Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
Date:         Sat, 29 Aug 1992 21:42:22 EDT
From:         JEK@NIHCU.BITNET
Subject:      For Sunday 30 August 1992
X-To:         CHRISTIA@ASUACAD.BITNET, BSTUDY-L@UTARLVM1.BITNET,
              IVCF-L@UBVM.BITNET

FOR SUNDAY 30 AUGUST 1992

READING: Ecclesiasticus (Sirach) 10:7-18 (see NOTE below)
 (Beware of arrogance. Remember that you are mortal. Pride is
rebellion against God, and will be punished.)

ALTERNATE READING: Proverbs 25:6-7
 (It is better to put yourself too low and have the king raise you
than put yourself too high and have him lower you.)

PSALM 112
 (God blessed and prospers those who revere Him.)

EPISTLE: Hebrews 13:1-8
 (Continue in charity, hospitality to strangers and foreigners, aid
to prisoners, chastity, and freedom from avarice.)

THE HOLY GOSPEL: Luke 14:1,7-14
 (As a guest at a banquet, choose a low seat and let your host raise
you, rather than choosing a high seat and forcing your host to lower
you. When giving a banquet, invite guests who cannot reward you with
invitations to their table, and you will be rewarded at the heavenly
banquet.)

PRAYER
   Lord of all power and might, who art the author and giver of
   all good things: Graft in our hearts the love of thy Name,
   increase in us true religion, nourish us with all goodness,
   and bring forth in us the fruit of good works;
   through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with
   thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

NOTE: Ecclesiastes (also called the Wisdom of Joshua (Jesus) the Son
of Sirach) is a book much in the style of Proverbs. It is an
apocryphal or deuterocanonical book -- found in the collections of
scrolls used by Greek-speaking Jews outside of Israel, but not
accepted as suthoritative by the Jews of the land of Israel. Today,
Roman Catholics and (to a lesser extent) East Orthodox use these
books as on a level with the books of the Hebrew canon. Many
Protestant groups do not use them at all. Anglicans, Lutherans, and
some other groups agree with Jerome in calling them useful for
historical background and moral exhortation, but not to be used in
establishing any doctrine. For the benefit of those wishing a
reading from a book acceptable to them, I have provided a suitable
reading from Proverbs. For the benefit of those who would like to
know what the reading from Ecclesiasticus is like, but who do not
have Bibles containing it, I append the text below (NRSV).

   Arrogance is hateful to the Lord and to mortals,
   And injustice is outrageous to both.
   Sovereignty passes from nation to nation
   on account of injustice and insolence and wealth.

   How can dust and ashes be prond?
   Even in life the human body decays.
   A long illness baffles the physician,
   the king of today will die to morrow.
   For when one is dead,
   he inherits maggots and vermin and worms.

   The beginning of human pride is to forsake the Lord,
   the heart has withdrawn from its Maker.
   For the beginning of pride is sin,
   and the one who clings to it pours out abominations.
   Therefore the Lord brings upon them unheard-of calamities,
   and destroys them completely.

   The Lord overthrows the thrones of rulers,
   and enthrones the lowly in their places.
   The Lord plucks up the roots of the nations
   and plants the humble in their place.
   The Lord lays waste the lands of the nations,
   and destroys them to the foundations of the earth.
   He removes some of them and destroys them,
   and erases the memory of them from the earth.

   Pride was not created for human beings,
   or violent anger for those born of women.