From antiochan.org, rongolini.com, biblegateway.com and dynamispublications.org:
Daily Readings:
Saints/Martyrs/Feasts/Fasts to be observed/commemmorated/celebrated: the Fast of the Nativity
Scriptural Readings:
Exodus 17:8-16 (12/21-1/3) Second Reading in Kellia: Moses as a Type of Christ
Foreshadows II ~ The Secret War: Exodus 17:8-16 SAAS, especially vs. 16:“...for with a secret hand the Lord wars with Amalek from generation to generation.” God is waging a war against the forces of evil, ever using His invincible weapon, the Cross. For example, He led Israel through the Red Sea, and He provided water when Moses struck a rock, and He had Moses stretch out his arms in a cruciform for victory over Amalek at Rephidim (vs. 8).
The Amalekites were a marauding, warlike tribe that persistently attacked Israel in times of their fatigue (Dt. 25:18). Amalek’s ancestry traces from “...the concubine of Eliphaz, Esau’s son...” (Gn. 36:12). Balaam, the prophetic son of Beor, declared that “Amalek was the first of the nations, but their seed shall perish” (Nm. 24:20). In Moses’ final words to Israel, he directed the People to “blot out the name of Amalek from under heaven...” (Dt. 25:19). Samuel, Saul, and David fought against the Amalekites. In the reign of King Hezekiah (729-686 BC), men of Simeon are said to have defeated the last of them (1 Ch. 4:43).
The present account of Israel’s initial encounter with this nagging enemy followed an important miracle in the arid Sinai desert, a region devoid of water resources: Just a few days after God’s People saw their Egyptian taskmasters drowned in the sea, they ran out of water. The Lord guided Moses to ‘the rock in Horeb’ that he was to strike with “the rod with which [he had] struck the river...” Nile, and water came forth for the People to drink (Ex. 17:5,6). These events serve us in our life in Christ as we journey to the Promised land of God’s Heavenly Kingdom.
Follow these steps, to see how they can and do aid us: God freed us from an Egyptian-like bondage to sin and death by our passage through the Baptismal Red Sea with the sign of the Cross. Now He is leading us through this barren world toward the Promised land, where He promises, “Whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst” (Jn. 7: 14). Moses struck the rock, which yielded water. That Rock was Christ (1 Cor. 10:4), as Saint Paul says. Since Christ our Rock was struck on the Cross, He brings forth living water to us.
After God gave water from the Rock, Amalek, the type of the forces of evil at war against God and His People, came to fight. This is why Saint Augustine identifies Amalek with “...that most proud spirit...to things above...” who “...receives a greater power of domination, unless one avoids the secret snares he is laying.” When that evil spirit is openly raging through a sinful people, he “...is like Amalek - he denies the passage to the land of promise. He then can be overcome by the Cross of Christ, which was prefigured by the extended hands of Moses.”
It is the victorious Christ Who defeats the forces of evil by the power of His Cross. During His wilderness fast, the Lord Jesus directly confronted the Devil, the leader of all the forces of evil. Similarly, during the whole of His ministry, Christ met demons crying out to Him and against Him, injuring, sickening and driving God’s People to madness. The Lord exerted His authority against the evil spirits, silencing and casting them out (Mk. 9:17-27; Mt. 12:22-29). In His conquest of sin and death, the Lord Jesus makes plain the vulnerability of the dark powers.
The Lord’s decisive defeat of evil power occurred on the Cross, the Prototype of all victory over evil. During ancient Israel’s battle with Amalek, Moses stretched out his arms in a cruciform, and the type gained victory through the power of the Prototype. God aided Moses in defeating Amalek. The Prophet’s cross-formed arms conquered sin and death by drawing victory from Christ’s Cross in the war against evil as he used the Lord’s true, invincible weapon.
O Christ our God, Who didst stretch out Thine arms on the hard wood of the Cross for our salvation, ever assist us by the power of Thy Cross to defeat every attack of the enemy.
Hebrews 12:25-26, 13:22-25
King James Version (KJV)
Hebrews 12:25-26
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25See that ye refuse not him that speaketh. For if they escaped not who refused him that spake on earth, much more shall not we escape, if we turn away from him that speaketh from heaven:
26Whose voice then shook the earth: but now he hath promised, saying, Yet once more I shake not the earth only, but also heaven.
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Hebrews 13:22-25
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22And I beseech you, brethren, suffer the word of exhortation: for I have written a letter unto you in few words.
23Know ye that our brother Timothy is set at liberty; with whom, if he come shortly, I will see you.
24Salute all them that have the rule over you, and all the saints. They of Italy salute you.
25Grace be with you all. Amen.
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Mark 10:2-12
Mark 10:2-12 (King James Version)
2And the Pharisees came to him, and asked him, Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife? tempting him.
3And he answered and said unto them, What did Moses command you?
4And they said, Moses suffered to write a bill of divorcement, and to put her away.
5And Jesus answered and said unto them, For the hardness of your heart he wrote you this precept.
6But from the beginning of the creation God made them male and female.
7For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife;
8And they twain shall be one flesh: so then they are no more twain, but one flesh.
9What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.
10And in the house his disciples asked him again of the same matter.
11And he saith unto them, Whosoever shall put away his wife, and marry another, committeth adultery against her.
12And if a woman shall put away her husband, and be married to another, she committeth adultery.
The Synaxarion:
December 21
Second Pre-festive Day of the nativity according to the Flesh of Our Lord, God, and Savior Jesus Christ
Memory of the holy Martyr Juliana of Nicomedia (beginning of the Fourth century)
The daughter of wealthy parents of Nicomedia, Saint Juliana lived under Emperor Maximian. Married to a pagan, named Eleusios, a senator then an eparch, she refused to live with him because he refused to embrace the Christian faith. Being furious, hr husband delivered her over to the judges. She was beheaded around 299 after many tortures.
Fifth Class Feast.
Troparia: of the Pre-festive Period of the Nativity according to the Flesh of Our Lord, God, and Savior Jesus Christ, of Saint Juliana, and of the Church Patron. Kondakion of the Pre-festive Period of the Nativity according to the Flesh of Our Lord, God, and Savior Jesus Christ (proper to this day).
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