January 22, 2015 DAILY SCRIPTURE READINGS with GOSPEL COMMENTARY +James 4:7-5:9+ 7 Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. 8 Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse yourhands, you sinners; and purify yourhearts, you double-minded. 9 Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. 10 Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up. 11 Do not speak evil of one another, brethren. He who speaks evil of a brother and judges his brother, speaks evil of the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge. 12 There is one Lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy. Who are you to judge another? 13 Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, spend a year there, buy and sell, and make a profit”; 14 whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what isyour life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. 15 Instead you oughtto say, “If the Lord wills, we shall live and do this or that.” 16 But now you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. 17 Therefore, to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin. 5:1 Come now, you rich, weep and howl for your miseries that are coming upon you! 2 Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten. 3 Your gold and silver are corroded, and their corrosion will be a witness against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have heaped up treasure in the last days. 4 Indeed the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out; and the cries of the reapers have reached the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth. 5 You have lived on the earth in pleasure and luxury; you have fattened your hearts as in a day of slaughter. 6 You have condemned, you have murdered the just; he does not resist you. 7 Therefore be patient, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, waiting patiently for it until it receives the early and latter rain. 8 You also be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand. 9 Do not grumble against one another, brethren, lest you be condemned. Behold, the Judge is standing at the door! +Mark 11:27-33+ 27 Then they came again to Jerusalem. And as He was walking in the temple, the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders came to Him. 28 And they said to Him, “By what authority are You doing these things? And who gave You this authority to do these things?” 29 But Jesus answered and said to them, “I also will ask you one question; then answer Me, and I will tell you by what authority I do these things: 30 The baptism of John—was it from heaven or from men? Answer Me. 31 And they reasoned among themselves, saying, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ He will say, ‘Why then did you not believe him?’ 32 But if we say, ‘From men’”—they feared the people, for all counted John to have been a prophet indeed. 33 So they answered and said to Jesus, “We do not know.” And Jesus answered and said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.” COMMENTARY – Mark 11:27-33 27-33. Then they came again to Jerusalem. And as He was walking in the temple, the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders came to Him. And they said to Him, “By what authority are You doing these things? And who gave You this authority to do these things?” But Jesus answered and said to them, “I also will ask you one question; then answer Me, and I will tell you by what authority I do these things: The baptism of John—was it from heaven or from men? Answer Me.” And they reasoned among themselves, saying, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ He will say, ‘Why then did you not believe him?’ But if we say, ‘From men’”—they feared the people, for all counted John to have been a prophet indeed. So they answered and said to Jesus, “We do not know.” And Jesus answered and said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.” +Furious that Jesus had cast the buyers and sellers out of the temple, they came to Him and asked by what authority He did these things, thinking to put Him at a loss for words. In effect they said to Him, Who are You to do these things? Have You been appointed a teacher? Have You been ordained high priest? They said this, striving to render Him speechless, so that they could lay hands on Him. For if He should answer, I do these things by My own authority, they could stone Him for setting Himself up against God. But if He should answer, I do these things by Gods authority, they could drive the multitude away from Him, for the multitude believed that Jesus was God. Therefore the Lord asks them about John, not without reason, nor simply to engage them in debate. Since John had given testimony to Christ, the Lord asks these evildoers about John, so that if they should accept that John was from God they would then be compelled to accept as well Johns testimony as to Christ. So when these evil-minded men were at a loss for words, then Jesus says, Neither do I tell you. He did not say, Neither do I know what to tell you, but, I do not tell you, that is, since you do evil, I will not honor you with an answer. Excerpt from THE EXPLANATION by BLESSED THEOPHYLACT of THE HOLY GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST. MARK, © 2007 Chrysostom Press. (The translation of the Holy Scripture which is used in the EXPLANATION books has been replaced with the NKJV translation to couple with the Gospel reading and the Gospel reading within the COMMENTARY section.)
Posted on: Fri, 23 Jan 2015 01:34:34 +0000
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