Daily Devotional

Scripture Readings

Paschalion — Movable Calendar

Fifth Sunday of Pascha, or Sunday of the Samaritan Woman

Mode Four — Seventh Eothinon

Epistle

The Reading is from the Acts of the Apostles [§ 28]. In those days:

For Gk usage, see Acts 11:19-30; for Sl. usage. see Acts 11:19-26, 29, 30.

11 ¹⁹The apostles, who were scattered because of the affliction that arose about Stephen, went abroad as far as Phœnicia and Cyprus and Antioch, speaking the word to no one except to Jews only. ²⁰But some of them were men of Cyprus and Cyrene, who, after they came to Antioch, began speaking to the Hellenists, preaching as good tidings the Lord Jesus. ²¹And the hand of the Lord was with them, and a great number believed and turned to the Lord. ²²Then the report concerning them was heard in the ears of the Church which was in Jerusalem. And they sent forth Barnabas to go through as far as Antioch, ²³who, after he came and saw the grace of God, was glad and was exhorting all to keep on remaining near to the Lord with purpose of heart. ²⁴For he was a good man, and full of the Holy Spirit and of faith; and a considerable crowd was added to the Lord. ²⁵And Barnabas went forth to Tarsus to search for Saul. ²⁶And having found him, he brought him to Antioch. And it came to pass that they were gathered together with the Church for a whole year, and taught a considerable crowd. And the disciples were called Christians first in Antioch.

²⁷And in these days prophets came down from Jerusalem to Antioch. ²⁸And one of them, by name Agavos, rose up, and signified by the Spirit that there was about to be a great famine over all the inhabited world, which also came to pass in the time of Claudius Cæsar. ²⁹And according as any one of the disciples was prospered, each of them determined to send relief toward ministering to the brethren who dwelt in Judæa, ³⁰which also they did, sending it off to the presbyters by the hand of Barnabas and Saul.

Gospel

The Reading is from the Holy Gospel according to Saint John [§ 12]. At that time:

4 ⁵Jesus came to a city of Samaria called Sychar, near the place which Jacob gave to his son Joseph. ⁶And Jacob’s well was there. Jesus then, having grown weary from the journey, was sitting thus on the well. It was about the sixth hour. ⁷There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water. Jesus saith to her, “Give Me to drink.” ⁸For His disciples had gone away into the city in order that they might buy provisions. ⁹Then the Samaritan woman saith to Him, “How is it that Thou, being a Jew, askest to drink from me, who am a Samaritan woman? For the Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.” ¹⁰Jesus answered and said to her, “If thou knewest the gift of God, and Who is the One Who saith to thee, ‘Give Me to drink,’ thou wouldest have asked Him, and He would have given to thee living water.” ¹¹The woman saith to Him, “Lord, Thou hast no bucket for drawing water, and the well is deep. From what place then hast Thou the water, the living one? ¹²“Thou art not greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank from it himself, and his sons, and his animals, art Thou?” ¹³Jesus answered and said to her, “Everyone who drinketh of this water shall thirst again; ¹⁴“but whosoever drinketh of the water which I shall give him in no wise shall ever thirst. But the water which I shall give him shall become in him a fountain of water springing into eternal life.” ¹⁵The woman saith to Him, “Lord, give me this water, that I may not be thirsting, nor keep on coming here to draw.” ¹⁶Jesus said to her, “Go, call thy husband, and come here.” ¹⁷The woman answered and said, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “Well didst thou say, ‘I have no husband,’ ¹⁸“for thou hast had five husbands, and now he whom thou hast is not thy husband; this truly thou hast spoken.” ¹⁹The woman saith to Him, “Lord, I perceive that Thou art a prophet. ²⁰“Our fathers do reverence in this mountain, and ye say that in Jerusalem is the place where it is needful to do reverence.” ²¹Jesus saith to her, “Woman, believe Me, that there is coming an hour when neither in this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, shall ye do reverence to the Father. ²²“Ye do reverence what ye know not; we do reverence what we know, for salvation is of the Jews. ²³“But there is coming an hour, and now is, when the true worshippers shall do reverence to the Father in spirit and truth; for also the Father seeketh such as those who revere Him. ²⁴“God is Spirit, and it is needful for those who revere Him to do reverence in spirit and truth.” ²⁵The woman said to Him, “I know that Messiah is coming, the One Who is called Christ. Whenever that One should come, He will announce to us all things.” ²⁶Jesus saith to her, “I am, the One Who speaketh to thee.” ²⁷And upon this came His disciples, and they wondered that He was speaking with a woman; nevertheless no one said, “What seekest Thou?” or “Why speakest Thou with her?” ²⁸The woman then left her waterpot, and went away into the city, and saith to the people, ²⁹“Come, see a Man Who told me all things whatsoever I did. This One is not the Christ, is He?” ³⁰Then they went forth out of the city and were going toward Him.

