2 Corinthians 1.1-7 (Epistle)

1Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus through the will of God, and Timothy our brother, to the assembly of God which is at Corinth, with all the saints who are in the whole of Achaia: 2Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

3Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, 4who comforts us in all our affliction, that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, through the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. 5For as the sufferings of Christ abound to us, even so our comfort also abounds through Christ. 6But if we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation. If we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you the patient enduring of the same sufferings which we also suffer. 7Our hope for you is steadfast, knowing that, since you are partakers of the sufferings, so you are also of the comfort.

Matthew 21.43-46 (Gospel)

43“Therefore I tell you, God’s Kingdom will be taken away from you and will be given to a nation producing its fruit. 44He who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces, but on whomever it will fall, it will scatter him as dust.”

45When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables, they perceived that he spoke about them. 46When they sought to seize him, they feared the multitudes, because they considered him to be a prophet.

Seven Sleepers of Ephesus

During a persecution of Christians under the Emperor Decius, these seven Christian youths hid themselves in a cave outside Ephesus. When they were discovered, their persecutors sealed them in the cave to die; but God instead sent them a miraculous, life-preserving sleep. There they rested for about two hundred years. In the time of the Emperor Theodosius the Younger (408-450), a heresy that denied the bodily Resurrection of the dead began to trouble the people. The Emperor prayed God to reveal the truth to the people. At this time, some shepherds removed the stones blocking the cave in order to build a sheep-pen. They discovered the seven youths, who awoke in full health and told their miraculous story. The miracle was told throughout the empire, and the Emperor himself came to Ephesus and spoke with the youths. A week later, they again fell asleep, this time in death.