn't get the last word. Decay is not the fate of everything. Entropy doesn't win. The universe and everything in it matters, and has purpose, meaning, and significance that will endure forever. Because everything truly good will never be lost.
God's answer to all the misery and death in our world is that life is worth living, because life--not death--wins. Therefore our works in the Lord are not in vain.
-CryptoLutheran