The Call of Abram

12 Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.^{(A) 2} I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.^{(B) 3} I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”^[a](C)

⁴ So Abram went, as the Lord had told him, and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran.^{(D) 5} Abram took his wife Sarai and his brother’s son Lot and all the possessions that they had gathered and the persons whom they had acquired in Haran, and they set forth to go to the land of Canaan. When they had come to the land of Canaan,^{(E) 6} Abram passed through the land to the place at Shechem, to the oak^[b] of Moreh. At that time the Canaanites were in the land.^{(F) 7} Then the Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring I will give this land.” So he built there an altar to the Lord, who had appeared to him.^{(G) 8} From there he moved on to the hill country on the east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east, and there he built an altar to the Lord and invoked the name of the Lord.^{(H) 9} And Abram journeyed on by stages toward the Negeb.

Jacob’s Dream at Bethel

¹⁰ Jacob left Beer-sheba and went toward Haran. ¹¹ He came to a certain place and stayed there for the night, because the sun had set. Taking one of the stones of the place, he put it under his head and lay down in that place. ¹² And he dreamed that there was a stairway^[a] set up on the earth, the top of it reaching to heaven, and the angels of God were ascending and descending on it.^{(A) 13} And the Lord stood beside him^[b] and said, “I am the Lord, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac; the land on which you lie I will give to you and to your offspring,^{(B) 14} and your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south, and all the families of the earth shall be blessed^[c] in you and in your offspring.^{(C) 15} Know that I am with you and will keep you wherever you go and will bring you back to this land, for I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.”^{(D) 16} Then Jacob woke from his sleep and said, “Surely the Lord is in this place—and I did not know it!”^{(E) 17} And he was afraid and said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.”

¹⁸ So Jacob rose early in the morning, and he took the stone that he had put under his head and set it up for a pillar and poured oil on the top of it.^{(F) 19} He called that place Bethel,^[d] but the name of the city was Luz at the first.^{(G) 20} Then Jacob made a vow, saying, “If God will be with me and will keep me in this way that I go and will give me bread to eat and clothing to wear,^{(H) 21} so that I come again to my father’s house in peace, then the Lord shall be my God,^{(I) 22} and this stone, which I have set up for a pillar, shall be God’s house, and of all that you give me I will surely give one-tenth to you.”^(J)

⁴ Now there are varieties of gifts but the same Spirit,^{(A) 5} and there are varieties of services but the same Lord,^{(B) 6} and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone. ⁷ To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.^{(C) 8} To one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit,^{(D) 9} to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit,^{(E) 10} to another the working of powerful deeds, to another prophecy, to another the discernment of spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues.^{(F) 11} All these are activated by one and the same Spirit, who allots to each one individually just as the Spirit chooses.^(G)

One Body with Many Members

¹² For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ.^{(H) 13} For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.^(I)

¹⁴ Indeed, the body does not consist of one member but of many. ¹⁵ If the foot would say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. ¹⁶ And if the ear would say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. ¹⁷ If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? ¹⁸ But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. ¹⁹ If all were a single member, where would the body be? ²⁰ As it is, there are many members yet one body. ²¹ The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” ²² On the contrary, the members of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, ²³ and those members of the body that we think less honorable we clothe with greater honor, and our less respectable members are treated with greater respect, ²⁴ whereas our more respectable members do not need this. But God has so arranged the body, giving the greater honor to the inferior member, ²⁵ that there may be no dissension within the body, but the members may have the same care for one another. ²⁶ If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it.

²⁷ Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.^{(J) 28} And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then deeds of power, then gifts of healing, forms of assistance, forms of leadership, various kinds of tongues.^{(K) 29} Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work powerful deeds? ³⁰ Do all possess gifts of healing? Do all speak in tongues? Do all interpret?^{(L) 31} But strive for the greater gifts. And I will show you a still more excellent way.^(M)