The Old Testament Lesson
The Old Testament Lesson for today is taken from Jeremiah 7:21-34
Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices, and eat the flesh. For in the day that I brought your ancestors out of the land of Egypt, I did not speak to them or command them concerning burnt offerings and sacrifices. But this command I gave them, "Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people; and walk only in the way that I command you, so that it may be well with you." Yet they did not obey or incline their ear, but, in the stubbornness of their evil will, they walked in their own counsels, and looked backward rather than forward. From the day that your ancestors came out of the land of Egypt until this day, I have persistently sent all my servants the prophets to them, day after day; yet they did not listen to me, or pay attention, but they stiffened their necks. They did worse than their ancestors did. So you shall speak all these words to them, but they will not listen to you. You shall call to them, but they will not answer you. You shall say to them: This is the nation that did not obey the voice of the LORD their God, and did not accept discipline; truth has perished; it is cut off from their lips. Cut off your hair and throw it away; raise a lamentation on the bare heights, for the LORD has rejected and forsaken the generation that provoked his wrath. For the people of Judah have done evil in my sight, says the LORD; they have set their abominations in the house that is called by my name, defiling it. And they go on building the high place of Topheth, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire-- which I did not command, nor did it come into my mind. Therefore, the days are surely coming, says the LORD, when it will no more be called Topheth, or the valley of the son of Hinnom, but the valley of Slaughter: for they will bury in Topheth until there is no more room. The corpses of this people will be food for the birds of the air, and for the animals of the earth; and no one will frighten them away. And I will bring to an end the sound of mirth and gladness, the voice of the bride and bridegroom in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem; for the land shall become a waste.
This is the Word of the Lord
Thanks be to God!
The Epistle Lesson
The Epistle Lesson for today is taken from Romans 4:13-25
For the promise that he would inherit the world did not come to Abraham or to his descendants through the law but through the righteousness of faith. If it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. For the law brings wrath; but where there is no law, neither is there violation. For this reason it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his descendants, not only to the adherents of the law but also to those who share the faith of Abraham (for he is the father of all of us, as it is written, "I have made you the father of many nations")-- in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist. Hoping against hope, he believed that he would become "the father of many nations," according to what was said, "So numerous shall your descendants be." He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was already as good as dead (for he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah's womb. No distrust made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, being fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. Therefore his faith "was reckoned to him as righteousness." Now the words, "it was reckoned to him," were written not for his sake alone, but for ours also. It will be reckoned to us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was handed over to death for our trespasses and was raised for our justification.
This is the Word of the Lord
Thanks be to God!
The Holy Gospel Lesson
The Holy Gospel is written in John 7:37-52
Glory be to Thee, O Lord!
On the last day of the festival, the great day, while Jesus was standing there, he cried out, "Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink. As the scripture has said, 'Out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water.'" Now he said this about the Spirit, which believers in him were to receive; for as yet there was no Spirit, because Jesus was not yet glorified. When they heard these words, some in the crowd said, "This is really the prophet." Others said, "This is the Messiah." But some asked, "Surely the Messiah does not come from Galilee, does he? Has not the scripture said that the Messiah is descended from David and comes from Bethlehem, the village where David lived?" So there was a division in the crowd because of him. Some of them wanted to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him. Then the temple police went back to the chief priests and Pharisees, who asked them, "Why did you not arrest him?" The police answered, "Never has anyone spoken like this!" Then the Pharisees replied, "Surely you have not been deceived too, have you? Has any one of the authorities or of the Pharisees believed in him? But this crowd, which does not know the law-- they are accursed." Nicodemus, who had gone to Jesus before, and who was one of them, asked, "Our law does not judge people without first giving them a hearing to find out what they are doing, does it?" They replied, "Surely you are not also from Galilee, are you? Search and you will see that no prophet is to arise from Galilee."
Here ends the Gospel lesson for today
Glory be to Thee ,O Christ!
Morning Psalms
Psalm 78: Part I Attendite, popule
1 Hear my teaching, O my people; incline your ears to the words of my mouth.
2 I will open my mouth in a parable; I will declare the mysteries of ancient times.
3 That which we have heard and known, and what our forefathers have told us, we will not hide from their children.
4 We will recount to generations to come the praiseworthy deeds and the power of the LORD, and the wonderful works he has done.
5 He gave his decrees to Jacob and established a law for Israel, which he commanded them to teach their children;
6 That the generations to come might know, and the children yet unborn; that they in their turn might tell it to their children;
7 So that they might put their trust in God, and not forget the deeds of God, but keep his commandments;
8 And not be like their forefathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation whose heart was not steadfast, and whose spirit was not faithful to God.
