Seven times he came to America, preaching across the Colonies, sometimes to crowds of over 30,000 people. This Great Awakening spread like fire. Benjamin Franklin not only attended his meetings and printed his sermons, but built an auditorium for him to speak in, afterwards donating it as the first building of the University of Pennsylvania. Who was he: George Whitefield, who died this day, September 30, 1770. Of Whitefield’s preaching, Franklin wrote: “It was wonderful to see… one could not walk thro’ the town in an evening without hearing psalms sung in different families of every street.”

Federer, B. (2003). American minute. St. Louis, MO.: Amerisearch, Inc.

The greatest destroyer of peace is abortion
because if a mother can kill her own child,
what is left for me to kill you and you to kill me?
There is nothing between.
--- Mother Teresa

... from here, there and everywhere

28 Like a city breached, without walls,
     is a person who lacks self-control.

Stern, D. H. (1998). Complete Jewish Bible-OE
: An English version of the Tanakh (OT) and
B'rit Hadashah (NT) (1st ed.). Clarksville, Md.: Jewish
New Testament Publications.

                The commission of the call

     Who now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for His body’s sake. --- Col. 1:24.

     We make calls out of our own spiritual consecration, but when we get right with God He brushes all these aside, and rivets us with a pain that is terrific to one thing we never dreamed of, and for one radiant, flashing moment we see what He is after, and we say—“Here am I, send me.”

     This call has nothing to do with personal sanctification, but with being made broken bread and poured-out wine. God can never makes us wine if we object to the fingers He uses to crush us with. If God would only use His own fingers, and make me broken bread and poured-out wine in a special way! But when He uses someone whom we dislike, or some set of circumstances to which we said we would never submit, and makes those the crushers, we object. We must never choose the scene of our own martyrdom. If ever we are going to be made into wine, we will have to be crushed; you cannot drink grapes. Grapes become wine only when they have been squeezed.

     I wonder what kind of finger and thumb God has been using to squeeze you, and you have been like a marble and escaped? You are not ripe yet, and if God had squeezed you, the wine would have been remarkably bitter. To be a sacramental personality means that the elements of the natural life are presenced by God as they are broken providentially in His service. We have to be adjusted to God before we can be broken bread in His hands. Keep right with God and let Him do what He likes, and you will find that He is producing the kind of bread and wine that will benefit His other children.

Chambers, O. (1993). My Utmost for His Highest

We were out in the hard country.
  The railroads kept crossing our path,
  Signed with important names,
  Salamanca to Madrid.
  Malaga to Barcelona.
  Sometimes an express went by,
  Tubular in the newest fashion;
  The faces were a blurred frieze,
  A hundred or so city people
  Digesting their latest meal,
  Over coffee, over a cigarette,
  Discussing the news from Viet Nam,
  Fondling imaginary wounds
  Of the last war, honoring themselves
  In the country to which they belonged
  By proxy. Their landscape slipped by
  On a spool. We saw the asses
  Hobbling upon the road
  To the village, no Don Quixote
  Upon their backs, but all the burden
  Of a poor land, the weeds and grasses
  Of the mesa. The men walked
  Beside them; there was no sound
  But the hoarse music of the bells.

R.S. Thomas Selected poems, 1946-1968

Jesse’s roots, composted with carcasses
    Of dove and lamb,
      parchments of ox and goat,
  Centuries of dried up prayers and bloody
  Sacrifice, now bear me gospel fruit.

David’s branch, fed on kosher soil,
  Blossoms a messianic flower, and then
  Ripens into a kingdom crop, conserving
  The fragrance and warmth of spring
    for winter use.

Holy Spirit, shake our family tree;
  Release your ripened fruit
    to our outstretched arms.

I’d like to see my children sink their teeth
  Into promised land pomegranates

And Canaan grapes, bushel gifts of God,
  While I skip a grace rope to a Christ tune.

Peterson, E. H. (1989). The Contemplative Pastor: Returning to the Art of Spiritual Direction.

The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light:
Those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness,
on them has light shined.
--- Isaiah 9:2.

