Daily Devotional

Scripture Readings

Paschalion — Movable Calendar

Thursday of the Thirty-Second Week

Epistle

The Reading is from the General Epistle of Saint Iakovos [§ 56]. Brethren:

4 ⁷Be subject to God. Stand against the devil, and he will flee from you. ⁸Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, O sinners! And purify your hearts, O double-minded ones! ⁹Endure hardship, and mourn, and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to a downcast look expressive of sorrow. ¹⁰Humble yourselves before the Lord, and He shall exalt you. ¹¹Cease speaking against one another, brethren. He who speaketh against a brother, and judgeth his brother, speaketh against the law, and judgeth the law. But if thou judge the law, thou art not a doer of the law, but a judge. ¹²One is the Lawgiver and Judge, Who is able to save and to destroy. But who art thou who judgest another?

¹³Come now ye that say, “Today and tomorrow we will go into this city, and spend a year there, and trade and gain”; ¹⁴whereas ye know not the matter of tomorrow. For what is your life? For it is a vapor which for a little time appeareth, but then is made to disappear. ¹⁵Instead ye ought to say, “If the Lord will, we shall both live and do this or that.” ¹⁶But now ye boast in your false pretensions; all such boasting is evil. ¹⁷Therefore, to him who knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin.

5 ¹Come now ye rich, weep, cry aloud over your hardships that are coming upon you! ²Your wealth hath rotted, and your garments have become moth-eaten. ³Your gold and silver have become rusty, and their rust shall be for a testimony against you and shall eat your fleshy parts. As fire ye laid up treasure in the last days. ⁴Behold, the hire of the workers who reaped your fields, which hath been kept back by you, crieth out; and the shouts of those who harvested have entered into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth. ⁵Ye lived luxuriously on the earth, and indulgently; ye nourished your hearts, as in a day of slaughter. ⁶Ye condemned, ye murdered the just One; He doth not resist you.

⁷Be long-suffering therefore, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. Behold, the farmer awaiteth the precious fruit of the earth, being long-suffering over it until it should receive the early and latter rain. ⁸Be ye also long-suffering. Make steadfast your hearts; for the coming of the Lord hath drawn near. ⁹Cease groaning against one another, brethren, in order that ye be not condemned. Behold, the Judge is standing before the door.

Gospel

The Reading is from the Holy Gospel according to Saint Mark [§ 30]. At that time:

7 ²⁴Jesus went away into the borders of Tyre and Sidon. And He entered into the house and wished no one to know it, but it was not possible to escape notice. ²⁵For a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit heard about Him, and came and fell at His feet. ²⁶Now the woman was a Greek, a Syrophoenician by race; and she kept on asking Him that He would cast out the demon from her daughter. ²⁷But Jesus said to her, “Let the children first be filled; for it is not good to take the bread of the children and to cast it to the little dogs.” ²⁸And she answered and said to Him, “Yes, Lord; indeed, even the little dogs under the table eat from the little crumbs of the children.” ²⁹And He said to her, “For this utterance go thy way; the demon hath gone out of thy daughter.” ³⁰And having gone away to her house, she found the demon had gone out, and the little child had been put on the bed.

Menaion — Fixed Calendar

The commemoration of our holy and God-bearing Father Anthony the Great.

Epistle

The Reading is from the Epistle of Saint Paul to the Hebrews [§ 335]. Brethren:

13 ¹⁷Be obedient to those who lead you, and keep on submitting, for they are watchful for your souls, as those about to render an account, that they may do this with joy, and not groaning; for this would be unprofitable for you. ¹⁸Keep on praying for us; for we trust that we have a good conscience, in all things wishing to conduct ourselves well. ¹⁹But I beseech you more abundantly to do this, that I might be restored more quickly to you.

²⁰Now the God of peace Who brought up from the dead our Lord Jesus, the Shepherd of the sheep, the great One, in the blood of an everlasting covenant, ²¹may He render you perfect in every good work, in order to do His will, doing in you that which is well-pleasing before His face, through Jesus Christ, to Whom be glory to the ages of the ages. Amen.

