12But before all these things, they will lay their hands on you and will persecute you, delivering you up to synagogues and prisons, bringing you before kings and governors for my name’s sake.
13It will turn out as a testimony for you.
14Settle it therefore in your hearts not to meditate beforehand how to answer,
15for I will give you a mouth and wisdom which all your adversaries will not be able to withstand or to contradict.
16You will be handed over even by parents, brothers, relatives, and friends. They will cause some of you to be put to death.
17You will be hated by all men for my name’s sake.
18And not a hair of your head will perish.
19“By your endurance you will win your lives.
Isaiah 40.18-31
(6th Hour)
18To whom have you⌃ compared the Lord? and with what likeness have you⌃ compared him?
19Has not the artificer made an image, or the goldsmith having melted gold, gilt it over, and made it a similitude?
20For the artificer chooses out a wood that will not rot, and will wisely enquire how he shall set up his image, and that so that it should not be moved.
21Will you⌃ not know? will you⌃ not hear? has it not been told you of old? Have you⌃ not known the foundations of the earth?
22It is he that comprehends the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants in it are as grasshoppers; he that set up the heaven as a chamber, and stretched it out as a tent to dwell in:
23he that appoints princes to rule as nothing, and has made the earth as nothing.
24For they shall not plant, neither shall they sow, neither shall their root be fixed in the ground: he has blown upon them, and they are withered, and a storm shall carry them away like sticks.
25Now then to whom have you⌃ compared me, that I may be exalted? says the Holy One.
26Lift up your eyes on high, and see, who has displayed all these things? even he that brings forth his host by number: he shall call them all by name by means of his great glory, and by the power of his might: nothing has escaped you.
27For say not you, O Jacob, and why have you spoken, Israel, saying, My way is hid from God, and my God has taken away my judgement, and has departed?
28And now, have you not known? have you not heard? the eternal God, the God that formed the ends of the earth, shall not hunger, nor be weary, and there is no searching of his understanding.
29He gives strength to the hungry, and sorrow to them that are not suffering.
30For the young men shall hunger, and the youths shall be weary, and the choice men shall be powerless:
31but they that wait on God shall renew their strength; they shall put forth new feathers like eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; they shall walk, and not hunger.
Genesis 15.1-15 (Vespers)
1And after these things the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram, I shield you, your reward shall be very great.
2And Abram said, Master and Lord, what will you give me? whereas I am departing without a child, but the son of Masek my home-born female slave, this Eliezer of Damascus is my heir.
3And Abram said, I am grieved since you have given me no seed, but my home-born servant shall succeed me.
4And immediately there was a voice of the Lord to him, saying, This shall not be your heir; but he that shall come out of you shall be your heir.
5And he brought him out and said to him, Look up now to heaven, and count the stars, if you shall be able to number them fully, and he said, Thus shall your seed be.
6And Abram believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness.
7And he said to him, I am God that brought you out of the land of the Chaldeans, so as to give you this land to inherit.
8And he said, Master and Lord, how shall I know that I shall inherit it?
9And he said to him, Take for me an heifer in her third year, and a she-goat in her third year, and a ram in his third year, and a dove and a pigeon.
10So he took to him all these, and divided them in the midst, and set them opposite to each other, but the birds he did not divide.
11And birds came down upon the bodies, even upon the divided parts of them, and Abram sat down by them.
12And about sunset a trance fell upon Abram, and behold! a great gloomy terror falls upon him.
13And it was said to Abram, You shall surely know that your seed shall be a sojourner in a land not their own, and they shall enslave them, and afflict them, and humble them four hundred years.
14And the nation whoever they shall serve I will judge; and after this, they shall come forth hither with much property.
15But you shall depart to your fathers in peace, nourished in a good old age.
Proverbs 15.7-19 (Vespers)
7The lips of the wise are bound by discretion: but the hearts of the foolish are not safe.
8The sacrifices of the ungodly are an abomination to the Lord; but the prayers of them that walk honestly are acceptable with him.
9The ways of an ungodly man are an abomination to the Lord; but he loves those that follow after righteousness.
10The instruction of the simple is known by them that pass by; but they that hate reproofs die disgracefully.
11Hell and destruction are manifest to the Lord; how shall not also be the hearts of men?
12An uninstructed person will not love those that reprove him; neither will he associate with the wise.
13When the heart rejoices the countenance is cheerful; but when it is in sorrow, the countenance is sad.
14An upright heart seeks discretion; but the mouth of the uninstructed will experience evils.
