Philippians 1.8-14
(Epistle)
8For God is my witness, how I long after all of you in the tender mercies of Christ Jesus.
9This I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and all discernment,
10so that you may approve the things that are excellent, that you may be sincere and without offense to the day of Christ,
11being filled with the fruits of righteousness which are through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God.
12Now I desire to have you know, brothers, that the things which happened to me have turned out rather to the progress of the Good News,
13so that it became evident to the whole palace guard, and to all the rest, that my bonds are in Christ,
14and that most of the brothers in the Lord, being confident through my bonds, are more abundantly bold to speak the word of God without fear.
Romans 9.18-33
(Epistle, Prophet Hosea)
18So then, he has mercy on whom he desires, and he hardens whom he desires.
19You will say then to me, “Why does he still find fault? For who withstands his will?”
20But indeed, O man, who are you to reply against God? Will the thing formed ask him who formed it, “Why did you make me like this?”
21Or hasn’t the potter a right over the clay, from the same lump to make one part a vessel for honor, and another for dishonor?
22What if God, willing to show his wrath and to make his power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction,
23and that he might make known the riches of his glory on vessels of mercy, which he prepared beforehand for glory—
24us, whom he also called, not from the Jews only, but also from the Gentiles?
25As he says also in Hosea, “I will call them ‘my people,’ which were not my people; and her ‘beloved,’ who was not beloved.”
26“It will be that in the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’ there they will be called ‘children of the living God.’”
27Isaiah cries concerning Israel, “If the number of the children of Israel are as the sand of the sea, it is the remnant who will be saved;
28for he will finish the work and cut it short in righteousness, because the Lord will make a short work upon the earth.”
29As Isaiah has said before, “Unless the Lord of Armies had left us a seed, we would have become like Sodom, and would have been made like Gomorrah.”
30What shall we say then? That the Gentiles, who didn’t follow after righteousness, attained to righteousness, even the righteousness which is of faith;
31but Israel, following after a law of righteousness, didn’t arrive at the law of righteousness.
32Why? Because they didn’t seek it by faith, but as it were by works of the law. They stumbled over the stumbling stone,
33even as it is written, “Behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone and a rock of offense; and no one who believes in him will be disappointed.”
Luke 9.23-27
(Gospel)
23He said to all, “If anyone desires to come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me.
24For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever will lose his life for my sake will save it.
25For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses or forfeits his own self?
26For whoever will be ashamed of me and of my words, of him will the Son of Man be ashamed when he comes in his glory, and the glory of the Father, and of the holy angels.
27But I tell you the truth: There are some of those who stand here who will in no way taste of death until they see God’s Kingdom.”