Daily Readings: September 27, 2024

Friday after the Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Morning	Evening
Psalm 88	Psalm 91 Psalm 92
Esther 8:1-8,15-17 Acts 19:21-41 Luke 4:31-37

The Collect of the Day

Proper 20

The Sunday closest to September 21

Grant us, Lord, not to be anxious about earthly things, but to love things heavenly; and even now, while we are placed among things that are passing away, to hold fast to those that shall endure; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Psalms

88

Domine, DeusBCP p. 712

¹O Lord, my God, my Savior, *by day and night I cry to you.

²Let my prayer enter into your presence; *incline your ear to my lamentation.

³For I am full of trouble; *my life is at the brink of the grave.

⁴I am counted among those who go down to the Pit; *I have become like one who has no strength;

⁵Lost among the dead, *like the slain who lie in the grave,

⁶Whom you remember no more, *for they are cut off from your hand.

⁷You have laid me in the depths of the Pit, *in dark places, and in the abyss.

⁸Your anger weighs upon me heavily, *and all your great waves overwhelm me.

⁹You have put my friends far from me; you have made me to be abhorred by them; *I am in prison and cannot get free.

¹⁰My sight has failed me because of trouble; *Lord, I have called upon you daily; I have stretched out my hands to you.

¹¹Do you work wonders for the dead? *will those who have died stand up and give you thanks?

¹²Will your loving-kindness be declared in the grave? *your faithfulness in the land of destruction?

¹³Will your wonders be known in the dark? *or your righteousness in the country where all is forgotten?

¹⁴But as for me, O Lord, I cry to you for help; *in the morning my prayer comes before you.

¹⁵Lord, why have you rejected me? *why have you hidden your face from me?

¹⁶Ever since my youth, I have been wretched and at the point of death; *I have borne your terrors with a troubled mind.

¹⁷Your blazing anger has swept over me; *your terrors have destroyed me;

¹⁸They surround me all day long like a flood; *they encompass me on every side.

¹⁹My friend and my neighbor you have put away from me, *and darkness is my only companion.

Daily Office Readings

Esther 8:1-8,15-17

A Reading from the Book of Esther.

¹On that day King Ahasuerus gave to Queen Esther the house of Haman, the enemy of the Jews; and Mordecai came before the king, for Esther had told what he was to her. ²Then the king took off his signet ring, which he had taken from Haman, and gave it to Mordecai. So Esther set Mordecai over the house of Haman. ³Then Esther spoke again to the king; she fell at his feet, weeping and pleading with him to avert the evil design of Haman the Agagite and the plot that he had devised against the Jews. ⁴The king held out the golden scepter to Esther, ⁵and Esther rose and stood before the king. She said, “If it pleases the king, and if I have won his favor, and if the thing seems right before the king, and I have his approval, let an order be written to revoke the letters devised by Haman son of Hammedatha the Agagite, which he wrote giving orders to destroy the Jews who are in all the provinces of the king. ⁶For how can I bear to see the calamity that is coming on my people? Or how can I bear to see the destruction of my kindred?” ⁷Then King Ahasuerus said to Queen Esther and to the Jew Mordecai, “See, I have given Esther the house of Haman, and they have hanged him on the gallows, because he plotted to lay hands on the Jews. ⁸You may write as you please with regard to the Jews, in the name of the king, and seal it with the king’s ring; for an edict written in the name of the king and sealed with the king’s ring cannot be revoked.” ¹⁵Then Mordecai went out from the presence of the king, wearing royal robes of blue and white, with a great golden crown and a mantle of fine linen and purple, while the city of Susa shouted and rejoiced. ¹⁶For the Jews there was light and gladness, joy and honor. ¹⁷In every province and in every city, wherever the king’s command and his edict came, there was gladness and joy among the Jews, a festival and a holiday. Furthermore, many of the peoples of the country professed to be Jews, because the fear of the Jews had fallen upon them.

Acts 19:21-41

A Reading from the Acts of the Apostles.

²¹Now after these things had been accomplished, Paul resolved in the Spirit to go through Macedonia and Achaia, and then to go on to Jerusalem. He said, “After I have gone there, I must also see Rome.” ²²So he sent two of his helpers, Timothy and Erastus, to Macedonia, while he himself stayed for some time longer in Asia. ²³About that time no little disturbance broke out concerning the Way. ²⁴A man named Demetrius, a silversmith who made silver shrines of Artemis, brought no little business to the artisans. ²⁵These he gathered together, with the workers of the same trade, and said, “Men, you know that we get our wealth from this business. ²⁶You also see and hear that not only in Ephesus but in almost the whole of Asia this Paul has persuaded and drawn away a considerable number of people by saying that gods made with hands are not gods. ²⁷And there is danger not only that this trade of ours may come into disrepute but also that the temple of the great goddess Artemis will be scorned, and she will be deprived of her majesty that brought all Asia and the world to worship her.” ²⁸When they heard this, they were enraged and shouted, “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!” ²⁹The city was filled with the confusion; and people rushed together to the theater, dragging with them Gaius and Aristarchus, Macedonians who were Paul’s travel companions. ³⁰Paul wished to go into the crowd, but the disciples would not let him; ³¹even some officials of the province of Asia, who were friendly to him, sent him a message urging him not to venture into the theater. ³²Meanwhile, some were shouting one thing, some another; for the assembly was in confusion, and most of them did not know why they had come together. ³³Some of the crowd gave instructions to Alexander, whom the Jews had pushed forward. And Alexander motioned for silence and tried to make a defense before the people. ³⁴But when they recognized that he was a Jew, for about two hours all of them shouted in unison, “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!” ³⁵But when the town clerk had quieted the crowd, he said, “Citizens of Ephesus, who is there that does not know that the city of the Ephesians is the temple keeper of the great Artemis and of the statue that fell from heaven? ³⁶Since these things cannot be denied, you ought to be quiet and do nothing rash. ³⁷You have brought these men here who are neither temple robbers nor blasphemers of our goddess. ³⁸If therefore Demetrius and the artisans with him have a complaint against anyone, the courts are open, and there are proconsuls; let them bring charges there against one another. ³⁹If there is anything further you want to know, it must be settled in the regular assembly. ⁴⁰For we are in danger of being charged with rioting today, since there is no cause that we can give to justify this commotion.” ⁴¹When he had said this, he dismissed the assembly.