James 1.1-12
(Vespers, St James)
1James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are in the Dispersion: Greetings.
2Count it all joy, my brothers, when you fall into various temptations,
3knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance.
4Let endurance have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.
5But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.
6But let him ask in faith, without any doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, driven by the wind and tossed.
7For that man shouldn’t think that he will receive anything from the Lord.
8He is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.
9Let the brother in humble circumstances glory in his high position;
10and the rich, in that he is made humble, because like the flower in the grass, he will pass away.
11For the sun arises with the scorching wind and withers the grass; and the flower in it falls, and the beauty of its appearance perishes. So the rich man will also fade away in his pursuits.
12Blessed is a person who endures temptation, for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord promised to those who love him.
James 1.13-27
(Vespers, St James)
13Let no man say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God,” for God can’t be tempted by evil, and he himself tempts no one.
14But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own lust and enticed.
15Then the lust, when it has conceived, bears sin. The sin, when it is full grown, produces death.
16Don’t be deceived, my beloved brothers.
17Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom can be no variation nor turning shadow.
18Of his own will he gave birth to us by the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first fruits of his creatures.
19So, then, my beloved brothers, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to anger;
20for the anger of man doesn’t produce the righteousness of God.
21Therefore, putting away all filthiness and overflowing of wickedness, receive with humility the implanted word, which is able to save your souls.
22But be doers of the word, and not only hearers, deluding your own selves.
23For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man looking at his natural face in a mirror;
24for he sees himself, and goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was.
25But he who looks into the perfect law of freedom and continues, not being a hearer who forgets but a doer of the work, this man will be blessed in what he does.
26If anyone among you thinks himself to be religious while he doesn’t bridle his tongue, but deceives his heart, this man’s religion is worthless.
27Pure religion and undefiled before our God and Father is this: to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.
James 2.1-13
(Vespers, St James)
1My brothers, don’t hold the faith of our glorious Lord Jesus Christ with partiality.
2For if a man with a gold ring, in fine clothing, comes into your synagogue, and a poor man in filthy clothing also comes in,
3and you pay special attention to him who wears the fine clothing and say, “Sit here in a good place;” and you tell the poor man, “Stand there,” or “Sit by my footstool”
4haven’t you shown partiality among yourselves, and become judges with evil thoughts?
5Listen, my beloved brothers. Didn’t God choose those who are poor in this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the Kingdom which he promised to those who love him?
6But you have dishonored the poor man. Don’t the rich oppress you and personally drag you before the courts?
7Don’t they blaspheme the honorable name by which you are called?
8However, if you fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” you do well.
9But if you show partiality, you commit sin, being convicted by the law as transgressors.
10For whoever keeps the whole law, and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all.
11For he who said, “Do not commit adultery,” also said, “Do not commit murder.” Now if you do not commit adultery but do murder, you have become a transgressor of the law.
12So speak and so do as men who are to be judged by the law of freedom.
13For judgment is without mercy to him who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment.
John 20.1-10
(7th Matins Gospel)
1Now on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene went early, while it was still dark, to the tomb, and saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb.
2Therefore she ran and came to Simon Peter and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken away the Lord out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have laid him!”
3Therefore Peter and the other disciple went out, and they went toward the tomb.
4They both ran together. The other disciple outran Peter and came to the tomb first.
5Stooping and looking in, he saw the linen cloths lying there; yet he didn’t enter in.
6Then Simon Peter came, following him, and entered into the tomb. He saw the linen cloths lying,
7and the cloth that had been on his head, not lying with the linen cloths, but rolled up in a place by itself.
8So then the other disciple who came first to the tomb also entered in, and he saw and believed.
9For as yet they didn’t know the Scripture, that he must rise from the dead.
10So the disciples went away again to their own homes.
Acts 11.19-26, 29-30
(Epistle)
19They therefore who were scattered abroad by the oppression that arose about Stephen traveled as far as Phoenicia, Cyprus, and Antioch, speaking the word to no one except to Jews only.
20But there were some of them, men of Cyprus and Cyrene, who, when they had come to Antioch, spoke to the Hellenists, preaching the Lord Jesus.
21The hand of the Lord was with them, and a great number believed and turned to the Lord.
22The report concerning them came to the ears of the assembly which was in Jerusalem. They sent out Barnabas to go as far as Antioch,
23who, when he had come, and had seen the grace of God, was glad. He exhorted them all, that with purpose of heart they should remain near to the Lord.
24For he was a good man, and full of the Holy Spirit and of faith, and many people were added to the Lord.
25Barnabas went out to Tarsus to look for Saul.
26When he had found him, he brought him to Antioch. For a whole year they were gathered together with the assembly, and taught many people. The disciples were first called Christians in Antioch.
