Daily Devotional

Scripture Readings

Paschalion — Movable Calendar

The Saturday of the Third Week of the Great Fast

Epistle

The Reading is from the Epistle of Saint Paul to the Hebrews [§ 325]. Brethren:

10 ³²Remind yourselves of the former days in which, after ye were illuminated, ye endured a great contest of sufferings: ³³partly, being made a show of both by reproaches and affliction; and partly, having become partners of those who conducted themselves thus. ³⁴For ye also sympathized with those in bonds and ye yourselves accepted the seizure of your possessions with joy, knowing in yourselves that ye have in the heavens a better and abiding possession. ³⁵Do not begin therefore to cast away your boldness which hath great recompense. ³⁶For ye have need of patience, that, after ye do the will of God, ye might receive for yourselves the promise. ³⁷“For yet a very little while, the One Who cometh will come, and will not delay [cf. Hab. 2:3]. ³⁸“Now the just shall live by faith; and if one should draw himself back, My soul hath no pleasure in him [cf. Hab. 2:4].”

Another Reading for Saturday of the Third Week of the Great Fast in Commemoration of the Departed

The Reading is from the First Epistle of Saint Paul to the Thessalonians [§ 270].

4 ¹³Brethren, we do not wish you to be ignorant concerning those who have fallen asleep, that ye may not be grieving, even as the rest who have no hope. ¹⁴For if we believe that Jesus died and is risen, so also those who fell asleep through Jesus will God bring with Him. ¹⁵For we say this to you by the word of the Lord, that we the living, the ones remaining over until the coming of the Lord, in no wise shall precede those who fell asleep. ¹⁶For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout of command, with a voice of an archangel, and with a trumpet of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first. ¹⁷Then we the living, the ones remaining over, shall be carried off together with them in clouds to a meeting of the Lord in the air, and so shall we always be with the Lord.

Gospel

The Reading is from the Holy Gospel according to Saint Mark [§ 8]. At that time:

2 ¹⁴As Jesus passed by, He saw Levi, the son of Alphæos, sitting at the custom-house, and saith to him, “Follow thou Me.” And he rose up and followed Him. ¹⁵And it came to pass, as He was reclining at table in his house, many tax collectors and sinners also were reclining together at table with Jesus and His disciples; for there were many, and they followed Him. ¹⁶And after the scribes and the Pharisees saw Him eating with the tax collectors and sinners, they were saying to His disciples, “Why is it that He eateth and drinketh with the tax collectors and sinners?” ¹⁷And Jesus, having heard it, saith to them, “They who are strong have no need of a physician, but they who are ill; I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.”

Commemoration of the Departed

The Reading is from the Holy Gospel according to Saint John [§ 16]. The Lord said to the Jews who had come to Him:

5 ²⁴“Verily, verily, I say to you, that the one who heareth My word and believeth the One Who sent Me hath everlasting life, and cometh not into judgment, but hath passed over out of death into life. ²⁵“Verily, verily, I say to you, that an hour cometh, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and they who hear shall live. ²⁶“For even as the Father hath life in Himself, so He also gave to the Son to have life in Himself, ²⁷“and He also gave to Him authority to execute judgment. That He is Son of Man, ²⁸“cease marvelling at this; for an hour is coming in which all those in the graves shall hear His voice, ²⁹“and shall go forth—they who did good things to a resurrection of life, but they who practised bad things to a resurrection of condemnation. ³⁰“I am not able to do anything of Myself. Even as I hear, I judge; and My judgment is just, because I seek not Mine own will, but the will of the One Who sent Me, the Father.”

Menaion — Fixed Calendar

The commemoration of our holy father among the saints, Iakovos the Confessor, Bishop of Catania.

No readings given.

Lives of the Saints (Prologue)

April 3rd – Civil Calendar
March 21st – Church Calendar

1. St. Iakovos, Bishop and Confessor.

Neither his birthplace nor the place of his episcopate are known. It is known only that he fulfilled the law of Christ, living in strict asceticism, in fasting and prayer and that, in the time of Kopronymos, he endured much hardship and suffering at the hands of the iconoclasts: hunger, imprisonment and ridicule of every sort. He finally gave his soul to God, Whom he had faithfully served in this life. He lived and suffered in the eighth century.

2. Our Holy Father Cyril (Beryllus), Bishop of Catania in Sicily.

Born in Antioch and a pupil of the Apostle Peter, he governed Christ’s flock well. He had the gift of working wonders by prayer: for example, by his prayers he turned some bitter and undrinkable water—in a place where there was no other water in summer—into sweet, drinkable water. He entered peacefully into rest.

3. St. Thomas, Patriarch of Constantinople.

He lived in the reigns of the Emperors Maurice and Phokas, and in the time of Patriarch John the Faster and Patriarch Kyriakos. Singled out by St. John for his great devotion and zeal, he was made patriarchal vicar by that saint, and after the death of Kyriakos, was chosen as patriarch. In his time an unusual event occurred: once when there was a procession with crosses carried, they began to sway and to hit against each other. The people marvelled at this; and when the patriarch heard it attested, he asked Theodore the Sykeote, a famous ascetic and clairvoyant, to explain what it forebode. Theodore prayed to God and revealed to the patriarch that it indicated a great misfortune that would come on the Church and on the Greek state through internal religious and political discord. Christians would fight and would exterminate each other. And all this came quickly to pass. Thomas begged Theodore to pray to God for him, that God would take him before this happened. ‘Do you command me to come to you, or shall we meet in the other world before God?’ So wrote Theodore to the patriarch, indicating by this that both he and the patriarch would die soon. And that same day the patriarch fell ill and died, and St. Theodore died very soon after. St. Thomas died and went to the Lord in 610.

4. Our Holy Father Serapion.

A companion of St. Anthony the Great, he lived in the Nitrian desert, in charge of the monastery of Arsina which contained 11,000 monks. Palladius and Sozomen gave him the title ‘the Great’. He entered into rest in about 366. St. Serapion wrote: ‘Do not think that sickness is grave; only sin is grave.... Sickness leads us only to the tomb, but sin follows the sinner beyond it’.

FOR CONSIDERATION

You will hear the following justification for enrichment from many who seek it: When you are rich, you can do many good deeds! Do not believe them, for they delude both you and themselves. St. John Climacus knew well the most hidden motives of the human soul when he said: ‘Love of money begins with the assumption that it produces charity, and ends with hatred for the poor.’ This is confirmed in every lover of money, both the very rich and the less rich. People usually say: ‘If I had the money, I would do this and that good deed.’ Do not believe them. Let them not believe themselves. Let them look, as in a mirror, at those who have money and do not do this or that good deed. So would they be if they acquired money. The wise John says again: ‘Do not say that you must collect (money) for the poor, that you may attain to the kingdom of God through these alms. For the kingdom can be bought for two farthings. Indeed the widow in the Gospel did buy it for two farthings, but the rich man, before whose door Lazarus lay, was not able to buy it with all his wealth. If you have nothing to give to the wretched, pray to God that He will give to them, and by that you give alms and purchase the kingdom of heaven. When St. Basil the New prophesied to the empress, the wife of the Emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus, that she would bear first a daughter and then a son, the empress offered him much gold. The saint refused it. But the empress swore in the name of the Holy Trinity that he should take it. Then St. Basil took three gold pieces and gave them to Theodore, his poor servant, saying: ‘We don’t want many of these thorns—they prick horribly!’

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.