³¹But in the meantime the disciples were entreating Him, saying, “Rabbi, eat.” ³²But He said to them, “I have food to eat which ye know not.” ³³Therefore the disciples were saying to one another, “No one brought Him anything to eat, did he?” ³⁴Jesus saith to them, “My food is that I be doing the will of Him Who sent Me, and that I should finish His work. ³⁵“Do ye not say, ‘It is yet a space of four months, and the harvest cometh’? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and see the fields, for they are white already to harvest. ³⁶“And the one who reapeth receiveth a reward, and gathereth fruit to life eternal, that both the one who soweth and the one who reapeth may rejoice together. ³⁷“For in this the saying is true, ‘There is one who soweth and another who reapeth.’ ³⁸“I sent you forth to reap on what ye have not labored; others have labored, and ye have entered into their labor.” ³⁹And many of the Samaritans of that city believed in Him, because of the utterance of the woman testifying, “He told me all things whatsoever I did.” ⁴⁰Therefore, when the Samaritans came to Him, they were asking Him to stay with them; and He stayed there two days. ⁴¹And many more believed because of His word. ⁴²And to the woman they were saying, “We no longer believe because of thy talk; for we ourselves have heard, and we know that this One is truly the Savior of the world, the Christ.”

Menaion — Fixed Calendar

The commemoration of the Virgin-martyr Pelagia of Tarsus.

No readings given.

Lives of the Saints (Prologue)

May 17th – Civil Calendar
May 4th – Church Calendar

1. The Holy Martyr Pelagia of Tarsus.

Born in the town of Tarsus of pagan but noble and wealthy parents, she heard about Christ and the salvation of the soul from Christians, became inflamed with love for the Savior and was a Christian in her soul. There was at that time a terrible persecution of Christians. It happened that the Emperor Diocletian himself stopped in Tarsus and that, during the time of his stay in the town, his son, the heir, fell deeply in love with Pelagia and wanted to make her his wife. Pelagia replied through her mother—a wicked woman—that she was already promised to her betrothed husband, Christ the Lord. Fleeing from the foul heir and her wicked mother, Pelagia sought and found Bishop Linus, a man renowned for his holiness. He instructed her in the Faith and baptized her. Then Pelagia gave away her luxurious clothing and great wealth, returned home and confessed to her mother that she was already baptized. Hearing of this, the emperor’s son, losing all hope of getting this holy maiden as his wife, ran himself through with a sword and died. Then the wicked mother denounced her daughter to the emperor and she was taken for trial. The emperor marveled at the girl’s beauty, and forgetting his son, burned with an impure passion for her. But when Pelagia remained unfaltering in her faith, the emperor condemned her to be burned in a metal ox heated by fire. She entered the ox with prayers of thanksgiving to God on her lips, and received a crown of martyrdom. She suffered with honor in 287. Diocletian bid that her remains be cast out of the city for wild beasts to devour, but God preserved her relics intact. Bishop Linus took her relics and buried them honorably. In the time of the Emperor Constantine Kopronymos (741-775), a beautiful church was built on that site in honor of this holy virgin and martyr Pelagia, who was sacrificed for Christ to reign eternally with Him.

2. The Hieromartyr Silvanos, Bishop of Gaza.

He was at first in military service, but later, urged by the strength of his faith, he transferred to spiritual service. Accused of bringing many pagans to Christianity, he was at first brutally tortured then beheaded with forty other soldiers in 311, and thus became a citizen of heaven.

3. Our Holy Father Nikephoros the Hesychast.

He was at first a Roman Catholic, but then became Orthodox. He lived in asceticism on the Holy Mountain as a monk, with the wise Theoleptos. He was a teacher of St. Gregory Palamas and wrote a work on mental prayer. He went peacefully to the Lord in the 14th century. He taught: ‘Gather your mind and compel it to enter into your heart and remain there. When your mind is firmly in your heart, it must not remain empty, but must incessantly make the prayer: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me!” And it must never fall silent. Through this the whole string of the virtues: love, joy, peace and the others, will make their abode in you, by which, then, every request of yours to God will be fulfilled.’

FOR CONSIDERATION

A young man, inexperienced in the spiritual struggle, makes a show to everyone of his good works with self-congratulation. But a soldier experienced in skirmishes with the passions and with demons belittles each work of his and intensifies his prayer for the help of God. Abba Matoes said: ‘The closer a man is to God, the more clearly he knows himself a sinner.’ And, again, he said: ‘When I was young, I thought that I might be able to do some good thing; but now that I am old, I see that I have not done a single good work.’ Did not the Lord say: ‘None is good, but the one God’? If, then, the one God alone is good and the fount of all good, how can a good work be done that is not of God? And how can anyone who performs a good work attribute it to himself and not to God? And, if this is so, by what can a dead man be praised? By nothing but God and the goodness of God.

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.