June 17, 2023 :: Evening Prayer
Saturday after the First Sunday after Trinity
Here beginneth the 30th chapter of Job.
But now they that are younger than I have me in derision, whose fathers I would have disdained to have set with the dogs of my flock.
Yea, whereto might the strength of their hands profit me, in whom old age was perished?
For want and famine they were solitary; fleeing into the wilderness in former time desolate and waste.
Who cut up mallows by the bushes, and juniper roots for their meat.
They were driven forth from among men, (they cried after them as after a thief;)
To dwell in the clifts of the valleys, in caves of the earth, and in the rocks.
Among the bushes they brayed; under the nettles they were gathered together.
They were children of fools, yea, children of base men: they were viler than the earth.
And now am I their song, yea, I am their byword.
They abhor me, they flee far from me, and spare not to spit in my face.
Because he hath loosed my cord, and afflicted me, they have also let loose the bridle before me.
Upon my right hand rise the youth; they push away my feet, and they raise up against me the ways of their destruction.
They mar my path, they set forward my calamity, they have no helper.
They came upon me as a wide breaking in of waters: in the desolation they rolled themselves upon me.
Terrors are turned upon me: they pursue my soul as the wind: and my welfare passeth away as a cloud.
And now my soul is poured out upon me; the days of affliction have taken hold upon me.
My bones are pierced in me in the night season: and my sinews take no rest.
By the great force of my disease is my garment changed: it bindeth me about as the collar of my coat.
He hath cast me into the mire, and I am become like dust and ashes.
I cry unto thee, and thou dost not hear me: I stand up, and thou regardest me not.
Thou art become cruel to me: with thy strong hand thou opposest thyself against me.
Thou liftest me up to the wind; thou causest me to ride upon it, and dissolvest my substance.
For I know that thou wilt bring me to death, and to the house appointed for all living.
Howbeit he will not stretch out his hand to the grave, though they cry in his destruction.
Did not I weep for him that was in trouble? was not my soul grieved for the poor?
When I looked for good, then evil came unto me: and when I waited for light, there came darkness.
My bowels boiled, and rested not: the days of affliction prevented me.
I went mourning without the sun: I stood up, and I cried in the congregation.
I am a brother to dragons, and a companion to owls.
My skin is black upon me, and my bones are burned with heat.
My harp also is turned to mourning, and my organ into the voice of them that weep.
Here endeth the first lesson.
Here beginneth the 1st chapter of Galatians.
Paul, an apostle, (not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised him from the dead;)
And all the brethren which are with me, unto the churches of Galatia:
Grace be to you and peace from God the Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ,
Who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father:
To whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.
I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel:
Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ.
But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.
As we said before, so say I now again, If any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed.
For do I now persuade men, or God? or do I seek to please men? for if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ.
But I certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached of me is not after man.
For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ.
For ye have heard of my conversation in time past in the Jews' religion, how that beyond measure I persecuted the church of God, and wasted it:
And profited in the Jews' religion above many my equals in mine own nation, being more exceedingly zealous of the traditions of my fathers.
But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by his grace,
To reveal his Son in me, that I might preach him among the heathen; immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood:
Neither went I up to Jerusalem to them which were apostles before me; but I went into Arabia, and returned again unto Damascus.
Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to see Peter, and abode with him fifteen days.
But other of the apostles saw I none, save James the Lord's brother.
Now the things which I write unto you, behold, before God, I lie not.
Afterwards I came into the regions of Syria and Cilicia;
And was unknown by face unto the churches of Judæa which were in Christ:
But they had heard only, That he which persecuted us in times past now preacheth the faith which once he destroyed.
And they glorified God in me.