In those days, Paul had decided to sail past Ephesos, so that he might not have to spend time in Asia; for he was hastening to be at Jerusalem, if possible, on the day of Pentecost. And from Miletos he sent to Ephe sos and called to him the elders of the church. And when they came to him, he said to them:<\/p>\n
‘Take heed to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God which he obtained with the blood of his own Son. I know that after my departure fierce wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock; and from among your own selves will arise men speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after them. Therefore be alert, remembering that f or three years I did not cease night or day to admonish every one with tears.<\/p>\n
And now I commend you to God and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up and to give you the inheritance among all those who are sanctified. I coveted no one’s silver or gold or apparel. You yourselves know that these hands ministered to my necessities, and to those who were with me. In all things I have shown you that by so toiling one must help the weak, remembering the words of the Lord Jesus, how he said, ‘ It is more blessed to give than to receive.'”<\/p>\n
And when he had spoken thus, he knelt down and prayed with them all.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Gospel<\/strong><\/p>\nJJohn 17:1 – 13 (Holy Fathers)<\/p>\n
The Reading of the Holy Gospel according to St. John <\/p>\n
At that time: When Jesus had spoken these words, he lifted up his eyes to heaven and said, “Father, the hour has come; glorify thy Son that the Son may glorify thee, since thou hast given him power over all flesh, to give eternal life to all whom thou hast given him. And this is eternal life, that they know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent. I glorified thee on earth, having accomplished the work which thou gavest me to do; and now, Father, glorify thou me in thy own presence with the glory which I had with thee before the wo rld was made.<\/p>\n
“I have manifested thy name to the men whom thou gavest me out of the world; thine they were, and thou gavest them to me, and they have kept thy word. Now they know that everything that thou hast given me is from thee; for I have given them the words which thou gavest me, and they have received them and know in truth that I came from thee; and they have believed that thou didst send me.<\/p>\n
I am praying for them; I am not praying for the world but for those whom thou hast given me, for they are thine; all mine are thine, and thine are mine, and I am glorified in them. And now I am no more in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to thee. Holy Father, keep them in thy name, which thou hast given me, that they may be one, even as we are one. While I was with them, I kept them in thy name, which thou hast given me; I have guarded them, and none of them is lost but the son of perdition, that the scripture might be fulfilled. But now I am coming to thee; and these things I speak in the world, that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Want to Learn More About Our Orthodox Faith? Did you know that Ancient Faith Radio is a great resource to learn about our Orthodox Faith. It can be a bit daunting on your first visit so let me make a few recommendations. 1) Fr. Thomas Hopko. Fr. Hopko runs a series called “Speaking the Truth<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":993,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1328","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stpeterorthodoxchurch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1328","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stpeterorthodoxchurch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stpeterorthodoxchurch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stpeterorthodoxchurch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stpeterorthodoxchurch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1328"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stpeterorthodoxchurch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1328\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stpeterorthodoxchurch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/993"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stpeterorthodoxchurch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1328"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stpeterorthodoxchurch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1328"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stpeterorthodoxchurch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1328"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}