9 The people of Ephraim, armed with the bow, turned back in the day of battle;
10 They did not keep the covenant of God, and refused to walk in his law;
11 They forgot what he had done, and the wonders he had shown them.
12 He worked marvels in the sight of their forefathers, in the land of Egypt, in the field of Zoan.
13 He split open the sea and let them pass through; he made the waters stand up like walls.
14 He led them with a cloud by day, and all the night through with a glow of fire.
15 He split the hard rocks in the wilderness and gave them drink as from the great deep.
16 He brought streams out of the cliff, and the waters gushed out like rivers.
17 But they went on sinning against him, rebelling in the desert against the Most High.
18 They tested God in their hearts, demanding food for their craving.
19 They railed against God and said, "Can God set a table in the wilderness?
20 True, he struck the rock, the waters gushed out, and the gullies overflowed; but is he able to give bread or to provide meat for his people?"
21 When the LORD heard this, he was full of wrath; a fire was kindled against Jacob, and his anger mounted against Israel;
22 For they had no faith in God, nor did they put their trust in his saving power.
23 So he commanded the clouds above and opened the doors of heaven.
24 He rained down manna upon them to eat and gave them grain from heaven.
25 So mortals ate the bread of angels; he provided for them food enough.
26 He caused the east wind to blow in the heavens and led out the south wind by his might.
27 He rained down flesh upon them like dust and wingéd birds like the sand of the sea.
28 He let it fall in the midst of their camp and round about their dwellings.
29 So they ate and were well filled, for he gave them what they craved.
30 But they did not stop their craving, though the food was still in their mouths.
31 So God's anger mounted against them; he slew their strongest men and laid low the youth of Israel.
32 In spite of all this, they went on sinning and had no faith in his wonderful works.
33 So he brought their days to an end like a breath and their years in sudden terror.
34 Whenever he slew them, they would seek him, and repent, and diligently search for God.
35 They would remember that God was their rock, and the Most High God their redeemer.
36 But they flattered him with their mouths and lied to him with their tongues.
37 Their heart was not steadfast toward him, and they were not faithful to his covenant.
38 But he was so merciful that he forgave their sins and did not destroy them; many times he held back his anger and did not permit his wrath to be roused.
39 For he remembered that they were but flesh, a breath that goes forth and does not return.
Evening Psalms
Psalm 78: Part II Quoties exacerbaverunt
40 How often the people disobeyed him in the wilderness and offended him in the desert!
41 Again and again they tempted God and provoked the Holy One of Israel.
42 They did not remember his power in the day when he ransomed them from the enemy;
43 How he wrought his signs in Egypt and his omens in the field of Zoan.
44 He turned their rivers into blood, so that they could not drink of their streams.
45 He sent swarms of flies among them, which ate them up, and frogs, which destroyed them.
46 He gave their crops to the caterpillar, the fruit of their toil to the locust.
47 He killed their vines with hail and their sycamores with frost.
48 He delivered their cattle to hailstones and their livestock to hot thunderbolts.
49 He poured out upon them his blazing anger: fury, indignation, and distress, a troop of destroying angels.
50 He gave full rein to his anger; he did not spare their souls from death; but delivered their lives to the plague.
51 He struck down all the firstborn of Egypt, the flower of manhood in the dwellings of Ham.
52 He led out his people like sheep and guided them in the wilderness like a flock.
53 He led them to safety, and they were not afraid; but the sea overwhelmed their enemies.
54 He brought them to his holy land, the mountain his right hand had won.
55 He drove out the Canaanites before them and apportioned an inheritance to them by lot; he made the tribes of Israel to dwell in their tents.
56 But they tested the Most High God, and defied him, and did not keep his commandments.
57 They turned away and were disloyal like their fathers; they were undependable like a warped bow.
58 They grieved him with their hill-altars they provoked his displeasure with their idols.
59 When God heard this, he was angry and utterly rejected Israel.
60 He forsook the shrine at Shiloh, the tabernacle where he had lived among his people.
61 He delivered the ark into captivity, his glory into the adversary's hand.
62 He gave his people to the sword and was angered against his inheritance.
63 The fire consumed their young men; there were no wedding songs for their maidens.
64 Their priests fell by the sword, and their widows made no lamentation.
65 Then the LORD woke as though from sleep, like a warrior refreshed with wine.
66 He struck his enemies on the backside and put them to perpetual shame.
67 He rejected the tent of Joseph and did not choose the tribe of Ephraim;
68 He chose instead the tribe of Judah and Mount Zion, which he loved.
69 He built his sanctuary like the heights of heaven, like the earth which he founded for ever.
70 He chose David his servant, and took him away from the sheepfolds.
71 He brought him from following the ewes, to be a shepherd over Jacob his people and over Israel his inheritance.
72 So he shepherded them with a faithful and true heart and guided them with the skillfulness of his hands.
New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved. The New Revised Standard Version Bible may be quoted and/or reprinted up to and inclusive of five hundred (500) verses without express written permission of the publisher, provided the verses quoted do not amount to a complete book of the Bible or account for fifty percent (50%) of the total work in which they are quoted.
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