Daily Devotional

Scripture Readings

Paschalion — Movable Calendar

Friday of the Twelfth Week

Epistle

The Reading is from the Second Epistle of Saint Paul to the Corinthians [§ 184]. Brethren:

7 ¹⁰The sorrow in accordance with God worketh out repentance to salvation, not to be regretted; but the sorrow of the world worketh out death. ¹¹For behold this very thing, that for you to be sorrowed according to God, how much earnestness it worked out in you, yea, what readiness to make a defense, yea, what indignation, yea, what fear, yea, what yearning, yea, what zeal, yea, what vindication! In all things ye commended yourselves to be clear in the matter. ¹²Then, even if I wrote to you, it was not on account of him who did wrong, nor on account of him who was wronged, but in order that your earnestness, which is on our behalf, might be made manifest to you before the face of God. ¹³On this account we have been comforted. And in your comfort, we rejoiced rather more abundantly for the joy of Titus, because his spirit hath been refreshed by all of you. ¹⁴For if I have boasted anything to him concerning you, I was not put to shame; but as we spoke all things to you in truth, so also our boasting, which was before Titus, came to be a truth. ¹⁵And the affection from his inward parts is more abundant toward you, as he remembereth the obedience of you all, how with fear and trembling ye received him. ¹⁶I rejoice that in everything I am of good courage concerning you.

Gospel

The Reading is from the Holy Gospel according to Saint Mark [§ 9]. At that time:

2 ¹⁸The disciples of John and those of the Pharisees were fasting. And they come and say to Jesus, “Why do the disciples of John and those of the Pharisees fast, but Thy disciples fast not?” ¹⁹And Jesus said to them, “The sons of the bridechamber are not able to fast while the bridegroom is with them, are they? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they are not able to fast. ²⁰“But days will come, whenever the bridegroom shall have been taken away from them, and then shall they fast in those days. ²¹“And no one seweth a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment; otherwise that new patch which filleth it taketh away from the old, and a worse tear taketh place. ²²“And no one putteth new wine into old wineskins; otherwise the new wine doth burst the wineskins, and the wine is poured out, and the wineskins will be destroyed; but new wine must be put into new wineskins.”

Menaion — Fixed Calendar

The commemoration of the holy Seven Youths ("the Seven Sleepers") of Ephesus: Maximilianos, Exakoustodianos, Iamvlichos, Martinianos, Dionysios, John, and Constantine.

No readings given.

Lives of the Saints (Prologue)

August 17th – Civil Calendar
August 4th – Church Calendar

1. The Seven Holy Youths of Ephesus.

There was a great persecution of Christians under the Emperor Decius. The emperor himself went to Ephesus, and there prepared a riotous festival in honor of dead idols and also a vicious slaughter of Christians. Seven youths, all of them soldiers, held themselves apart from the foul offering of sacrifice, and wholeheartedly begged the one God to save the Christian people. They were the sons of the most eminent nobles in Ephesus, and their names were: Maximilian, Iamblichus, Martinian, John, Dionysius, Exacustodian, and Antoninus. When they were accused before the emperor, they hid on a hill called Ochlon outside Ephesus, concealing themselves in a cave. When the emperor discovered this, he commanded that the cave be walled-in. God then, in His far-seeing providence, let a miraculous and long-lasting sleep fall on the young men. The imperial courtiers Theodore and Rufinus, secret Christians, caused a copper catafalque with leaden plaques to be made, on which were written the names of these young men and their death by martyrdom under the Emperor Decius. One hundred ninety-four years then passed. In the time of the Emperor Theodosios the Younger (408-450), there arose a great dispute about the resurrection of the dead, for there were some who doubted the resurrection. Emperor Theodosios was greatly grieved at this dispute among the faithful, and prayed God that He would in some way reveal the truth to the people. At that time of altercation in the Church, some shepherds of a certain Adolios, who owned Ochlon, began building pens for their sheep and took stone after stone from this cave. Then the youths awoke from their sleep, young and in full health as they had fallen asleep. This marvel was noised abroad on all sides, and Theodosios himself came with a great retinue and spoke apart with the young men. After a week, they prayed to God to take them from the clamor of the world, and again entered into sleep, the sleep of death, to await the general resurrection. The emperor wanted to place their bodies in golden coffins, but they appeared to him in a dream and told him to leave them in the earth, as they had been.

2. The New-Hieromartyr Kosmas, Equal to the Apostles.

Born in Aitolia, in the village of Megadendron (Great Tree), he went off to the Holy Mountain as a young man and there, in the monastery of Philotheou, was tonsured as a monk. But, urged by a constant desire to preach the Gospel to the people, he went to Constantinople, where he asked the blessing of Patriarch Seraphim II for this. He visited all the Danube area, preaching the Gospel, working especially in Albania, where he suffered at the hands of a certain Kurt Pasha, who was stirred up by the Jews against Kosmas. Kosmas was strangled by the Turks and then cast into a river, in 1779. His wonder-working relics are preserved in the village of Kalikontasi, in the church of the holy Mother of God, not far from the town of Berati. He suffered for his Lord at the age of sixty-five.

FOR CONSIDERATION

‘Keep on asking, and it shall be given you,’ says the Lord (Matt. 7:7). As parents give to their children all that they ask for that is good for them, so our God, in His love for mankind, gives to men all that they ask of Him that is of aid to their salvation. St. Kosmas, as a monk of the Holy Mountain, begged two things of God: to preach the Gospel to the people and to suffer a martyr for the Faith. For a monk of the Holy Mountain, linked by obedience to his monastery, these two desires might have seemed unlikely of fulfillment. But God is almighty. God perfectly fulfilled both of Kosmas’ desires. His joy when he received the patriarch’s blessing to leave the Holy Mountain and go among the people to preach the Gospel was indescribable, and he had another similar moment of joy when the servants of the Turkish pasha announced that, according to the pasha’s orders, he must die. Full of joy, the saint fell to his knees, thanking God for having fulfilled this wish also, and he gave his body to death and his soul to the living 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.