Daily Devotional

Scripture Readings

Paschalion — Movable Calendar

Friday of the Eleventh Week

Epistle

The Reading is from the Second Epistle of Saint Paul to the Corinthians [§ 177]. Brethren:

4 ¹³Since we have the same spirit of faith, according to that which hath been written: “I believed, wherefore I spoke [Ps. 115(116):1],” we also believe, and therefore speak, ¹⁴knowing that the One Who raised up the Lord Jesus shall raise up us also through Jesus, and shall present us with you. ¹⁵For all things are for your sakes, that the grace, which abounded through the majority, might cause the giving of thanks to abound more to the glory of God. ¹⁶Wherefore, we are not fainthearted; but even if our outward man is being utterly destroyed, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day. ¹⁷For the lightness of our momentary affliction worketh for us a more and more surpassing eternal weight of glory, ¹⁸while we do not look at the things which are seen, but the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.

Gospel

The Reading is from the Holy Gospel according to Saint Matthew [§ 100]. The Lord said to His disciples:

24 ²⁷“For even as the lightning cometh forth from the east and appeareth as far as the west, so also shall be the coming of the Son of Man. ²⁸“For wheresoever the corpse may be, there will the eagles be gathered together.

²⁹“And straightway after the affliction of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from the heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken. ³⁰“And then shall the sign of the Son of Man appear in the heaven, and then the tribes of the earth shall mourn, and they shall see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the heaven with power and great glory. ³¹“And He shall send forth His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together His elect from the four winds, from the uttermost parts of the heavens unto their extremities. ³²“Now learn the parable from the fig tree: Whenever its branch at once should become tender and put forth leaves, ye know that the summer is near. ³³“Thus also ye, whenever ye see all these things, know ye that it is near, even at the doors. ³⁴“Verily I say to you, in no wise shall this generation pass away until all these things shall have taken place. ³⁵“The heaven and the earth shall pass away, but My words in no wise shall pass away. ³⁶“But concerning that day and hour, no one knoweth, not even the angels of the heavens, except My Father only. ³⁷“But even as the days of Noah were, so also shall be the coming of the Son of Man. ³⁸“For even as in the days which were before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark— ³⁹“and they knew not until the flood came and took all away—so also shall be the coming of the Son of Man. ⁴⁰“Then two shall be in the field: the one is taken and the one is left. ⁴¹“Two women shall be grinding at the mill: one is taken and one is left. ⁴²“Be watching then, for ye know not in what hour your Lord cometh. ⁴³“But know ye this, that if the master of the house had known in what watch the thief was coming, he would have watched and not let his house be broken into. ⁴⁴“On this account, ye also keep on becoming ready, for in what hour ye think not, the Son of Man cometh. ⁴⁵“Who then is the faithful and prudent slave, whom his lord appointeth over his household, to give them food in due season? ⁴⁶“Happy is that slave whom his lord, after he cometh, shall find so doing. ⁴⁷“Verily I say to you, that he shall appoint him over all his possessions. ⁴⁸“But if that evil slave should say in his heart, ‘My lord taketh time to come,’ ⁴⁹“and should himself begin to strike his fellow slaves, and to eat and to drink with the drunken, ⁵⁰“the lord of that slave shall come in a day in which he expecteth not, and in an hour in which he knoweth not, ⁵¹“and will cut him in twain, and will place his portion with the hypocrites. There shall be there the weeping and the gnashing of the teeth.”

Menaion — Fixed Calendar

The commemoration of Hieromartyr Eftychios, disciple of St. John the Theologian.

No readings given.

Lives of the Saints (Prologue)

September 6th – Civil Calendar
August 24th – Church Calendar

1. The Hieromartyr Eftyches.

One of the lesser apostles, born in Sebastopol, he was a disciple and friend of the Apostles John the Theologian and Paul. Although he was not included in the Seventy, he was called an apostle by virtue of having been a disciple of the great apostles, and because he showed true apostolic zeal in the service of the Gospel. Consecrated as a missionary bishop, St. Eftyches travelled widely, having an angel as a companion, and he also received heavenly bread from an angel while in prison. When his body was flayed with serrated iron rods, his blood ran down mingled with a sweet myrrh. He was thrown into the flames and before wild beasts, and was finally beheaded with the sword in Sebastopol.

2. The Holy Martyr Tation.

Born in Mantinaeas near Claudioupolis in Bithynia, he suffered under Diocletian. After harsh torture, he was buried alive and thus gave his holy soul into God’s hands.

3. The Holy Martyr Syra.

A kinswoman of St. Golinduc (July 12th), she was a Persian, the daughter of an eminent priest of fire-worship. Brought up in paganism, the maiden Syra heard of Christ from some godly Christian woman, and her little heart became inflamed with love for the Lord. In a time of sickness, while still unbaptized, she begged dust from the church of the Christian priest, but he refused to give it to her in her unbaptized state. Then she, with great faith, touched the priest’s garments and was healed. This miraculous healing confirmed her yet more fully in the Christian Faith. Her soulless father put her to harsh torture, during which she received encouragement and support from heavenly visions. Cruelly strangled with a cord and then drowned, in 558 at the age of eighteen, in the time of the Persian King Chozroes I, this holy maiden thus gloriously finished her earthly course and entered into the heavenly community of the angels.

4. Our Holy Father Arseny of Komel.

Born in Moscow of noble parents, he received the monastic schema as a young man in the community of St. Sergius of Radonezh. A model monk, he was chosen as abbot, but he yearned for a life of prayerful solitude and withdrew to the forest of Komel, where he lived in asceticism till his death, fighting courageously with great diabolical temptations. He entered into rest in the Lord in 1550.

5. St. George Limniotes (“of the Lake”).

A confessor and a great ascetic of Olympus, he suffered in about 216, at the age of ninety-five.

In the Greek Great Synaxarion, St. Dionysius, Archbishop of Aegina, who died in 1624, is also commemorated (translation of his relics). Many miracles have been wrought over his relics.

FOR CONSIDERATION

If you ask many people why they do not go to church, they usually reply: ‘I haven’t got time; I must work.’ Look at these people, who only work and never go to church, devoting themselves only to their work, and compare them with people who set aside time both for work and for prayer, and you will soon be convinced that these latter are different. They are better-off, and which is more important, more contented. It is told of two neighbors who were tailors that they were very different in their work and in their prayer, in their possessions and in their contentment. One of them had a large family and the other was single. The first had the habit of going to church each morning, and the lone one never went to church. The first not only worked less, but was a less skilled workman than the other, but he had all he needed and the other was in straitened circumstances. The latter asked the former how it was that he had everything although he worked less. The prayerful man replied that he went to church every day, and found some gold on the way. He invited his neighbor to go with him to pray, promising that they would share the gold that they found. His neighbor began going regularly to church, and they both soon became one in their abundance and their contentment. They found no gold on the road, but the gold of God’s blessing increased the abundance of these true men of prayer. To those who ‘seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness,’ God will add the increase of all that is necessary to them for their bodily life.

Daily Scripture Readings taken from The Orthodox New Testament, translated and published by Holy Apostles Convent, Buena Vista, Colorado, copyright © 2000, used with permission, all rights reserved.

Daily Prologue Readings taken from The Prologue of Ochrid, by Bishop Nikolai Velimirovic, translated by Mother Maria, published by Lazarica Press, Birmingham, England, copyright © 1985, all rights reserved. Edited by Dormition Skete.