Daily Devotional

Monday, May 27, 2024 (NS), May 14, 2024 (OS)

No Fasting.

Monday of the Fourth Week

The commemoration of the Martyr Isidore at Chios.

Jump to Prologue

Scripture Readings

Paschalion — Movable Calendar

Monday of the Fourth Week

Epistle

The Reading is from the Acts of the Apostles [§ 24]. In those days:

10 ¹There was a certain man in Cæsarea, by name Cornelius, a centurion from a cohort which is called Italic, ²a pious man and one who feared God with all his house, who both did many alms to the people and entreated God continually. ³He saw in a vision plainly, about the ninth hour of the day, an angel of God come in to him and say to him, “Cornelius.” ⁴And after he looked intently on him, he became afraid, and said, “What is it, Lord?” And he said to him, “Thy prayers and thine alms are gone up for a memorial before God. ⁵“And now send men to Joppa, and send for Simon, who is surnamed Peter. ⁶“This man is staying as a guest with one Simon a tanner, whose house is by the sea.” ⁷And when the angel who spoke to Cornelius departed, he called two of his household servants, and a pious soldier of those who remained in service to him. ⁸And after he related in full all things to them, he sent them forth to Joppa. ⁹And on the morrow, as they sojourned and drew near to the city, Peter went up on the housetop to pray, about the sixth hour. ¹⁰And he became very hungry, and was wishing to taste food. But while they prepared, a state of ecstasy fell upon him. ¹¹And he beholdeth the heaven having been opened, and a certain vessel descending upon him, as a great sheet bound at the four corners, and being let down upon the earth, ¹²in which were all the quadrupeds of the earth, and the beasts, and the creeping things, and the birds of the heaven. ¹³And there came a voice to him, “Rise up, Peter, slay and eat.” ¹⁴But Peter said, “Not at all, Lord; for I never ate anything common or unclean.” ¹⁵And a voice again came for the second time to him, “What God cleansed, cease thou making common.” ¹⁶And this took place thrice; and the vessel was taken up again into the heaven.

Gospel

The Reading is from the Holy Gospel according to Saint John [§ 24]. The Lord said to those Jews who had believed Him:

6 ⁵⁶“The one who eateth My flesh and drinketh My blood abideth in Me, and I in him. ⁵⁷“Even as the living Father sent Me forth, and I live because of the Father, also the one who eateth Me, even he shall live because of Me. ⁵⁸“This One is the bread, the One having come down out of the heavens—not as your fathers ate the manna, and died. The one who eateth this bread shall live forever.” ⁵⁹These things He said in the synagogue, as He taught in Capernaum.

⁶⁰Many of His disciples, therefore, after they heard this, said, “Hard is this saying; who is able to hear it?” ⁶¹But Jesus, knowing in Himself that His disciples were murmuring about this, said to them, “Doth this offend you? ⁶²“What if then ye should see the Son of Man ascending where He was before? ⁶³“It is the spirit that maketh alive; the flesh profiteth nothing. The words which I have spoken to you are spirit and life. ⁶⁴“But there are some of you who believe not.” For Jesus knoweth from the beginning who they are who believe not, and who is the one who shall deliver Him up. ⁶⁵And He was saying, “Therefore, I have told you, that no one is able to come to Me, except it be given to him from My Father.” ⁶⁶From this time on, many out of His disciples went away to the things left behind, and no longer walked about with Him. ⁶⁷Then said Jesus to the twelve, “Ye do not also wish to go away, do ye?” ⁶⁸Then Simon Peter answered Him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life; ⁶⁹“and we have believed and have come to know that Thou art the Christ, the Son of God, the living One.”

Menaion — Fixed Calendar

The commemoration of the Martyr Isidore at Chios.

No readings given.