Uncandled menorahs
     and oilless lamps abandoned
  By foolish virgins too much in a hurry to wait
  And tend the light are clues
     to the failed watch,
  The missed arrival,
     the midnight might-have-been.

Wick and beeswax make a guttering protest,
  Fragile, defiant flame against demonic
  Terrors that gust, invisible and nameless,
  Out of galactic ungodded emptiness.

Then deep in the blackness
     fires nursed by wise
Believers surprise with shining
     all groping derelicts

Bruised and stumbling in a world benighted.
  The sudden blazing backlights
     each head with a nimbus.

Shafts of storm-filtered sun
     search and destroy
  The Stygian desolation:
     I see. I see.

Peterson, E. H. (1989). The Contemplative Pastor: Returning to the Art of Spiritual Direction.

     The Lord has often used people in church history whom we may not have liked had we lived during their days. Jerome, for example. He possessed a brilliant mind, a sharp tongue, hot blood, and thin skin. He was a contrarian, remembered as one of the church’s most irritable scholars and among the first of the great Bible translators who have spread the gospel abroad.

     Jerome was an Italian, born about 330, who early fell in love with women and books. After indulging in the former, he joined an ascetic group to enjoy the latter; but his sandpaper personality caused the group to disintegrate. As Jerome struggled to control his sexual energy, he began advancing the doctrine of the perpetual virginity of Mary. He believed that after Jesus’ birth, Mary continued to live a virgin’s life; and his own Herculean efforts to remain celibate led to his so exalting virginity that he considered marriage beneficial only because it brought virgins into the world.

     Perhaps the answer for him was a hermit’s life in the desert, practicing severe self-disciplines. It didn’t work. He still dreamed of Roman dancing girls. Returning to Rome, he faced the temptations head-on and avoided the dancing girls. But he didn’t avoid Paula, a young widow who became, not a sexual partner, but a lifelong soulmate. In Rome in the early 380s he discovered his life’s work. Pope Damasus suggested he prepare a new Latin version of the Gospels and Psalms. Jerome set to work on it, and for the next 22 years he labored tirelessly as a Bible translator.

     His sharp tongue made trouble in Rome, so he and Paula moved to Bethlehem in 386. Near the birthplace of Jesus, they established separate monasteries for men and women where Jerome balanced his need for companionship with a corresponding need for solitude, study, and asceticism. He poured himself into the Latin translation of the Bible, his life’s crowning achievement. He died, white-haired and wrinkled, on September 30, 420.

     With my whole heart I agree with the Law of God. But in every part of me I discover something fighting against my mind, and it makes me a prisoner of sin that controls everything I do. What a miserable person I am. Who will rescue me … ? Thank God! Jesus Christ will rescue me.
--- Romans 7:22-25a.

Morgan, R. J. On This Day 365 Amazing And Inspiring Stories About Saints, Martyrs And Heroes

     If we define Midrash as “homiletic or legal interpretations of the Bible,” that is, interpretive readings of sacred text, then the process of Midrash certainly continues today—in two formats. There are contemporary commentaries written on the Bible, often reflecting the needs and interests of the day. And secular culture commonly adapts religious themes for artistic purposes.

     As an example of the first, the “rabbi’s sermon” given in the modern synagogue is often a Midrash-like exposition on the week’s Torah reading; by attempting to relate Torah to life today, the sermon is the example par excellence of contemporary Midrash. It is not uncommon for a contemporary rabbi to hold an ancient midrashic text in one hand, and a news clipping from the daily paper in the other, as he or she tries to make sense out of the present by searching for meaning in the past.

     Works like Ellen Frankel’s The Five Books of Miriam are another prime example. This is a collection of modern midrashic statements put into the mouths of women to answer the question “What did women then, and what do women now, make of the events in this chapter?” Here is one such selection from The Five Books of Miriam:

     OUR DAUGHTERS ASK: Why does Jethro advise Moses to appoint only men to help him share the onerous burden of leadership? As it is written: “SEEK OUT CAPABLE MEN WHO FEAR GOD, TRUSTWORTHY MEN WHO SPURN ILL-GOTTEN GAIN” (Exodus 18:21). We can’t believe that there weren’t capable, God-fearing women among the people.

