3rd Week after Holy Cross

Philippians 3:17-4:1
Join with others in being imitators of me, brothers, and observe those who thus conduct themselves according to the model you have in us. For many, as I have often told you and now tell you even in tears, conduct themselves as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their end is destruction. Their God is their stomach; their glory is in their “shame.” Their minds are occupied with earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we also await a savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. He will change our lowly body to conform with his glorified body by the power that enables him also to bring all things into subjection to himself. Therefore, my brothers, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, in this way stand firm in the Lord, beloved.

Matthew 24:23-31
If anyone says to you then, ‘Look, here is the Messiah!’ or, ‘There he is!’ do not believe it. False messiahs and false prophets will arise, and they will perform signs and wonders so great as to deceive, if that were possible, even the elect. Behold, I have told it to you beforehand. So if they say to you, ‘He is in the desert,’ do not go out there; if they say, ‘He is in the inner rooms,’ do not believe it. For just as lightning comes from the east and is seen as far as the west, so will the coming of the Son of Man be. Wherever the corpse is, there the vultures will gather. “Immediately after the tribulation of those days, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from the sky, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. And then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming upon the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he will send out his angels with a trumpet blast, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.

The Prayer of the Faithful, vol. III
SECOND PRAYER
Lord, have mercy on us and save us.
Light from Light, and true God from true God,
according to your will you endured bodily death
and yet remain alive in the Spirit.
Through the blessings of this holy day of your
glorious resurrection from the dead,
turn us from the death of sin,
so that we may glorify and praise you, our light and joy,
and exalt your Father and your Holy Spirit,
now and forever.
Amen.

Meditation on the Third Sunday After The Holy Cross
But listen to what the apostle has said: “If we judge ourselves, we will not be judged.” Judge within yourself what I say to you: suppose you happen to go on a long journey and become thirsty in the heat, and [then] encounter one of the brothers and say to him, “Relieve me from the exhaustion of thirst”, and he says to you. “It is the time of prayer; I will pray and then I will come to you.” But while he is praying and coming to you, you die of thirst. What seems better to you? Should he leave to pray, or relieve your exhaustion? Again, suppose you go on a journey in the winter and rain and snow fall on you, and you become exhausted from the cold. Again, at the time of prayer you happen to meet your friend, and he answers you in the same way, and you die from the cold. What good is his prayer, which did not relieve [your] exhaustion? For our Lord, when he described the time of judgment (when he would divide [people] and make [them] stand on his right and on his left), [said that] he would say to those on his right, “I was hungry and you gave me something to eat. I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink. I was sick and you visited me. I was a stranger and you invited me in!” He spoke like this to those on his left also, but because they had not done these things, he sent them to torment, and those on his right he sent to the kingdom. – Aphrahat, the Persian Sage, (Dem. 4.15; Parisot 172-173)