Lives of the Saints (Prologue)

May 27th – Civil Calendar
May 14th – Church Calendar

1. The Holy Martyr Isidore.

In the reign of the Emperor Decius, this Isidore was taken by force by soldiers from the island of Chios. He had held the Christian Faith from his youth, and had spent his life in fasting, prayer and good works. So when, in the army, he declared himself to be a Christian, the commander took him to task for it, and urged him to deny Christ and offer sacrifice to idols. The saint replied: ‘Even if you kill my body, you have no power over my soul. I have the true and living God, Jesus Christ, Who lives in me and will be with me at my death; and I am in Him and shall remain in Him, and will not cease to confess His holy name while the spirit is in my body.’ The commander ordered that they first beat him with iron flails and then cut out his tongue. But, even without his tongue, Isidore was able to speak, and confessed the name of Christ by the Spirit of God. Meanwhile the punishment of God struck the commander, and he suddenly became mute. The mute commander finally gave the signal to behead Isidore. Isidore rejoiced at this sentence, and praising God, went out to the scaffold, where his head was cut off in the year 251. His friend, Ammon, buried his body, and after that, himself suffered and received the wreath of martyrdom.

2. Our Holy Father Serapion the Sindonite.

‘Sindon’ means ‘linen cloth,’ and this saint was called ‘the Sindonite’ because he covered his naked body only with a linen cloth. He carried the Gospels in his hand. Serapion lived like the birds, with no roof and no cares, moving from one place to another. He gave his linen cloth to a poor wretch who was shivering with cold, and himself remained completely naked. When someone asked him: ‘Serapion, who made you naked?’ he indicated the Gospels and said: ‘This!’ But, after that, he gave away the Gospels also for the money needed by a man who was being hounded to prison by a creditor for a debt. At one time in Athens, he did not eat for four days, having nothing, and began to cry out with hunger. When the Athenian philosophers asked him what he was shouting about, he replied: ‘There were three to whom I was in debt: two have quieted down, but the third is still tormenting me.’ The crowd was roused to aid him. They asked him who these were who were tormenting him. He replied: ‘The first creditor is carnal lust, which has tormented me from my youth; the second is love of money, and the third is the stomach. The first two have left me alone, but the third one still torments me.’ The philosophers gave him some gold to buy bread. He went to a baker, bought a single loaf, put down all the gold and went out. He went peacefully to the Lord in old age, in the 5th century.

3. Blessed Isidore the Fool for Christ.

He was of German birth. Going to Rostov from an attraction to the Orthodox Faith, he not only became a member of the Orthodox Church but took on himself the strict asceticism of folly for Christ. He lived in rags, spending the day pretending madness, and through this madness, teaching men; and spending the nights in prayer. He spent these nights in a hut outside the town, built in a lonely swamp. Great and mighty wonders were performed by this saint, both during his lifetime and after his death. He appeared to a merchant who had been thrown out of his ship and was drowning. Isidore came to him through the water and led him to the shore. He caused the wine in all the containers to dry up one day, when the servants had driven him from the door of the Prince of Rostov without giving him a single cup of water. When he died in his hut on May 24th, 1484, the whole of Rostov was aware of a fragrant aroma. The merchant who had been saved from the sea built a church in the place where the hut had stood.

FOR CONSIDERATION

A sin that is a cause of scandal to others is a twofold sin. A wise man tries to ensure that he gives scandal to no one by his sinful example and leads another into sin. St. Ambrose applauds such wisdom in the Emperor Valentinian, who died young, in this example from his life: ‘The emperor, hearing that he was being talked of all over Rome as a passionate hunter of wild beasts—which he, in fact, was not—and that this passion was taking the emperor away from his duties of state, immediately commanded that all the wild beasts in his forests be destroyed. Hearing, on another occasion, that some malicious person was spreading word that he lunched early (wanting by this to make him out to be a glutton), he took on himself a very strict fast, both publicly and privately. At public meals, he was rarely seen to put a morsel of food into his mouth. When, again, his sisters were in dispute with a man over some land, the emperor, although he had the right to try the case himself, submitted it to trial in open court, so that he could not be accused of partiality.’ Truly this devout emperor kept with godly fear to the words of the Lord: ‘Woe to him that causes offence to one of these little ones.’

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.