Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

Psalm 118

World’s creation in seven days

1 When God began to create^[a] the heavens and the earth— ² the earth was without shape or form, it was dark over the deep sea, and God’s wind swept over the waters— ³ God said, “Let there be light.” And so light appeared. ⁴ God saw how good the light was. God separated the light from the darkness. ⁵ God named the light Day and the darkness Night.

There was evening and there was morning: the first day.

⁶ God said, “Let there be a dome in the middle of the waters to separate the waters from each other.” ⁷ God made the dome and separated the waters under the dome from the waters above the dome. And it happened in that way. ⁸ God named the dome Sky.

There was evening and there was morning: the second day.

⁹ God said, “Let the waters under the sky come together into one place so that the dry land can appear.” And that’s what happened. ¹⁰ God named the dry land Earth, and he named the gathered waters Seas. God saw how good it was. ¹¹ God said, “Let the earth grow plant life: plants yielding seeds and fruit trees bearing fruit with seeds inside it, each according to its kind throughout the earth.” And that’s what happened. ¹² The earth produced plant life: plants yielding seeds, each according to its kind, and trees bearing fruit with seeds inside it, each according to its kind. God saw how good it was.

¹³ There was evening and there was morning: the third day.

¹⁴ God said, “Let there be lights in the dome of the sky to separate the day from the night. They will mark events, sacred seasons, days, and years. ¹⁵ They will be lights in the dome of the sky to shine on the earth.” And that’s what happened. ¹⁶ God made the stars and two great lights: the larger light to rule over the day and the smaller light to rule over the night. ¹⁷ God put them in the dome of the sky to shine on the earth, ¹⁸ to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. God saw how good it was.

¹⁹ There was evening and there was morning: the fourth day.

³⁵ But someone will say, “How are the dead raised? What kind of body will they have when they come back?” ³⁶ Look, fool! When you put a seed into the ground, it doesn’t come back to life unless it dies. ³⁷ What you put in the ground doesn’t have the shape that it will have, but it’s a bare grain of wheat or some other seed. ³⁸ God gives it the sort of shape that he chooses, and he gives each of the seeds its own shape. ³⁹ All flesh isn’t alike. Humans have one kind of flesh, animals have another kind of flesh, birds have another kind of flesh, and fish have another kind. ⁴⁰ There are heavenly bodies and earthly bodies. The heavenly bodies have one kind of glory, and the earthly bodies have another kind of glory. ⁴¹ The sun has one kind of glory, the moon has another kind of glory, and the stars have another kind of glory (but one star is different from another star in its glory). ⁴² It’s the same with the resurrection of the dead: a rotting body is put into the ground, but what is raised won’t ever decay. ⁴³ It’s degraded when it’s put into the ground, but it’s raised in glory. It’s weak when it’s put into the ground, but it’s raised in power. ⁴⁴ It’s a physical body when it’s put into the ground, but it’s raised as a spiritual body.

If there’s a physical body, there’s also a spiritual body. ⁴⁵ So it is also written, The first human, Adam, became a living person,^[a] and the last Adam became a spirit that gives life. ⁴⁶ But the physical body comes first, not the spiritual one—the spiritual body comes afterward. ⁴⁷ The first human was from the earth made from dust; the second human is from heaven. ⁴⁸ The nature of the person made of dust is shared by people who are made of dust, and the nature of the heavenly person is shared by heavenly people. ⁴⁹ We will look like^[b] the heavenly person in the same way as we have looked like the person made from dust.