Gospel

The Reading is from the Holy Gospel according to Saint Luke [§ 24]. At that time:

6 ¹⁷Jesus stood upon a level place. And there was a crowd of His disciples, and a great multitude of the people from all of Judæa and Jerusalem and the seacoast of Tyre and Sidon, who came to hear Him, and to be healed of their diseases— ¹⁸even those who were troubled by unclean spirits; and they were cured. ¹⁹And all the crowd was seeking to touch Him, for power was coming forth from Him and healing all. ²⁰And He lifted up His eyes to His disciples, and began to say:
   “Blessed are the poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.
   ²¹“Blessed are ye who hunger now, for ye shall be filled.
Blessed are ye who weep now, for ye shall laugh.
   ²²“Blessed are ye whenever men hate you, and whenever they separate you, and reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, on account of the Son of Man.
   ²³“Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in the heavens.”

Lives of the Saints (Prologue)

January 30th – Civil Calendar
January 17th – Church Calendar

1. Our Holy Father Anthony the Great.

He was an Egyptian, born about 250 in a village called Quemen-el-Arons near Herakleopolis. After the death of his rich and noble parents, he shared his inherited possessions with his sister, who was still in her minority, made sure that she was cared for, gave away his half of the inheritance to the poor, and at the age of twenty, consecrated himself to the life of asceticism that he had desired from childhood. At first he lived near his own village but then, in order to escape the disturbance of men, went off into the desert, on the shores of the Red Sea, where he spent twenty years as a hermit in company with no one but God, in unceasing prayer, pondering and contemplation, patiently undergoing inexpressible demonic temptations. His fame spread through the whole world and around him gathered many disciples whom he, by word and example, placed on the path of salvation. In eighty-five years of ascetic life, he went only twice to Alexandria: the first time to seek martyrdom during a time of persecution of the Church, and the second at the invitation of St. Athanasius, to refute the Arians’ slanderous allegations that he too was a follower of the Arian heresy. He departed this life at the age of 105, leaving behind a whole army of disciples and followers. And although Anthony was unlettered, he was as a counselor and teacher one of the most learned men of his age, as also was St. Athanasius the Great. When some Hellenic philosophers tried to test him with literary learning, Anthony shamed them with the question: ‘Which is older, the understanding or the book? And which of these is the source of the other?’ The shamed philosophers dispersed, for they saw that they had only book-learning without understanding, while Anthony had understanding. Here was a man who had attained perfection insofar as man is able on earth. Here was an educator of educators and teacher of teachers, who for a whole eighty-five years perfected himself, and only thus was able to perfect many others. Full of years and great works, Anthony entered into rest in the Lord in the year 356.

2. The Holy Emperor Theodosios the Great.

This famous emperor, a zealot for the Faith, ruled from 379 to 395. Constantine the Great forbade the persecution of Christians. Theodosios the Great went a stage further: he forbade sacrifice to idols in the area under his administration. He played a considerable part in the establishing and spread of the Christian Faith in the world.

3. The Holy Martyr George the New of Ioannina.

He was an Albanian, born in the village of Churkli of very poor parents who were farm-laborers. Made a target by the Turks for conversion to Islam, he remained steadfast in the Christian Faith, for which he was hanged in Ioannina on January 17th, 1838. A great wonder-worker and healer, he is still active today.

FOR CONSIDERATION

St. Anthony teaches: ‘Learn to desire humility, for that will cover all your sins. All sin is hateful to God, but the most hateful of all is pride of heart. Do not consider yourself learned or wise, or all your toil will be lost and your ship will arrive empty at the shore.... If you have great power, threaten no man with death; know that according to nature you also are subject to death and that each soul takes off its body as its final clothing.’

In Byzantium there was a strange and instructive custom at the coronation of the emperor in Hagia Sophia. This was that, when the patriarch placed the crown on the emperor’s head, he at the same time placed in his hand a silk purse filled with grave-dust, that the emperor might be mindful of his death, flee all pride and be humble.

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.