August 26, 2022

Events of the day

• Translation of the relics of St Maximus the Confessor; St Tikhon of Zadonsk

  Polyeleos rank

• Leave-taking of the feast: Transfiguration of the Lord

Fasting

Fast day · Dormition Fast

Dormition Fast, Monday, Wednesday and Friday: xerophagy.

• Meat: not allowed
• Dairy & eggs: not allowed
• Fish: not allowed
• Oil: not allowed
• Wine: not allowed
• Xerophagy

Food rules are reference church information. Agree your personal measure of fasting with a priest; consult a doctor if you are ill.

Readings of the day

• Vespers

  Composite reading — Proverbs 10, 3, 8

• Vespers

  Proverbs 10:31–11:12

• Vespers

  Wisdom of Solomon 4:7–15

• Matins Gospel

  John 10:9–16

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  ⁹I am the door. If anyone enters in by me, he will be saved, and will go in and go out, and will find pasture.

  ¹⁰The thief only comes to steal, kill, and destroy. I came that they may have life, and may have it abundantly.

  ¹¹I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

  ¹²He who is a hired hand, and not a shepherd, who doesn’t own the sheep, sees the wolf coming, leaves the sheep, and flees. The wolf snatches the sheep, and scatters them.

  ¹³The hired hand flees because he is a hired hand, and doesn’t care for the sheep.

  ¹⁴I am the good shepherd. I know my own, and I’m known by my own;

  ¹⁵even as the Father knows me, and I know the Father. I lay down my life for the sheep.

  ¹⁶I have other sheep, which are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will hear my voice. They will become one flock with one shepherd.

• Epistle

  2 Corinthians 4:13–18

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  ¹³But having the same spirit of faith, according to that which is written, “I believed, and therefore I spoke.” We also believe, and therefore we also speak;

  ¹⁴knowing that he who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus, and will present us with you.

  ¹⁵For all things are for your sakes, that the grace, being multiplied through the many, may cause the thanksgiving to abound to the glory of God.

  ¹⁶Therefore we don’t faint, but though our outward man is decaying, yet our inward man is renewed day by day.

  ¹⁷For our light affliction, which is for the moment, works for us more and more exceedingly an eternal weight of glory,

  ¹⁸while we don’t look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.

• Epistle · St Tikhon

  Hebrews 7:26–8:2

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  ²⁶For such a high priest was fitting for us: holy, guiltless, undefiled, separated from sinners, and made higher than the heavens;

  ²⁷who doesn’t need, like those high priests, to offer up sacrifices daily, first for his own sins, and then for the sins of the people. For he did this once for all, when he offered up himself.

  ²⁸For the law appoints men as high priests who have weakness, but the word of the oath which came after the law appoints a Son forever who has been perfected.

  ¹Now in the things which we are saying, the main point is this. We have such a high priest, who sat down on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens,

  ²a servant of the sanctuary and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, not man.

• Gospel

  Matthew 24:27–33, 42–51

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  ²⁷For as the lightning flashes from the east, and is seen even to the west, so will the coming of the Son of Man be.

  ²⁸For wherever the carcass is, that is where the vultures gather together.

  ²⁹But immediately after the suffering of those days, the sun will be darkened, the moon will not give its light, the stars will fall from the sky, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken;

  ³⁰and then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky. Then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory.

  ³¹He will send out his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they will gather together his chosen ones from the four winds, from one end of the sky to the other.

  ³²“Now from the fig tree learn this parable. When its branch has now become tender, and produces its leaves, you know that the summer is near.

  ³³Even so you also, when you see all these things, know that it is near, even at the doors.

  ⁴²Watch therefore, for you don’t know in what hour your Lord comes.

  ⁴³But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what watch of the night the thief was coming, he would have watched, and would not have allowed his house to be broken into.

  ⁴⁴Therefore also be ready, for in an hour that you don’t expect, the Son of Man will come.

  ⁴⁵“Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom his lord has set over his household, to give them their food in due season?

  ⁴⁶Blessed is that servant whom his lord finds doing so when he comes.

  ⁴⁷Most certainly I tell you that he will set him over all that he has.

  ⁴⁸But if that evil servant should say in his heart, ‘My lord is delaying his coming,’

  ⁴⁹and begins to beat his fellow servants, and eat and drink with the drunkards,

  ⁵⁰the lord of that servant will come in a day when he doesn’t expect it, and in an hour when he doesn’t know it,

  ⁵¹and will cut him in pieces, and appoint his portion with the hypocrites. That is where the weeping and grinding of teeth will be.

• Gospel · St Tikhon

  Matthew 5:14–19

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  ¹⁴You are the light of the world. A city located on a hill can’t be hidden.

  ¹⁵Neither do you light a lamp, and put it under a measuring basket, but on a stand; and it shines to all who are in the house.

  ¹⁶Even so, let your light shine before men; that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.

  ¹⁷“Don’t think that I came to destroy the law or the prophets. I didn’t come to destroy, but to fulfill.

  ¹⁸For most certainly, I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not even one smallest letter or one tiny pen stroke shall in any way pass away from the law, until all things are accomplished.

  ¹⁹Whoever, therefore, shall break one of these least commandments, and teach others to do so, shall be called least in the Kingdom of Heaven; but whoever shall do and teach them shall be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven.

Source: Orthocal: lectionary data — Slavic tradition, Julian calendar. Text: World English Bible.

Saints and icons

• Prayer of the day: Short penitential prayers