The Morning Offering

Living the evangelical life of Orthodox monasticism in witness to the salvific truth of the Gospels of Our Lord, God, and Saviour, Jesus Christ.

Glory to Jesus Christ! Glory to Him forever!

The Morning Offering

Wednesday, June 23 / 10 (Church Calendar)

Saints of the Day:

June 10 / 23. Hieromartyr Timothy, Bishop of Prusa. Martyr Alexander and Virgin Martyr Antonina at Constantinople. St. Bassian, Bishop of Lodi in Lombardy. St. Theophanes, monk of Antioch, and St. Pansemne, the former harlot of Antioch. St. John Maximovitch, Metropolitan of Tobolsk. St. Silvanus of the Kiev Caves. (Greek Calendar: Martyr Neaniscus the Wise of Alexandria. St. Canides, monk of Cappadocia. St. Apollo, Bishop, St. Alexius of Bithynia, Bishop) Hieromartyr Metrophanes, the first Chinese priest, and the Chinese New-Martyrs of the Boxer Uprising, at Peking and other places, in 1900. Namesday of Blessed Archbishop John Maximovitch. Repose of Elder Nahum of Solovki (1853) and Schemamonk Sergius of Valaam (1860).

Photo of the Day:

The Holy Offering.

(click for enlargement)

Quote of the Day:

"One must force himself to prayer when he has not spiritual prayer; and thus God, beholding him thus striving and compelling himself by force, in spite of an unwilling heart, gives him the true prayer of the Spirit."

St. Macarius the Great

Scripture Readings for the Day:

Romans 15:7-16

Glorify God Together

⁷ Therefore receive one another, just as Christ also received us, to the glory of God. ⁸ Now I say that Jesus Christ has become a servant to the circumcision for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made to the fathers, ⁹ and that the Gentiles might glorify God for His mercy, as it is written:


      " For this reason I will confess to You among the Gentiles,
      And sing to Your name."

 ¹⁰ And again he says:


      " Rejoice, O Gentiles, with His people!"

   

 ¹¹ And again:


      " Praise the LORD, all you Gentiles!
      Laud Him, all you peoples!"

 ¹² And again, Isaiah says:


      " There shall be a root of Jesse;
      And He who shall rise to reign over the Gentiles,
      In Him the Gentiles shall hope."

¹³ Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.

From Jerusalem to Illyricum

¹⁴ Now I myself am confident concerning you, my brethren, that you also are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge, able also to admonish one another. ¹⁵ Nevertheless, brethren, I have written more boldly to you on some points, as reminding you, because of the grace given to me by God, ¹⁶ that I might be a minister of Jesus Christ to the Gentiles, ministering the gospel of God, that the offering of the Gentiles might be acceptable, sanctified by the Holy Spirit.

Matthew 12:38-45

The Scribes and Pharisees Ask for a Sign

³⁸ Then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered, saying, "Teacher, we want to see a sign from You."
³⁹ But He answered and said to them, "An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. ⁴⁰ For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. ⁴¹ The men of Nineveh will rise up in the judgment with this generation and condemn it, because they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and indeed a greater than Jonah is here. ⁴² The queen of the South will rise up in the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and indeed a greater than Solomon is here.

An Unclean Spirit Returns

⁴³ "When an unclean spirit goes out of a man, he goes through dry places, seeking rest, and finds none. ⁴⁴ Then he says, 'I will return to my house from which I came.' And when he comes, he finds it empty, swept, and put in order. ⁴⁵ Then he goes and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last state of that man is worse than the first. So shall it also be with this wicked generation."