Daily Devotional

Scripture Readings

Pascalion — Movable Calendar

Tuesday of the Thirty-Fourth Week

Epistle

The Reading is from the Second General Epistle of Saint Peter [§ 67]. Beloved:

2 ⁹The Lord knoweth how to deliver the pious out of temptation, and to keep the unjust who are under punishment until a day of judgment, ¹⁰and, most of all, those who walk after the flesh in the lust of defilement and despise dominion. They are daring, self-willed! They tremble not at blaspheming dignities; ¹¹whereas angels, who are greater in strength and power, do not bring a reviling condemnation against them before the Lord. ¹²But these—as irrational animals, in accordance with nature, having been born for capture and corruption, blaspheming in which things they are ignorant—shall be destroyed in their corruption, ¹³and are about to receive the wages of unrighteousness, since they deem it pleasure living softly in the day. Spots they are and blemishes, revelling in their deceits, feasting with you, ¹⁴having eyes full of an adulteress and of incessant sin, enticing unstable souls, having a heart which hath been exercised with greedy desires, children of a curse! ¹⁵Forsaking the straight way, they were led astray, following the way of Balaam, son of Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness. ¹⁶But he had reproof of his own transgression of the law: the dumb beast of burden which spoke in a man’s voice hindered the madness of the prophet. ¹⁷These are waterless fountains, clouds being driven by a storm, for whom the gloom of darkness hath been kept forever. ¹⁸For when they speak great swelling words of vanity, they entice with the desires of the flesh, by licentious acts, the ones who verily escape from those who conduct themselves in error, ¹⁹promising them freedom who are themselves slaves of corruption; for by whom anyone hath been defeated, by the same hath he been enslaved. ²⁰For if, after they escaped the pollutions of the world by a full knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they then are again entangled in these and defeated, the last state hath become worse to them than the first. ²¹For it would have been better for them not to have acknowledged the way of righteousness, than, having acknowledged it, to have turned from the holy commandment which was delivered to them. ²²But the word of the proverb hath happened to them: “The dog returned to its own vomit [cf. Prov. 26:11]”; and, “The sow, having washed herself, to her wallowing in the mire.”

Gospel

The Reading is from the Holy Gospel according to Saint Mark [§ 60]. The Lord said to His disciples:

13 ¹⁴“Whenever ye see ‘the abomination of the desolation [cf. Dan. 9:27, 12:11],’ which was spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing where it ought not—the one who readeth, let him understand—then let those in Judæa flee to the mountains. ¹⁵“And the one who is on the housetop, let him not come down into the house, nor go in to take away anything out of his house. ¹⁶“And the one who is in the field, let him not return to the things behind, to take up his outer garment. ¹⁷“And woe to those who are with child, and to those who give suck in those days! ¹⁸“But be praying that your flight might not take place in winter. ¹⁹“For there shall be affliction in those days, such as hath not been the like from the beginning of creation which God created until the present, and never shall be. ²⁰“And if the Lord did not shorten those days, no flesh would be saved; but for the elect’s sake, whom He chose for Himself, He shortened the days. ²¹“And then if anyone should say to you, ‘Behold, here is the Christ; behold, there,’ do not begin to believe it. ²²“For false christs and false prophets shall be raised up, and shall produce signs and wonders, with a view to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. ²³“Be taking heed; behold, I have told you all things beforehand.”

Menaion — Fixed Calendar

21. The commemoration of our venerable Father Maximos the Confessor, the holy Martyr Neophytos of Nicæa, and the holy Martyrs Evgenios, Candidos, Valerian, and Aquila at Trebizond.

Epistle

For the Confessor:

The Reading is from the Epistle of Saint Paul to the Philippians [§ 237].

1 ¹²Brethren, I wish you to know that the things concerning me have come rather to the advancement of the Gospel, ¹³so that my bonds in Christ have become manifest in all the Prætorium, and to all the rest; ¹⁴and the majority of the brethren in the Lord, having become confident by my bonds, more abundantly dare to speak the word without fear. ¹⁵Some on the one hand proclaim Christ even because of envy and strife, but some on the other hand also because of good will: ¹⁶The former announce Christ out of factiousness, not purely, supposing to bring affliction to my bonds; ¹⁷but the latter out of love, knowing that I am set for the defense of the Gospel. ¹⁸What then? Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is announced. And in this I rejoice. Yes, and I will be rejoicing. ¹⁹For I know that this shall turn out to my salvation through your entreaty, and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ, ²⁰according to mine earnest expectation and hope, that in nothing shall I be ashamed, but in all boldness, as always, also now Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether by life or by death.

for Sl. usage, see [Heb. 11:33-40].

For the Martyrs:

The Reading is from the Epistle of Saint Paul to the Hebrews [§§ 330, 331]. Brethren:

11 ³³All the saints through faith struggled against kingdoms, wrought righteousness, attained to promises, stopped mouths of lions, ³⁴quenched the power of fire, escaped the edges of the sword, were empowered out of weakness, became strong in battle, turned back encampments of aliens. ³⁵Women received their dead by resurrection. And others were tortured, not accepting release, that they might attain a better resurrection. ³⁶And others received trial of mockings and of scourgings, and, moreover, of bonds and of imprisonment. ³⁷They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted; they died, murdered by the sword. They went about in sheepskins, in goatskins, being in need, afflicted, ill-treated— ³⁸of whom the world was not worthy. They were made to wander in deserts, and in mountains, and in caves, and in the holes of the earth. ³⁹And these all, having been approved by testimony through faith, received not for themselves the promise, ⁴⁰God having foreseen some better thing concerning us, that they should not be made perfect without us.