15The eyes of the wicked are always looking for evil things; but the good are always quiet.
16Better is a small portion with the fear of the Lord, than great treasures without the fear of the Lord.
17Better is an entertainment of herbs with friendliness and kindness, than a feast of calves, with enmity.
18A passionate man stirs up strife; but he that is slow to anger appeases even a rising one. A man slow to anger will extinguish quarrels; but an ungodly man rather stirs them up.
19The ways of sluggards are strewn with thorns; but those of the diligent are made smooth.
Hebrews 12.1-10
(Epistle, Martyrs)
1Therefore let’s also, seeing we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, lay aside every weight and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let’s run with perseverance the race that is set before us,
2looking to Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising its shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
3For consider him who has endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, that you don’t grow weary, fainting in your souls.
4You have not yet resisted to blood, striving against sin.
5You have forgotten the exhortation which reasons with you as with children, “My son, don’t take lightly the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when you are reproved by him;
6for whom the Lord loves, he disciplines, and chastises every son whom he receives.”
7It is for discipline that you endure. God deals with you as with children, for what son is there whom his father doesn’t discipline?
8But if you are without discipline, of which all have been made partakers, then you are illegitimate, and not children.
9Furthermore, we had the fathers of our flesh to chasten us, and we paid them respect. Shall we not much rather be in subjection to the Father of spirits and live?
10For they indeed for a few days disciplined us as seemed good to them, but he for our profit, that we may be partakers of his holiness.
Matthew 20.1-16
(Gospel, Martyrs)
1“For the Kingdom of Heaven is like a man who was the master of a household, who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard.
2When he had agreed with the laborers for a denarius a day, he sent them into his vineyard.
3He went out about the third hour, and saw others standing idle in the marketplace.
4He said to them, ‘You also go into the vineyard, and whatever is right I will give you.’ So they went their way.
5Again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did likewise.
6About the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing idle. He said to them, ‘Why do you stand here all day idle?’
7“They said to him, ‘Because no one has hired us.’ “He said to them, ‘You also go into the vineyard, and you will receive whatever is right.’
8“When evening had come, the lord of the vineyard said to his manager, ‘Call the laborers and pay them their wages, beginning from the last to the first.’
9“When those who were hired at about the eleventh hour came, they each received a denarius.
10When the first came, they supposed that they would receive more; and they likewise each received a denarius.
11When they received it, they murmured against the master of the household,
12saying, ‘These last have spent one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat!’
13“But he answered one of them, ‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong. Didn’t you agree with me for a denarius?
14Take that which is yours, and go your way. It is my desire to give to this last just as much as to you.
15Isn’t it lawful for me to do what I want to with what I own? Or is your eye evil, because I am good?’
16So the last will be first, and the first last. For many are called, but few are chosen.”
Commemorations
The Holy Forty Martyrs of Sebastia (Sebaste) (320)
They were all soldiers under one general, taken captive in the time of Licinius for their faith in Christ. They were stripped naked and cast onto a frozen lake at Sebastia in Pontus. They endured the entire night, encouraging each other to be patient. Some accounts say that their persecutors placed warm baths in their sight on the shore to entice them to renounce Christ. Finally one of their number, broken by his sufferings, apostatized and left the company. One of the guards, named Aglaius, saw in a vision thirty-nine wreaths descending from heaven onto the heads of the faithful sufferers, and was moved to declare himself a Christian. He was immediately sent to join the martyrs on the frozen lake, keeping the number of forty complete. In the morning all of them, almost dead, were cast into fire, and their remains thrown in the lake. On the third day the martyrs appeared to Peter, the local bishop, and told him to search for them in the lake. The bishop went to the lake on a dark night with his clergy, and one account says that the bones of the martyrs rose to the surface and burned there like a candle. The relics were gathered and given honorable burial.
This is the most common account. The Prologue gives a somewhat different version, in which the martyrs were made to stand, not on the frozen lake, but in the freezing waters.
St Caesarius (369)
He was the brother of St Gregory the Theologian and, like his brother, was a theological writer. In his works he gave an answer to the question: How long did Adam and Eve spend in Paradise before the Fall? Various writers had given estimates ranging from six hours to three days. Saint Caesarius wrote that our first parents’ time in Paradise was forty days; and that for this reason Christ fasted for forty days in the wilderness, being tempted by the Devil. “For, while the old Adam was not able to withstand the devil’s temptation in the abundance of Paradise, the New Adam withstood him as a true knight in hunger and thirst in the wilderness.” (Prologue)