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 41.4-14
(6th Hour)
4Who has wrought and done these things? he has called it who called it from the generations of old; I God, the first and to all futurity, I AM.
5The nations saw, and feared; the ends of the earth drew near, and came together,
6every one judging for his neighbor and that to assist his brother: and one will say,
7The artificer has become strong, and the coppersmith that smites with the hammer, and forges also: sometimes he will say, It is a piece well joined: they have fastened them with nails; they will fix them, and they shall not be moved.
8But you, Israel, are my servant Jacob, and he whom I have chosen, the seed of Abraam, whom I have loved:
9whom I have taken hold of from the ends of the earth, and from the high places of it I have called you, and said to you, You are my servant; I have chosen you, and I have not forsaken you.
10Fear not; for I am with you: wander not; for I am your God, who have strengthened you; and I have helped you, and have established you with my just right hand.
11Behold, all your adversaries shall be ashamed and confounded; for they shall be as if they were not: and all your opponents shall perish.
12You shall seek them, and you shall not find the men who shall insolently rage against you: for they shall be as if they were not, and they that war against you shall not be.
13For I am your God, who holds your right hand, who says to you,
14Fear not, Jacob, and you Israel few in number; I have helped you, says your God, he that redeems you, O Israel.
Genesis 17.1-9 (Vespers)
1And Abram was ninety-nine years old, and the Lord appeared to Abram and said to him, I am your God, be well-pleasing before me, and be blameless.
2And I will establish my covenant between me and you, and I will multiply you exceedingly.
3And Abram fell upon his face, and God spoke to him, saying,
4And I, behold! my covenant is with you, and you shall be a father of a multitude of nations.
5And your name shall no more be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraam, for I have made you a father of many nations.
6And I will increase you very exceedingly, and I will make nations of you, and kings shall come out of you.
7And I will establish my covenant between you and your seed after you, to their generations, for an everlasting covenant, to be your God, and the God of your seed after you.
8And I will give to you and to your seed after you the land wherein you sojourn, even all the land of Chanaan for an everlasting possession, and I will be to them a God.
9And God said to Abraam, You also shall fully keep my covenant, you and your seed after you for their generations.
Proverbs 15.20-16.9 (LXX) (Vespers)
20A wise son gladdens his father; but a foolish son sneers at his mother.
21The ways of a foolish man are void of sense; but a wise man proceeds on his way aright.
22They that honor not councils put off deliberation; but counsel abides in the hearts of counselors.
23A bad man will by no means attend to counsel; neither will he say anything seasonable, or good for the common weal.
24The thoughts of the wise are ways of life, that he may turn aside and escape from hell.
25The Lord pulls down the houses of scorners; but he establishes the border of the widow.
26An unrighteous thought is abomination to the Lord; but the sayings of the pure are held in honor.
27A receiver of bribes destroys himself; but he that hates the receiving of bribes is safe. By alms and by faithful dealings sins are purged away; but by the fear of the Lord every one departs from evil.
28The hearts of the righteous meditate faithfulness; but the mouth of the ungodly answers evil things. The ways of righteous men are acceptable with the Lord; and through them even enemies become friends.
29God is far from the ungodly; but he hearkens to the prayers of the righteous. Better are small receipts with righteousness, than abundant fruits with unrighteousness. Let the heart of a man think justly, that his steps may be rightly ordered of God. The eye that sees rightly rejoices the heart; and a good report fattens the bones.
32He that rejects instruction hates himself; but he that mind reproofs loves his soul.
33The fear of the Lord is instruction and wisdom; and the highest honor will correspond therewith.
2All the works of the humble man are manifest with God; but the ungodly shall perish in an evil day.
5Every one that is proud in heart is unclean before God, and he that unjustly strikes hands with hand shall not be held guiltless. The beginning of a good way is to do justly; and it is more acceptable with God than to offer sacrifices. He that seeks the Lord shall find knowledge with righteousness: and they that rightly seek him shall find peace. All of the works of the Lord are done with righteousness; and the ungodly man is kept for the evil day.
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)