September 20, 2023 :: Evening Prayer
Wednesday after the Fifteenth Sunday after Trinity
Here beginneth the 7th chapter of Zechariah.
Lord came unto Zechariah in the fourth day of the ninth month, even in Chisleu;
And it came to pass in the fourth year of king Darius, that the word of the Lord,
When they had sent unto the house of God Sherezer and Regem-melech, and their men, to pray before the Lord of hosts, and to the prophets, saying, Should I weep in the fifth month, separating myself, as I have done these so many years?
And to speak unto the priests which were in the house of the Lord of hosts unto me, saying,
Then came the word of the Speak unto all the people of the land, and to the priests, saying, When ye fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh month, even those seventy years, did ye at all fast unto me, even to me?
And when ye did eat, and when ye did drink, did not ye eat for yourselves, and drink for yourselves?
Lord hath cried by the former prophets, when Jerusalem was inhabited and in prosperity, and the cities thereof round about her, when men inhabited the south and the plain?
Should ye not hear the words which the Lord came unto Zechariah, saying,
And the word of the Lord of hosts, saying, Execute true judgment, and shew mercy and compassions every man to his brother:
Thus speaketh the And oppress not the widow, nor the fatherless, the stranger, nor the poor; and let none of you imagine evil against his brother in your heart.
But they refused to hearken, and pulled away the shoulder, and stopped their ears, that they should not hear.
Lord of hosts hath sent in his spirit by the former prophets: therefore came a great wrath from the Lord of hosts.
Yea, they made their hearts as an adamant stone, lest they should hear the law, and the words which the Lord of hosts:
Therefore it is come to pass, that as he cried, and they would not hear; so they cried, and I would not hear, saith the But I scattered them with a whirlwind among all the nations whom they knew not. Thus the land was desolate after them, that no man passed through nor returned: for they laid the pleasant land desolate.
Here endeth the first lesson.
Here beginneth the 5th chapter of 1 Corinthians.
It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you, and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles, that one should have his father's wife.
And ye are puffed up, and have not rather mourned, that he that hath done this deed might be taken away from among you.
For I verily, as absent in body, but present in spirit, have judged already, as though I were present, concerning him that hath so done this deed,
In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ,
To deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.
Your glorying is not good. Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump?
Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us:
Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.
I wrote unto you in an epistle not to company with fornicators:
Yet not altogether with the fornicators of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or with idolaters; for then must ye needs go out of the world.
But now I have written unto you not to keep company, if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such an one no not to eat.
For what have I to do to judge them also that are without? do not ye judge them that are within?
But them that are without God judgeth. Therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked person.