     THE SAGES IN OUR OWN TIME ANSWER: We must be careful not to judge Jethro by the standards of twentieth-century Western democracy. After all, in his time and place, women generally did not occupy such leadership roles.

     LILITH THE REBEL COUNTERS: But we can hold today’s Jethros in our own communities to such standards! Especially since the burdens of leadership have not gotten any lighter—and since capable, God-fearing, trustworthy women now stand ready to share them.

     The Five Books that were once attributed to Moses have now been expanded to include the insights of all of our Miriams as well.

     Midrash can be “done” by Christians, as well as by Jews, though the process would have a different name and would draw on a different set of techniques and values, since “Midrash” is a uniquely Jewish product. In Deuteronomy, chapters 31–34, Moses gives his final farewell to the Israelite nation. Their leader tells them that although he will die on this side of the Jordan, they will get to the land that God has promised them. God instructs Moses to go to the top of a mountain, to see the land that the Israelites will soon enter but that he will not. Moses’ final speeches are poignant and moving: The greatest leader will see his goal accomplished by others, yet he himself will not arrive there.

     Compare these chapters in Deuteronomy to the famous “I See the Promised Land” speech by the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., given on April 3, 1968:

     Well, I don’t know what will happen now. We’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn’t matter with me now. Because I’ve been to the mountaintop. And I don’t mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over. And I’ve seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people will get to the promised land. And I’m happy, tonight. I’m not worried about anything. I’m not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.

     By ending with a stirring message about seeing the Promised Land from the mountaintop, the Reverend Dr. King evoked images of Moses entering the land. This Midrash turned out to be prophetic, for King was assassinated the very next day.

     One of the oldest collections of Midrash, if not the oldest, is the Passover Haggadah. The process of Midrash on the Exodus story remains alive and well in modern haggadot. There are literally hundreds of Haggadah interpretations, each giving its own spin on the verses from Exodus—an archaeological Haggadah, a feminist version, an Israeli version that focuses on the fulfillment of God’s promise to redeem us.

     Yet, the process of interpreting the Bible and of writing Midrash, especially on the Exodus theme, goes well beyond these works. In the biblical account, we are told that Moses was placed in a basket on the Nile by his mother, that Moses’ sister watched as the daughter of Pharaoh came to bathe in the Nile and saw the basket:

     Then his sister said to Pharaoh’s daughter: “Shall I go and get you a Hebrew nurse to suckle the child for you?” And Pharaoh’s daughter answered, “Yes.” So the girl went and called the child’s mother. And Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Take this child and nurse it for me, and I will pay your wages.” So the woman took the child and nursed it. When the child grew up, she brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter, who made him her son. She named him Moses, explaining, “I drew him out of the water.”

     Some time after that, when Moses had grown up, he went out to his kinsfolk and witnessed their labors. (Exodus 2:7–10)

     The Bible does not tell us how Moses finds out he is a Hebrew, only that “he went out to his kinsfolk.” The few details in the biblical story led to many midrashic interpretations, including those in the 1998 movie The Prince of Egypt. This is from the story line of The Prince of Egypt:

     That night as Moses returns to his room, he discovers that Tzipporah has escaped. Intrigued by the rebellious girl, he follows her through the Hebrew settlement of Goshen where he comes upon his true siblings, Miriam and Aaron. Believing that Moses has returned to help them, Miriam reveals to Moses the truth about his identity, that he is the son of a Hebrew slave. Shocked and dismayed, Moses refuses to believe her and flees back to the palace. That night he has a nightmare about the slaughter of the newborn Hebrews many years ago.

     The movie’s authors and producers added many details to the terse biblical narrative. They have Tzipporah, Moses’ future wife, meeting him in Egypt, where in the biblical account he meets her later, in Midian. The Bible does not tell us exactly how Moses found out he is a Hebrew, while in the movie, “Miriam reveals to Moses the truth about his identity, that he is the son of a Hebrew slave.” These are plausible answers to questions about the Exodus story. Yet, they—as well as much of the Prince of Egypt animated feature—are a Midrash, filling in the holes for those curious about what exactly took place. And if we compare Jeffrey Katzenberg’s Midrash in The Prince of Egypt to Cecil B. De Mille’s in The Ten Commandments, we have an understanding of the distinct approaches of different interpreters of the same text—one reflecting the sensibilities of America in the 1950s, the other of an American Jew at the end of the twentieth century.

