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Wednesday in Holy Week

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    The Collect of the Day

    Wednesday in Holy Week

    Lord God, whose blessed Son our Savior gave his body to be whipped and his face to be spit upon: Give us grace to accept joyfully the sufferings of the present time, confident of the glory that shall be revealed; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

    Psalms

    55

    Exaudi, DeusBCP p. 660

    1Hear my prayer, O God; *do not hide yourself from my petition.

    2Listen to me and answer me; *I have no peace, because of my cares.

    3I am shaken by the noise of the enemy *and by the pressure of the wicked;

    4For they have cast an evil spell upon me *and are set against me in fury.

    5My heart quakes within me, *and the terrors of death have fallen upon me.

    6Fear and trembling have come over me, *and horror overwhelms me.

    7And I said, “Oh, that I had wings like a dove! *I would fly away and be at rest.

    8I would flee to a far-off place *and make my lodging in the wilderness.

    9I would hasten to escape *from the stormy wind and tempest.”

    10Swallow them up, O Lord; confound their speech; *for I have seen violence and strife in the city.

    11Day and night the watchmen make their rounds upon her walls, *but trouble and misery are in the midst of her.

    12 There is corruption at her heart; *her streets are never free of oppression and deceit.

    13For had it been an adversary who taunted me, then I could have borne it; *or had it been an enemy who vaunted himself against me, then I could have hidden from him.

    14But it was you, a man after my own heart, *my companion, my own familiar friend.

    15We took sweet counsel together, *and walked with the throng in the house of God.

    16Let death come upon them suddenly; let them go down alive to the grave; *for wickedness is in their dwellings, in their very midst.

    17But I will call upon God, *and the Lord will deliver me.

    18In the evening, in the morning, and at noonday, I will complain and lament, *and he will hear my voice.

    19He will bring me safely back from the battle waged against me; *for there are many who fight me.

    20God, who is enthroned of old, will hear me and bring them down; *they never change; they do not fear God.

    21My companion stretched forth his hand against his comrade; *he has broken his covenant.

    22His speech is softer than butter, *but war is in his heart.

    23His words are smoother than oil, *but they are drawn swords.

    24Cast your burden upon the Lord, and he will sustain you; *he will never let the righteous stumble.

    25For you will bring the bloodthirsty and deceitful *down to the pit of destruction, O God.

    26They shall not live out half their days, *but I will put my trust in you.

    Daily Office Readings

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    Lam. 2:1-9, 14-17

    1 How the Lord in his anger has humiliated daughter Zion! He has thrown down from heaven to earth the splendor of Israel; he has not remembered his footstool in the day of his anger. 2 The Lord has destroyed without mercy all the dwellings of Jacob; in his wrath he has broken down the strongholds of daughter Judah; he has brought down to the ground in dishonor the kingdom and its rulers. 3 He has cut down in fierce anger all the might of Israel; he has withdrawn his right hand from them in the face of the enemy; he has burned like a flaming fire in Jacob, consuming all around. 4 He has bent his bow like an enemy, with his right hand set like a foe; he has killed all in whom we took pride in the tent of daughter Zion; he has poured out his fury like fire. 5 The Lord has become like an enemy; he has destroyed Israel; He has destroyed all its palaces, laid in ruins its strongholds, and multiplied in daughter Judah mourning and lamentation. 6 He has broken down his booth like a garden, he has destroyed his tabernacle; the Lord has abolished in Zion festival and sabbath, and in his fierce indignation has spurned king and priest. 7 The Lord has scorned his altar, disowned his sanctuary; he has delivered into the hand of the enemy the walls of her palaces; a clamor was raised in the house of the Lord as on a day of festival. 8 The Lord determined to lay in ruins the wall of daughter Zion; he stretched the line; he did not withhold his hand from destroying; he caused rampart and wall to lament; they languish together. 9 Her gates have sunk into the ground; he has ruined and broken her bars; her king and princes are among the nations; guidance is no more, and her prophets obtain no vision from the Lord. 14 Your prophets have seen for you false and deceptive visions; they have not exposed your iniquity to restore your fortunes, but have seen oracles for you that are false and misleading. 15 All who pass along the way clap their hands at you; they hiss and wag their heads at daughter Jerusalem; “Is this the city that was called the perfection of beauty, the joy of all the earth?” 16 All your enemies open their mouths against you; they hiss, they gnash their teeth, they cry: “We have devoured her! Ah, this is the day we longed for; at last we have seen it!” 17 The Lord has done what he purposed, he has carried out his threat; as he ordained long ago, he has demolished without pity; he has made the enemy rejoice over you, and exalted the might of your foes.

    2 Cor. 1:23-2:11

    23 But I call on God as witness against me: it was to spare you that I did not come again to Corinth. 24 I do not mean to imply that we lord it over your faith; rather, we are workers with you for your joy, because you stand firm in the faith. 1 So I made up my mind not to make you another painful visit. 2 For if I cause you pain, who is there to make me glad but the one whom I have pained? 3 And I wrote as I did, so that when I came, I might not suffer pain from those who should have made me rejoice; for I am confident about all of you, that my joy would be the joy of all of you. 4 For I wrote you out of much distress and anguish of heart and with many tears, not to cause you pain, but to let you know the abundant love that I have for you. 5 But if anyone has caused pain, he has caused it not to me, but to some extent—not to exaggerate it—to all of you. 6 This punishment by the majority is enough for such a person; 7 so now instead you should forgive and console him, so that he may not be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow. 8 So I urge you to reaffirm your love for him. 9 I wrote for this reason: to test you and to know whether you are obedient in everything. 10 Anyone whom you forgive, I also forgive. What I have forgiven, if I have forgiven anything, has been for your sake in the presence of Christ. 11 And we do this so that we may not be outwitted by Satan; for we are not ignorant of his designs.

    Mark 12:1-11

    1 Then he began to speak to them in parables. ‘A man planted a vineyard, put a fence around it, dug a pit for the wine press, and built a watch-tower; then he leased it to tenants and went to another country. 2 When the season came, he sent a slave to the tenants to collect from them his share of the produce of the vineyard. 3 But they seized him, and beat him, and sent him away empty-handed. 4 And again he sent another slave to them; this one they beat over the head and insulted. 5 Then he sent another, and that one they killed. And so it was with many others; some they beat, and others they killed. 6 He had still one other, a beloved son. Finally he sent him to them, saying, “They will respect my son.” 7 But those tenants said to one another, “This is the heir; come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.” 8 So they seized him, killed him, and threw him out of the vineyard. 9 What then will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the tenants and give the vineyard to others. 10 Have you not read this scripture: “The stone that the builders rejected    has become the cornerstone; 11 this was the Lord’s doing, and it is amazing in our eyes”?’