12 ¹Therefore we also, having so great a cloud of witnesses which is set around us, and having laid aside every weight and sin that is easily circumvented, let us by means of patience be running the course which is set before us, ²looking to Jesus, the originator and accomplisher of our faith, Who, in exchange for the joy set before Him, endured a cross, having despised the shame, and hath sat down on the right of the throne of God.

Gospel

The Reading is from the Holy Gospel according to Saint Luke [§ 64]. The Lord said to His disciples:

12 ⁸“Everyone who shall confess in Me before men, the Son of Man also shall confess in him before the angels of God. ⁹“But the one who denieth Me before the face of men shall be denied before the face of the angels of God. ¹⁰“And everyone who shall speak a word against the Son of Man, it shall be forgiven him; but to the one who blasphemeth against the Holy Spirit it shall not be forgiven. ¹¹“And whenever they bring you in before the synagogues and the rulers and the authorities, cease being anxious how or what ye should speak in defense, or what ye should say; ¹²“for the Holy Spirit shall teach you in the same hour what things it is needful to say.”

Lives of the Saints (Prologue)

February 3rd – Civil Calendar
January 21st – Church Calendar

1. Our Holy Father Maximus the Confessor.

By birth a citizen of Constantinople and at first a high-ranking courtier at the court of the Emperor Herakleios, he then became a monk and the abbot of a monastery not far from the capital. He was the greatest defender of Orthodoxy against the Monothelite heresy, which developed from the heresy of Eftyches. That is to say: as Eftyches asserted that there is in Christ only one nature, so the Monothelites asserted that there is in Him only one will. Maximus resisted this assertion and found himself in opposition to both the emperor and the patriarch. But he was unafraid, and persevered to the end in proving that there are in the Lord two wills and also two natures. By his efforts, one council in Carthage and one in Rome stood firm, and both these councils anathematized the Monothelite teaching. Maximus’ sufferings for Orthodoxy cannot be described: he was tortured by hierarchs, spat upon by the mass of the people, beaten by soldiers, persecuted, imprisoned; until finally, with his tongue cut out and one hand cut off, he was condemned to exile for life in Skhimaris, where he gave his soul into God’s hands in the year 662. Even with his tongue cut out, he was, through God’s grace, able to speak even more clearly in defense of the Faith.

2. Blessed Maximus the Greek.

He was born in Greece, whence he was called to the court of the Russian Tsar Vasily Ivanovitch as Imperial librarian and translator. He labored much and also suffered much for the truth. He spent a long time in prison, where he wrote the well-known Canon to the Holy Spirit which is still used in church, and entered into rest in the Lord in the year 1556.

3. The Holy Martyr Neophytos.

Nicaean by birth, he was even in childhood a worker of great wonders by the grace of God. He brought forth water from rocks and raised his dead mother to life. Led by a white dove to Mount Olympus, he chased a lion out of its cave and himself settled there. He was martyred for Christ in Nicaea under Diocletian at the age of fifteen, refusing to deny Christ in any way. After beatings and imprisonment, he was thrown into fire, but God preserved him alive. Then he was put before a hungry lion, but the lion fawned around him. The saint recognized this lion as the same one in whose cave he had lived in asceticism, so he pardoned it and ordered it to return to the cave. Then Neophytos was run through with a spear and his soul went to the courts of the Lord.

4. The Holy Martyr Agnes.

As a girl of thirteen, she was thrown into the fire for her faith in Christ, then beheaded with the sword. She showed great wonder-working power, both in her lifetime and after her death. She suffered in the reign of Diocletian, in the year 305.

FOR CONSIDERATION

The Christian Faith uniquely in the world has one fixed and unchanging scale of values. St. John Chrysostom speaks clearly about this: ‘There are,’ he says, ‘three kinds of category; the first are good and can never be evil; for example, wisdom, mercy and so forth; the second are evil and can never be good; for example, debauchery, inhumanity, cruelty. The third are sometimes the one and sometimes the other, according to the disposition of those who make use of them.’ And, with this explanation by that godly teacher, one sees how riches and poverty, freedom and slavery, power and sickness and death itself fall into this neutral category, which are in themselves neither good nor evil, but are the one or the other according to the disposition of men and the use men make of them. For example, if riches were good and poverty were evil, then all the rich would be good and all the poor would be evil. However, we are daily convinced that, as there are good and evil rich people, so there are good and evil poor people. This can also be noted in relation to the healthy and the sick, the free and the enslaved, the fed and the hungry, those in power and those in subjection. Even death is not evil, for ‘the martyrs became through death the happiest of all’.

Daily Scripture Readings taken from The Orthodox New Testament, translated and published by Holy Apostles Convent, Buena Vista, Colorado, copyright © 2000, used with permission, all rights reserved.

Daily Prologue Readings taken from The Prologue of Ochrid, by Bishop Nikolai Velimirovic, translated by Mother Maria, published by Lazarica Press, Birmingham, England, copyright © 1985, all rights reserved. Edited by Dormition Skete.