     The process of Midrash can also be seen in art, music, and literature. Chagall’s paintings are often modern expressions of traditional themes. The spiritual hymn “Let My People Go” took a well-known phrase from the Bible, one that Moses directed to Pharaoh, and reframed it as referring to blacks talking to Southern slave owners.

     Let’s look at a modern Midrash on Ecclesiastes, chapter 3. Here is a translation of verses 1 to 8 of that chapter:

To everything there is a season,
     And a time for every purpose under heaven:
     A time for being born and a time for dying,
     A time for planting and a time for uprooting the planted;
     A time for slaying and a time for healing;
     A time for tearing down and a time for building up;
     A time for weeping and a time for laughing,
     A time for wailing and a time for dancing;
     A time for throwing stones and a time for gathering stones,
     A time for embracing and a time for shunning embraces;
     A time for seeking and a time for losing,
     A time for keeping and a time for discarding;
     A time for ripping and a time for sewing,
     A time for silence and a time for speaking;
     A time for loving and a time for hating;
     A time for war and a time for peace.

     The 1960s hit “Turn, Turn, Turn,” sung by the Byrds and written by folk singer Pete Seeger, begins as a fairly straightforward musical presentation of the Bible text.

Chorus:
     To everything, turn, turn, turn,
     There is season, turn, turn, turn,
     And a time for every purpose under heaven.

     A time to be born, a time to die,
     A time to plant, a time to reap,
     A time to kill, a time to heal,
     A time to laugh, a time to weep.
Chorus …

     And the second stanza is also faithful to the biblical text:

     A time of love, a time of hate,
     A time of war, a time of peace,
     A time you may embrace,
     A time to refrain from embracing.
Chorus …

     Seeger leaves out certain verses and rearranges the sequence, but the song retains the flow of the biblical text—until the last lines. Where Ecclesiastes ends with “A time for war, and a time for peace,” the Byrds’ hit adds a 1960s anti-war postscript to reflect the mood of the time:

     A time to gain, a time to lose,
     A time to rend, a time to sow,
     A time to love, a time to hate,
     A time of peace, I swear it’s not too late.

     The author of Ecclesiastes states that there is a time for everything in life, predetermined by a power beyond our control. Pete Seeger’s song completely changes the meaning: War and peace are in the hands of human beings; the choices that people make can change the world.

     The list goes on and on: Leonard Bernstein’s Jeremiah is an example of music-as-Midrash. John Steinbeck’s East of Eden, Thomas Mann’s Joseph and His Brothers, and (more recently) Anita Diamant’s The Red Tent each took a biblical theme and wove it into a story, creating a literary Midrash of its own.

     The Rabbis took the Bible seriously, searching for new and deeper meaning from the text and for an understanding (or, better, understandings) that spoke to their day and age. The Bible is the greatest example of a classic text, one which we go back to over and over, finding new meaning and inspiration in it time and time again, generation after generation. Our attempts to understand and interpret the Bible today—be they literary (like classic midrashim), musical, or artistic—demonstrate that we, too, are trying to incorporate sacred scripture into our own lives. If, as we claimed in Part I, “What Is Midrash,” “the process of Midrash began the very first time the Torah was read,” then surely the process of Midrash continues today, as we continue to read, ponder, and gain inspiration from the TANAKH.

     The Rabbis read the Bible seriously, and they created the Midrash. If we, today, read the Bible and the Midrash seriously, we can create our own midrashim, our interpretations, not only of the Bible but also of the Midrash itself. By confronting sacred text and engaging in a struggle with it, we affirm its sanctity and relevance in our lives. We engage in Midrash with a sense of awe, with an appreciation that we stand in the presence of something sacred, something holy, something of ultimate importance.

Katz, M., & Schwartz, G. Searching for Meaning in Midrash: Lessons for Everyday Living Philadelphia, PA: The Jewish Publication Society.

