1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. 2 Now the earth was without shape and empty, and darkness was over the surface of the watery deep, but the Spirit of God was hovering¹¹ over the surface of the water. 3 God said, “Let there be light.” And there was light! 4 God saw that the light was good, so God separated the light from the darkness.

18 For this is what the Lord says, the one who created the sky— he is the true God, the one who formed the earth and made it; he established it, he did not create it without order, he formed it to be inhabited: “I am the Lord, I have no peer. 19 I have not spoken in secret, in some hidden place. I did not tell Jacob’s descendants, ‘Seek me in vain!’ I am the Lord, the one who speaks honestly, who makes reliable announcements. 20 Gather together and come! Approach together, you refugees from the nations. Those who carry wooden idols know nothing, those who pray to a god that cannot deliver.