Daily Devotional

Scripture Readings

Special Commemorations

The Saturday After the Nativity of Christ

Epistle

The Reading is from the First Epistle of Saint Paul to Saint Timothy [§ 288]. Child Timothy:

6 ¹¹Be pursuing righteousness, piety, faith, love, patience, meekness. ¹²Keep on fighting the good fight of the faith. Be laying hold of eternal life, to which thou wast also called, and didst confess the good confession before many witnesses. ¹³I enjoin thee before God Who maketh alive all things, and Christ Jesus Who witnessed the good confession before Pontius Pilate, ¹⁴that thou keep the commandment spotless, irreproachable, until the appearance of our Lord Jesus Christ, ¹⁵which in His own times He shall reveal the blessed and only Potentate, the King of those who reign as kings and Lord of those who lord as lords, ¹⁶the One Who alone hath immortality, dwelling in light unapproachable, Whom not one of mankind did see, nor is able to see, to Whom be honor and everlasting might. Amen.

Gospel

The Reading is from the Holy Gospel according to Saint Matthew [§ 46]. At that time:

12 ¹⁵Great crowds followed Jesus, and He cured them all. ¹⁶And He strictly warned them that they should not make Him manifest, ¹⁷in order that what was spoken through Esaias the prophet might be fulfilled, saying, ¹⁸“Behold, My Servant Whom I chose, My Beloved, in Whom My soul is well pleased; I will put My Spirit upon Him, and He shall declare judgment to the nations [cf. Is. 42:1]. ¹⁹“He shall not strive nor cry out, nor shall anyone hear His voice in the streets [cf. Is. 42:2]. ²⁰“A crushed reed He shall not break to pieces, and a smoking flax He shall not quench, until He should send forth the judgment to victory [cf. Is. 42:3, 4].”

Paschalion — Movable Calendar

Saturday of the Thirty-Second Week

Epistle

The Reading is from the First Epistle of Saint Paul to the Thessalonians [§ 273].

5 ¹⁴Brethren, we exhort you, be admonishing the disorderly, be consoling the fainthearted, be supporting the weak, be long-suffering toward all. ¹⁵See ye that no one render evil for evil to anyone, but always be pursuing the good both toward one another and toward all. ¹⁶Be rejoicing always; ¹⁷be praying unceasingly. ¹⁸In everything be giving thanks, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. ¹⁹Cease quenching the Spirit. ²⁰Cease setting at nought prophecies. ²¹Be testing all things, holding fast to the good. ²²Abstain from every form of evil. ²³Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you wholly; and may your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Gospel

The Reading is from the Holy Gospel according to Saint Luke [§ 84]. The Lord said:

17 ³“Be taking heed to yourselves. Now if thy brother should sin against thee, rebuke him; and if he should repent, forgive him. ⁴“And if seven times in the day he should sin against thee, and seven times in the day he should return to thee, saying, ‘I repent,’ thou shalt forgive him.” ⁵And the apostles said to the Lord, “Add faith to us.” ⁶But the Lord said, “If ye have faith as a grain of mustard, ye would say to this sycamine tree, ‘Be rooted out and be planted in the sea’; and it should obey you. ⁷“But which of you, having a slave plowing or shepherding, will say to him when he cometh in from out of the field, ‘straightway, come forth and recline at table’? ⁸“But will he not say to him, ‘Make ready what I might sup on, and gird thyself, and be serving me while I eat and drink; and after these things thou shalt eat and drink’? ⁹“He doth not have gratitude toward that slave because he did the things which were commanded him, doth he? I think not. ¹⁰“Thus also ye, whenever ye have done all things which were commanded you, say, ‘We are unprofitable slaves, for we have done that which we were bound to do.’”

Menaion — Fixed Calendar

The commemoration of the Leave-taking of Nativity, and our venerable mother among the saints, Melanie the Younger, nun of Rome.

No readings given.