29As any of the disciples had plenty, each determined to send relief to the brothers who lived in Judea;
30which they also did, sending it to the elders by the hands of Barnabas and Saul.
Acts 12.1-11
(Epistle, St James)
1Now about that time, King Herod stretched out his hands to oppress some of the assembly.
2He killed James, the brother of John, with the sword.
3When he saw that it pleased the Jews, he proceeded to seize Peter also. This was during the days of unleavened bread.
4When he had arrested him, he put him in prison and delivered him to four squads of four soldiers each to guard him, intending to bring him out to the people after the Passover.
5Peter therefore was kept in the prison, but constant prayer was made by the assembly to God for him.
6The same night when Herod was about to bring him out, Peter was sleeping between two soldiers, bound with two chains. Guards in front of the door kept the prison.
7And behold, an angel of the Lord stood by him, and a light shone in the cell. He struck Peter on the side and woke him up, saying, “Stand up quickly!” His chains fell off his hands.
8The angel said to him, “Get dressed and put on your sandals.” He did so. He said to him, “Put on your cloak and follow me.”
9And he went out and followed him. He didn’t know that what was being done by the angel was real, but thought he saw a vision.
10When they were past the first and the second guard, they came to the iron gate that leads into the city, which opened to them by itself. They went out and went down one street, and immediately the angel departed from him.
11When Peter had come to himself, he said, “Now I truly know that the Lord has sent out his angel and delivered me out of the hand of Herod, and from everything the Jewish people were expecting.”
John 4.5-42
(Gospel)
5So he came to a city of Samaria called Sychar, near the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph.
6Jacob’s well was there. Jesus therefore, being tired from his journey, sat down by the well. It was about the sixth hour.
7A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.”
8For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.
9The Samaritan woman therefore said to him, “How is it that you, being a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.)
10Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.”
11The woman said to him, “Sir, you have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. So where do you get that living water?
12Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his children and his livestock?”
13Jesus answered her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again,
14but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never thirst again; but the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life.”
15The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I don’t get thirsty, neither come all the way here to draw.”
16Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.”
17The woman answered, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You said well, ‘I have no husband,’
18for you have had five husbands; and he whom you now have is not your husband. This you have said truly.”
19The woman said to him, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet.
20Our fathers worshiped in this mountain, and you Jews say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.”
21Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father.
22You worship that which you don’t know. We worship that which we know; for salvation is from the Jews.
23But the hour comes, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such to be his worshipers.
24God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”
25The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming, he who is called Christ. When he has come, he will declare to us all things.”
26Jesus said to her, “I am he, the one who speaks to you.”
27Just then, his disciples came. They marveled that he was speaking with a woman; yet no one said, “What are you looking for?” or, “Why do you speak with her?”
28So the woman left her water pot, went away into the city, and said to the people,
29“Come, see a man who told me everything that I have done. Can this be the Christ?”
30They went out of the city, and were coming to him.
31In the meanwhile, the disciples urged him, saying, “Rabbi, eat.”
32But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you don’t know about.”
33The disciples therefore said to one another, “Has anyone brought him something to eat?”
34Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work.
35Don’t you say, ‘There are yet four months until the harvest’? Behold, I tell you, lift up your eyes and look at the fields, that they are white for harvest already.
36He who reaps receives wages and gathers fruit to eternal life, that both he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together.
37For in this the saying is true, ‘One sows, and another reaps.’
38I sent you to reap that for which you haven’t labored. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.”
39From that city many of the Samaritans believed in him because of the word of the woman, who testified, “He told me everything that I have done.”
40So when the Samaritans came to him, they begged him to stay with them. He stayed there two days.
41Many more believed because of his word.
42They said to the woman, “Now we believe, not because of your speaking; for we have heard for ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Savior of the world.”
Luke 5.1-11
(Gospel, St James)
1Now while the multitude pressed on him and heard the word of God, he was standing by the lake of Gennesaret.
2He saw two boats standing by the lake, but the fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets.
3He entered into one of the boats, which was Simon’s, and asked him to put out a little from the land. He sat down and taught the multitudes from the boat.
4When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.”
5Simon answered him, “Master, we worked all night and caught nothing; but at your word I will let down the net.”
6When they had done this, they caught a great multitude of fish, and their net was breaking.
7They beckoned to their partners in the other boat, that they should come and help them. They came and filled both boats, so that they began to sink.
8But Simon Peter, when he saw it, fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, Lord.”
9For he was amazed, and all who were with him, at the catch of fish which they had caught;
10and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. Jesus said to Simon, “Don’t be afraid. From now on you will be catching people alive.”
11When they had brought their boats to land, they left everything, and followed him.