     How great is God—beyond our understanding! --- Job 36:26.

     Invisible! (Joseph Parker (1830–1902), “The Unknowable God,” downloaded from a Web site of Tom Garner, at www.txdirect.net/~tgarner/ghmor2.htm, accessed Aug. 21, 2001.) The invisibleness of God is not a scientific discovery; it is a biblical revelation: “No one has ever seen God” (John 1:18). This is the difficulty of all life, and the higher the life the higher the difficulty. No one can see oneself and live! You can see your incarnation, but your very self—the pulse that makes you human—you have never seen, you can never see!

     Anatomy says it has never found the soul and adds, “Therefore there is no soul.” The reasoning overleaps itself and takes away its own life. Has anatomy found genius? Or has anatomy laid its finger on imagination and held it up, saying, “Look, the mighty wizard”?

     But if there is no soul simply because anatomy has never found one, then there is no genius, no imagination, because the surgeon’s knife has failed to come upon them!

     Anatomize the dead poet and the dead ass, and you will find as much genius in one as in the other; therefore there is no genius! Who that valued his or her life would set foot on such a bridge as the rickety “therefore”? But some people will venture on any bridge that leads away from God—because they do not like to retain God in their hearts (Rom. 1:28). It is not because of intellectual superiority but because of moral distaste, an invincible aversion.

     Yes, God is unknown and unknowable. But that does not make him unusable and unprofitable. If scientists avow that they have not developed a theory of magnetism, do they therefore ignore it or decline to inquire into its uses? Do they write its name with a big M and run away from it, shaken and whitened by fear? Indeed they are not such fools. They actually use what they do not understand.

     Bring their example to bear on the religious life. I do not scientifically know God. The term does not come within the analysis that is available to me. God is great, and I know him not; yet the term has its practical uses in life, and into those broad and obvious uses all people may inquire. What part does the God of the Bible play in the life of the person who accepts him? Any creed that does not come down easily into the daily life to purify and direct it is imperfect and useless.
--- Joseph Parker

Wallis, D. (2001). Take Heart: Daily Devotions with the Church's Great Preachers

PROPER 21, FRIDAY
YEAR 1

Psalms (Morning) Psalm 102
Psalms (Evening) Psalm 107:1–32
Old Testament 2 Kings 19:1–20
New Testament 1 Corinthians 9:16–27
Gospel Matthew 8:1–17

Index of Readings

PSALMS (MORNING)
Psalm 102

A prayer of one afflicted, when faint and pleading before the LORD.

1 Hear my prayer, O LORD;
let my cry come to you.
2 Do not hide your face from me
in the day of my distress.
Incline your ear to me;
answer me speedily in the day when I call.

3 For my days pass away like smoke,
and my bones burn like a furnace.
4 My heart is stricken and withered like grass;
I am too wasted to eat my bread.
5 Because of my loud groaning
my bones cling to my skin.
6 I am like an owl of the wilderness,
like a little owl of the waste places.
7 I lie awake;
I am like a lonely bird on the housetop.
8 All day long my enemies taunt me;
those who deride me use my name for a curse.
9 For I eat ashes like bread,
and mingle tears with my drink,
10 because of your indignation and anger;
for you have lifted me up and thrown me aside.
11 My days are like an evening shadow;
I wither away like grass.

12 But you, O LORD, are enthroned forever;
your name endures to all generations.
13 You will rise up and have compassion on Zion,
for it is time to favor it;
the appointed time has come.
14 For your servants hold its stones dear,
and have pity on its dust.
15 The nations will fear the name of the LORD,
and all the kings of the earth your glory.
16 For the LORD will build up Zion;
he will appear in his glory.
17 He will regard the prayer of the destitute,
and will not despise their prayer.

18 Let this be recorded for a generation to come,
so that a people yet unborn may praise the LORD:
19 that he looked down from his holy height,
from heaven the LORD looked at the earth,
20 to hear the groans of the prisoners,
to set free those who were doomed to die;
21 so that the name of the LORD may be declared in Zion,
and his praise in Jerusalem,
22 when peoples gather together,
and kingdoms, to worship the LORD.

