What Does 1 Corinthians 15:58 Mean?
So then, my beloved brothers, be steady, unmoved, always overflowing in the work of the Lord, seeing that your toil is not empty in the Lord.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.THE KEY
The risen life makes your labor in the Lord something death cannot empty.
THE MEANING
Your effort in the Lord is not hollow or lost. You can stand firm and overflow in that work because resurrection carries its fruit beyond what you can see now.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie that costly, unseen work disappears without consequence.
THE ROOT
κόπος
kopos
GROWS FROM
κόπτω
To strike or beat; κόπος (kopos) names the wear and toil of labor.
“toil” in this verse is kopos. The word holds the bodily cost of work: this is effort that wears on you, not an abstract task. Yet the verse says this real cost is not empty when it is in the Lord.
ALSO GROWS
kopiaō: To labor, grow weary through effort.
κοπιάω
It shares the κόπ- word family and shows that the labor named here can be felt as weariness.
koptō: To strike, beat, or mourn.
κόπτω
The root’s forceful image gives κόπος its sense of effort that takes something out of the body.
κενός
kenos
GROWS FROM
κεν-
Empty, hollow, or without content.
The Greek says your labor is not empty in the Lord. Its cost is not erased, and its meaning is not measured only by what is visible now.
ALSO GROWS
kenoō: To empty or make void.
κενόω
It makes the verse’s assurance vivid: the labor is not emptied of its worth.
kenodoxia: Empty glory or conceit.
κενοδοξία
This related word joins emptiness with hollow recognition, clarifying that labor’s worth rests in the Lord rather than in visible acclaim.
περισσεύοντες
perisseuontes
GROWS FROM
περισσ-
Surplus, abundance, more than enough.
“overflowing” in this verse is perisseuontes. The word pictures more than merely continuing: your work can overflow. Joined to the promise that labor is not empty, abundance becomes possible without pretending the labor is effortless.
ALSO GROWS
perisseuō: To abound, overflow, or have in excess.
περισσεύω
This is the verb behind the verse’s image of work extending beyond a bare minimum.
perisseuma: Surplus or abundance.
περίσσευμα
This related noun helps show the sense of overflow carried by the work described here.
THE PATTERN
Labor rooted in God is not lost to present weariness; its fruit reaches beyond what is visible now.
Those who sow in tears reap in a ringing cry. Going, he goes and weeps, carrying the bag of seed; coming, he comes in a ringing cry, carrying his sheaves.While making good, let us not give out, for in its own season we reap, if we do not go slack.For God is not out of alignment to forget your work and the toil of love, which you have shown toward his nature, in that you have served the set-apart ones, and still serve.THE THREAD
But by the favor of God I am what I am, and his favor toward me did not become empty; rather I toiled more abundantly than all of them, yet not I, but the favor of God that is with me.The word translated “laboured” is κοπιάω (kopiaō), from the same word family as κόπος (kopos), “labour,” in this verse. The earlier line holds costly effort together with grace, showing how labor can be real without becoming empty.
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