Daily Devotional

Scripture Readings

Paschalion — Movable Calendar

Saturday of the Fourth Week

Epistle

The Reading is from the Epistle of Saint Paul to the Romans [§ 92]. Brethren:

6 ¹¹Thus reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord. ¹²Therefore let not sin be reigning in your mortal body, so that ye obey it in its desires. ¹³Cease presenting your members as weapons of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourselves to God, as those alive from the dead, and your members as weapons of righteousness to God. ¹⁴For sin shall not have dominion over you; for ye are not under the law, but under grace.

¹⁵What then? Shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? May it not be! ¹⁶Ye know, do ye not, that to whom ye present yourselves slaves in regard to obedience, his slaves ye are to whom ye obey, whether of sin to death, or of obedience to righteousness? ¹⁷But thanks be to God, that ye were slaves of sin, but ye obeyed from the heart, to which form of teaching ye were delivered.

Gospel

The Reading is from the Holy Gospel according to Saint Matthew [§ 26]. At that time:

8 ¹⁴After Jesus came into the house of Peter, He saw his mother-in-law bedridden and ill with a fever. ¹⁵And He touched her hand, and the fever left her. And she arose and began to minister to Him. ¹⁶And evening having come to pass, they brought to Him many possessed by demons. And He cast out the spirits with a word, and cured all those who were ill, ¹⁷that it might be fulfilled that which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, “He Himself took our weaknesses and bore our diseases [cf. Is. 53:4].”

¹⁸Now after Jesus saw great crowds around Him, He gave orders to go away to the other side. ¹⁹And a scribe came and said to Him, “Teacher, I will follow Thee wheresoever Thou goest.” ²⁰And Jesus saith to him, “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the heaven have nests, but the Son of Man hath nowhere that He may lay His head.” ²¹And another of His disciples said to Him, “Lord, permit me first to go away and bury my father.” ²²But Jesus said to him, “Follow thou Me, and leave the dead to bury their own dead.”

²³And after He embarked into the ship, His disciples followed Him.

Menaion — Fixed Calendar

The commemoration of Hieromartyr Timothy, Bishop of Prusa, and the Martyrs Alexander and Antonina at Constantinople.

No readings given.

Lives of the Saints (Prologue)

June 23rd – Civil Calendar
June 10th – Church Calendar

1. The Hieromartyr Timothy, Bishop of Prousa.

For his great spiritual purity, God gave him the gift of wonder-working, and he healed all manner of diseases and pains among the people. During the reign of the evil Emperor Julian, who had renounced Christ, holy Timothy was thrown into prison. The faithful visited him there to listen to the wise teaching of their bishop. When this came to his ears, Julian commanded that the executioner behead him in the prison. This was in 362, and his soul entered into Paradise while his relics remained, full of miraculous power, to help the people and declare the power of the Lord.

2. The Holy Martyrs Alexander and Antonina.

Antonina was a virgin and Alexander an imperial soldier, both from Alexandria and both Christians. Antonina was first taken before the judge and tortured. When they threw her into prison, Alexander went to it at the command of an angel of God (being up to that time a stranger to Antonina), draped her in his military cloak and told her to keep her head lowered and go out through the guardhouse in front of the gates. In this way, she escaped and he remained in the prison. They brought Alexander before the judge, and began to interrogate him for the name of Christ. When Antonina heard of this, she came before the judge herself, and he put them both to various tortures. He cut off their hands and then flayed their naked bodies, scorching their wounds with torches, and finally cast them into a fire set in a hole in the ground, covering them with earth. They suffered with honor for the name of Christ and entered into the courts of the heavenly King on May 3rd, 313. The wicked judge, Festus, became dumb at the time of the martyrs’ deaths, and an evil spirit fell on him, torturing him for seven days before killing him.

3. St. Bassian, Bishop of Lodi.

A pagan born in Syracuse of eminent and wealthy parents, he studied philosophy in Rome. At his own desire, he was baptized by the devout elder Gordianus. This offended his parents, and to escape their wrath, he went to Ravenna on the advice of St. John the Theologian, who appeared to him, and there in Ravenna made himself known to the bishop, Ursus, a kinsman of his. On the bishop’s instructions, Bassian found lodgings near the Church of the Holy Martyr Apollinarius outside the city, and there labored a long time in toil, fasting and prayer. When the Bishop of Lodi in Liguria died, Bassian was elected, not according to his own desire but through a revelation in a dream. He was consecrated by St. Ambrose of Milan and Ursus of Ravenna. He had a great gift of healing, and could even raise the dead. He was present during St. Ambrose’s last hours and heard from those holy lips how St. Ambrose had seen the Lord Jesus Christ. He lived to a great age in toil and asceticism and finished his earthly course at the age of ninety, entering into the kingdom of God in about 409. His holy relics continue to work miracles as a witness to the power of God and the greatness of His saint.

FOR CONSIDERATION

It is not the same thing to eat your meal with a blessing and to eat it without one. Every meal is eaten at God’s table which He Himself has laid for us, and we must thank God, our Host, and ask His blessing. Food which is blessed is both sweeter and more satisfying, but unblessed food is both bitter and unsatisfying—and unhealthy. The Emperor Theodosios the Younger was once walking in the outskirts of Constantinople, and seeing the little house of a monk, called in on him. The elder asked the emperor if he would like something to eat. The emperor accepted, and the elder brought him bread, oil, salt and water. The emperor ate and drank, and then asked the monk: ‘Do you know who I am?’ ‘God knows who you are,’ answered the monk. ‘I am the Emperor Theodosios.’ The monk silently prostrated before him. The emperor then said to him: ‘I am an emperor and the son of an emperor, but believe me, I have never before in my life eaten such sweet-tasting food as here today with you.’ ‘And do you know the reason?’ asked the elder, and went on: ‘It is because we monks always prepare our food with prayer and a blessing, and therefore even bad food will turn into sweet for us. They certainly take a lot of trouble over the preparation of your food, but they do not ask a blessing from God, and so the most delicious food is tasteless.’

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.