23 He has broken my strength in midcourse;
he has shortened my days.
24 “O my God,” I say, “do not take me away
at the midpoint of my life,
you whose years endure
throughout all generations.”

25 Long ago you laid the foundation of the earth,
and the heavens are the work of your hands.
26 They will perish, but you endure;
they will all wear out like a garment.
You change them like clothing, and they pass away;
27 but you are the same, and your years have no end.
28 The children of your servants shall live secure;
their offspring shall be established in your presence.

PSALMS (EVENING)
Psalm 107:1–32

1 O give thanks to the LORD, for he is good;
for his steadfast love endures forever.
2 Let the redeemed of the LORD say so,
those he redeemed from trouble
3 and gathered in from the lands,
from the east and from the west,
from the north and from the south.

4 Some wandered in desert wastes,
finding no way to an inhabited town;
5 hungry and thirsty,
their soul fainted within them.
6 Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble,
and he delivered them from their distress;
7 he led them by a straight way,
until they reached an inhabited town.
8 Let them thank the LORD for his steadfast love,
for his wonderful works to humankind.
9 For he satisfies the thirsty,
and the hungry he fills with good things.

10 Some sat in darkness and in gloom,
prisoners in misery and in irons,
11 for they had rebelled against the words of God,
and spurned the counsel of the Most High.
12 Their hearts were bowed down with hard labor;
they fell down, with no one to help.
13 Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble,
and he saved them from their distress;
14 he brought them out of darkness and gloom,
and broke their bonds asunder.
15 Let them thank the LORD for his steadfast love,
for his wonderful works to humankind.
16 For he shatters the doors of bronze,
and cuts in two the bars of iron.

17 Some were sick through their sinful ways,
and because of their iniquities endured affliction;
18 they loathed any kind of food,
and they drew near to the gates of death.
19 Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble,
and he saved them from their distress;
20 he sent out his word and healed them,
and delivered them from destruction.
21 Let them thank the LORD for his steadfast love,
for his wonderful works to humankind.
22 And let them offer thanksgiving sacrifices,
and tell of his deeds with songs of joy.

23 Some went down to the sea in ships,
doing business on the mighty waters;
24 they saw the deeds of the LORD,
his wondrous works in the deep.
25 For he commanded and raised the stormy wind,
which lifted up the waves of the sea.
26 They mounted up to heaven, they went down to the depths;
their courage melted away in their calamity;
27 they reeled and staggered like drunkards,
and were at their wits’ end.
28 Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble,
and he brought them out from their distress;
29 he made the storm be still,
and the waves of the sea were hushed.
30 Then they were glad because they had quiet,
and he brought them to their desired haven.
31 Let them thank the LORD for his steadfast love,
for his wonderful works to humankind.
32 Let them extol him in the congregation of the people,
and praise him in the assembly of the elders.

OLD TESTAMENT
2 Kings 19:1–20

19 When King Hezekiah heard it, he tore his clothes, covered himself with sackcloth, and went into the house of the LORD. 2 And he sent Eliakim, who was in charge of the palace, and Shebna the secretary, and the senior priests, covered with sackcloth, to the prophet Isaiah son of Amoz. 3 They said to him, “Thus says Hezekiah, This day is a day of distress, of rebuke, and of disgrace; children have come to the birth, and there is no strength to bring them forth. 4 It may be that the LORD your God heard all the words of the Rabshakeh, whom his master the king of Assyria has sent to mock the living God, and will rebuke the words that the LORD your God has heard; therefore lift up your prayer for the remnant that is left.” 5 When the servants of King Hezekiah came to Isaiah, 6 Isaiah said to them, “Say to your master, ‘Thus says the LORD: Do not be afraid because of the words that you have heard, with which the servants of the king of Assyria have reviled me. 7 I myself will put a spirit in him, so that he shall hear a rumor and return to his own land; I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land.’ ”

8 The Rabshakeh returned, and found the king of Assyria fighting against Libnah; for he had heard that the king had left Lachish. 9 When the king heard concerning King Tirhakah of Ethiopia, “See, he has set out to fight against you,” he sent messengers again to Hezekiah, saying, 10 “Thus shall you speak to King Hezekiah of Judah: Do not let your God on whom you rely deceive you by promising that Jerusalem will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria. 11 See, you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands, destroying them utterly. Shall you be delivered? 12 Have the gods of the nations delivered them, the nations that my predecessors destroyed, Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, and the people of Eden who were in Telassar? 13 Where is the king of Hamath, the king of Arpad, the king of the city of Sepharvaim, the king of Hena, or the king of Ivvah?”

