November 8, 2034

Events of the day

• Great-martyr Demetrius of Thessalonica; commemoration of the great earthquake in Constantinople (740)

  Vigil rank

Fasting

Fast day · Wednesday / Friday

Wednesday and Friday: fast without meat, dairy or eggs. Whether fish is allowed depends on the day's feast — check the church calendar.

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

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 — Isaiah 63.15-64.5, 8-9

• Vespers

  Jeremiah 2:2–12

• Vespers

  Wisdom of Solomon 4:7–15

• Matins Gospel

  Matthew 10:16–22

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  ¹⁶“Behold, I send you out as sheep among wolves. Therefore be wise as serpents, and harmless as doves.

  ¹⁷But beware of men: for they will deliver you up to councils, and in their synagogues they will scourge you.

  ¹⁸Yes, and you will be brought before governors and kings for my sake, for a testimony to them and to the nations.

  ¹⁹But when they deliver you up, don’t be anxious how or what you will say, for it will be given you in that hour what you will say.

  ²⁰For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you.

  ²¹“Brother will deliver up brother to death, and the father his child. Children will rise up against parents, and cause them to be put to death.

  ²²You will be hated by all men for my name’s sake, but he who endures to the end will be saved.

• Epistle

  1 Thessalonians 4:1–12

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  ¹Finally then, brothers, we beg and exhort you in the Lord Jesus, that as you received from us how you ought to walk and to please God, that you abound more and more.

  ²For you know what instructions we gave you through the Lord Jesus.

  ³For this is the will of God: your sanctification, that you abstain from sexual immorality,

  ⁴that each one of you know how to control his own body in sanctification and honor,

  ⁵not in the passion of lust, even as the Gentiles who don’t know God,

  ⁶that no one should take advantage of and wrong a brother or sister in this matter; because the Lord is an avenger in all these things, as also we forewarned you and testified.

  ⁷For God called us not for uncleanness, but in sanctification.

  ⁸Therefore he who rejects this doesn’t reject man, but God, who has also given his Holy Spirit to you.

  ⁹But concerning brotherly love, you have no need that one write to you. For you yourselves are taught by God to love one another,

  ¹⁰for indeed you do it toward all the brothers who are in all Macedonia. But we exhort you, brothers, that you abound more and more;

  ¹¹and that you make it your ambition to lead a quiet life, and to do your own business, and to work with your own hands, even as we instructed you;

  ¹²that you may walk properly toward those who are outside, and may have need of nothing.

• Epistle · Earthquake

  Hebrews 12:6–13, 25–27

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  ⁶for whom the Lord loves, he disciplines, and chastises every son whom he receives.”

  ⁷It is for discipline that you endure. God deals with you as with children, for what son is there whom his father doesn’t discipline?

  ⁸But if you are without discipline, of which all have been made partakers, then you are illegitimate, and not children.

  ⁹Furthermore, we had the fathers of our flesh to chasten us, and we paid them respect. Shall we not much rather be in subjection to the Father of spirits, and live?

  ¹⁰For they indeed, for a few days, punished us as seemed good to them; but he for our profit, that we may be partakers of his holiness.

  ¹¹All chastening seems for the present to be not joyous but grievous; yet afterward it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.

  ¹²Therefore lift up the hands that hang down and the feeble knees,

  ¹³and make straight paths for your feet, so what is lame may not be dislocated, but rather be healed.

  ²⁵See that you don’t refuse him who speaks. For if they didn’t escape when they refused him who warned on the earth, how much more will we not escape who turn away from him who warns from heaven,

  ²⁶whose voice shook the earth then, but now he has promised, saying, “Yet once more I will shake not only the earth, but also the heavens.”

  ²⁷This phrase, “Yet once more” signifies the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things that have been made, that those things which are not shaken may remain.

• Epistle · St Demetrius

  2 Timothy 2:1–10

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  ¹You therefore, my child, be strengthened in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.

  ²The things which you have heard from me among many witnesses, commit the same things to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also.

  ³You therefore must endure hardship as a good soldier of Christ Jesus.

  ⁴No soldier on duty entangles himself in the affairs of life, that he may please him who enrolled him as a soldier.

  ⁵Also, if anyone competes in athletics, he isn’t crowned unless he has competed by the rules.

  ⁶The farmer who labors must be the first to get a share of the crops.

  ⁷Consider what I say, and may the Lord give you understanding in all things.

  ⁸Remember Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, of the offspring of David, according to my Good News,

  ⁹in which I suffer hardship to the point of chains as a criminal. But God’s word isn’t chained.

  ¹⁰Therefore I endure all things for the chosen ones’ sake, that they also may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory.

• Gospel

  Luke 11:9–13

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  ⁹“I tell you, keep asking, and it will be given you. Keep seeking, and you will find. Keep knocking, and it will be opened to you.

  ¹⁰For everyone who asks receives. He who seeks finds. To him who knocks it will be opened.

  ¹¹“Which of you fathers, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, he won’t give him a snake instead of a fish, will he?

  ¹²Or if he asks for an egg, he won’t give him a scorpion, will he?

  ¹³If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?”

• Gospel · Earthquake

  Matthew 8:23–27

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  ²³When he got into a boat, his disciples followed him.

  ²⁴Behold, a violent storm came up on the sea, so much that the boat was covered with the waves, but he was asleep.

  ²⁵They came to him, and woke him up, saying, “Save us, Lord! We are dying!”

  ²⁶He said to them, “Why are you fearful, O you of little faith?” Then he got up, rebuked the wind and the sea, and there was a great calm.

  ²⁷The men marveled, saying, “What kind of man is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?”

• Gospel · St Demetrius

  John 15:17–16:2

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  ¹⁷“I command these things to you, that you may love one another.

  ¹⁸If the world hates you, you know that it has hated me before it hated you.

  ¹⁹If you were of the world, the world would love its own. But because you are not of the world, since I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.

  ²⁰Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his lord.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours.

  ²¹But they will do all these things to you for my name’s sake, because they don’t know him who sent me.

  ²²If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have had sin; but now they have no excuse for their sin.

  ²³He who hates me, hates my Father also.

  ²⁴If I hadn’t done among them the works which no one else did, they wouldn’t have had sin. But now they have seen and also hated both me and my Father.

  ²⁵But this happened so that the word may be fulfilled which was written in their law, ‘They hated me without a cause.’

  ²⁶“When the Counselor has come, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will testify about me.

  ²⁷You will also testify, because you have been with me from the beginning.

  ¹“I have said these things to you so that you wouldn’t be caused to stumble.

  ²They will put you out of the synagogues. Yes, the time comes that whoever kills you will think that he offers service to God.

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

Saints and icons

• Prayer of the day: The Trisagion