Lives of the Saints (Prologue)

January 13th – Civil Calendar
December 31st – Church Calendar

1. Our Holy Mother Melanie the Roman.

Born in Rome of devout and very wealthy parents, she was forced by them to marry a young nobleman, Pinian. She was taken very seriously ill in giving birth to her second child, and told her husband that she would be healed only if he vowed before God to live with her in the future as brother and sister. Her husband agreed and Melanie, in her deep joy, was healed. When it pleased God to take both children to Himself, they agreed to sell all their possessions and give the proceeds to the destitute, the Church and the monasteries. They traveled through many lands and cities, everywhere doing good works. They visited famous spiritual guides in Upper and Lower Egypt, and received much instruction and inspiration from them. During all that time, Melanie lived in strict fasting, fervent prayer and the reading of the holy Scriptures. She followed the practice of reading the Scriptures right through, the Old and New Testaments, every three years, living with her husband as with a brother and fellow-ascetic. Going to Alexandria, they received the blessing of the patriarch, St. Cyril. After that, they went to Jerusalem and settled on the Mount of Olives. There Melanie became an anchoress, and gave herself completely to pondering, fasting and prayer. She lived thus for fourteen years, after which she came out, to help others to salvation, and founded monasteries for men and women. At the invitation of her kinsman, the senator Volusianus, a pagan, she went to Constantinople and brought him to the Christian Faith. She then returned to the Mount of Olives, where she went to God in 438, at the age of fifty-seven.

2. Our Holy Father, the Martyr Zoticus, Protector of the Poor.

He was eminent both of birth and rank. He moved to Constantinople, cast off all worldly things and received ordination to the priesthood, founding a home for the poor, containing a place for the treatment of infectious diseases, and ministering to those cared for in it. He was a close acquaintance of the Emperor Constantine the Great. In retaliation for the gold that Zoticus had had from him for his plague-victims, Constantine’s son, Constantius, tied him behind a wild ass, which was driven about until he died of his wounds. He suffered in the fourth century.

3. Blessed Theophylact, Archbishop of Ochrid.

Born on the island of Evia (Euboea), and educated in Constantinople by the most eminent teachers of his day, he became a priest in the Great Church. He was chosen as bishop, and sent, against his will, to Ochrid, where he spent about twenty-five years (from about 1082 to 1108). Chomatianus of Ochrid calls him ‘the wisest archbishop’. He was a man of enormous learning, both secular and theological, of refined Byzantine tastes, and was by nature melancholy and sensitive. Theophylact felt himself among the Slavs of Ochrid like an exile among barbarians. He wrote commentaries on the Four Gospels and on other books of the New Testament. These are the finest works of their sort after St. John Chrysostom, and are read to this day with great benefit. Of his other works, we know of his Letters, and a Life of St. Clement of Ochrid. In old age, Theophylact withdrew from Ochrid to Thessalonica, and finishing his earthly course, went to the blessedness of eternity.

FOR CONSIDERATION

How wisely holy men and women were able to handle their wealth! How skillfully they bought heavenly goods with their earthly riches! Oh, how low a value they set on earthly goods in themselves, treating them as dust and ashes! When St. Melanie visited the hermits in Egypt with the intention of giving them some financial help, she was astounded at their utter scorning of goods and wealth. Thus, she visited one hermit, Ephestion, and saw nothing in his cell but mats, a bowl for water, a little dry bread and a salt pot. Discovering in advance that the elder would not take money from her, she seized the opportunity to hide several gold pieces in the salt pot. But, as she was on the way back, she heard the elder running after her and calling her to stop. She stopped. The elder held the gold out to her on his palm, saying: ‘I don’t need this; take what’s yours.’ Melanie said to him: ‘If you don’t need it, give it to someone else.’ He replied: ‘No one around here would have any use for it.’ When Melanie would not take the gold back, the elder swung his arm and threw the gold into the river, and then returned to his cell.

During an outbreak of plague in Constantinople, the Emperor Constantius ordered that everyone affected be immediately thrown into the sea. St. Zoticus brought together those infected, and took them to his house to look after them there. When his money ran out, he went to the emperor and asked for money to buy precious pearls for him. The emperor gave him some money, and with this, he gathered further plague-victims and looked after them. One day, the emperor asked Zoticus for the promised pearls, and Zoticus took him and showed him the men in his house, saying: ‘These, O emperor, are living pearls, which I have acquired with toil and money for your salvation.’ The furious emperor condemned Zoticus to death. Zoticus entered into eternal life, and the emperor remained to expiate and repent of his sin.

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.