14 Hezekiah received the letter from the hand of the messengers and read it; then Hezekiah went up to the house of the LORD and spread it before the LORD. 15 And Hezekiah prayed before the LORD, and said: “O LORD the God of Israel, who are enthroned above the cherubim, you are God, you alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth; you have made heaven and earth. 16 Incline your ear, O LORD, and hear; open your eyes, O LORD, and see; hear the words of Sennacherib, which he has sent to mock the living God. 17 Truly, O LORD, the kings of Assyria have laid waste the nations and their lands, 18 and have hurled their gods into the fire, though they were no gods but the work of human hands—wood and stone—and so they were destroyed. 19 So now, O LORD our God, save us, I pray you, from his hand, so that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you, O LORD, are God alone.”

20 Then Isaiah son of Amoz sent to Hezekiah, saying, “Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel: I have heard your prayer to me about King Sennacherib of Assyria.

NEW TESTAMENT
1 Corinthians 9:16–27

16 If I proclaim the gospel, this gives me no ground for boasting, for an obligation is laid on me, and woe to me if I do not proclaim the gospel! 17 For if I do this of my own will, I have a reward; but if not of my own will, I am entrusted with a commission. 18 What then is my reward? Just this: that in my proclamation I may make the gospel free of charge, so as not to make full use of my rights in the gospel.

19 For though I am free with respect to all, I have made myself a slave to all, so that I might win more of them. 20 To the Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win Jews. To those under the law I became as one under the law (though I myself am not under the law) so that I might win those under the law. 21 To those outside the law I became as one outside the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law) so that I might win those outside the law. 22 To the weak I became weak, so that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all people, that I might by all means save some. 23 I do it all for the sake of the gospel, so that I may share in its blessings.

24 Do you not know that in a race the runners all compete, but only one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may win it. 25 Athletes exercise self-control in all things; they do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable one. 26 So I do not run aimlessly, nor do I box as though beating the air; 27 but I punish my body and enslave it, so that after proclaiming to others I myself should not be disqualified.

GOSPEL
Matthew 8:1–17

8 When Jesus had come down from the mountain, great crowds followed him; 2 and there was a leper who came to him and knelt before him, saying, “Lord, if you choose, you can make me clean.” 3 He stretched out his hand and touched him, saying, “I do choose. Be made clean!” Immediately his leprosy was cleansed. 4 Then Jesus said to him, “See that you say nothing to anyone; but go, show yourself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses commanded, as a testimony to them.”

5 When he entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, appealing to him 6 and saying, “Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, in terrible distress.” 7 And he said to him, “I will come and cure him.” 8 The centurion answered, “Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof; but only speak the word, and my servant will be healed. 9 For I also am a man under authority, with soldiers under me; and I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes, and to another, ‘Come,’ and he comes, and to my slave, ‘Do this,’ and the slave does it.” 10 When Jesus heard him, he was amazed and said to those who followed him, “Truly I tell you, in no one in Israel have I found such faith. 11 I tell you, many will come from east and west and will eat with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, 12 while the heirs of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” 13 And to the centurion Jesus said, “Go; let it be done for you according to your faith.” And the servant was healed in that hour.

14 When Jesus entered Peter’s house, he saw his mother-in-law lying in bed with a fever; 15 he touched her hand, and the fever left her, and she got up and began to serve him. 16 That evening they brought to him many who were possessed with demons; and he cast out the spirits with a word, and cured all who were sick. 17 This was to fulfill what had been spoken through the prophet Isaiah, “He took our infirmities and bore our diseases.”

The Episcopal Church. Book of Common Prayer Lectionary