The Wartburg Project

Daily Lectionary

September 13, 2024

These daily readings from the EHV follow the one-year daily lectionary provided in Christian Worship: Hymnal, the Lutheran Service Book, and the Treasury of Daily Prayer. In this lectionary, two readings of 15-25 verses each are provided for each day. Under this plan, nearly all of the New Testament and approximately one-third of the Old Testament are read each year. These readings fit well within the daily offices of Matins, Vespers, or Compline as daily family devotions.

2 Chronicles 32:1-22

The King of Assyria Threatens Jerusalem
321After these events and this faithfulness, Sennacherib king of Assyria came into Judah and laid siege to the fortified cities. He intended to capture them for himself.
2When Hezekiah saw that Sennacherib had come and was ready to wage war against Jerusalem, 3he made plans with his officials and soldiers to block the water supply from the springs outside the city. They helped him 4by gathering a large group of people, who stopped all the springs and the water channel that flowed through the middle of the land.[] They said, “Why should the kings of Assyria come and find abundant water?”
5Hezekiah strengthened his position. He rebuilt the whole part of the wall that had been broken down. He made the towers taller. He made a second wall outside the first wall. He strengthened the Millo[] of the City of David. He made many weapons and shields. 6He set military officers over the people. He brought them together with him in the square at the city gate.
He spoke to encourage them: 7“Be strong. Be courageous. Do not be afraid. Do not be terrified because of the presence of the king of Assyria and the horde that is with him, because the one with us is greater than all those who are with him. 8With him is only an arm of flesh. With us is the Lord our God to help us and to fight our battles.” The people were encouraged by the words of Hezekiah king of Judah.
9After this, while Sennacherib king of Assyria was attacking Lachish with his powerful forces, he sent his officials to Jerusalem, to Hezekiah king of Judah and to all the people of Judah who were in Jerusalem.
10Sennacherib's officials proclaimed:
This is what Sennacherib king of Assyria says. What are you relying on as you sit there under siege in Jerusalem? 11Isn't Hezekiah misleading you? He is handing you over to die by famine and by thirst, when he says, “The Lord our God will deliver us from the hand of the king of Assyria.”
12Hasn't this same Hezekiah taken away the Lord's high places and altars and commanded Judah and Jerusalem: “You are to worship in front of one altar, and you are to send up sacrifices only from it”?
13Don't you know what I and my fathers have done to all the people of the other lands? Were the gods of those foreign nations ever able to deliver their land from my hand? 14Who among all the gods of those nations that my fathers devoted to destruction was able to deliver his people from my hand? So, will your God be able to deliver you from my hand?
15Now don't let Hezekiah deceive you and mislead you like this. Do not believe him, for no god of any nation or kingdom has been able to deliver his people from my hand or from the hand of my father. How much less will your God! He will not deliver you from my hand.
16These officials had even more to say against the Lord God and against his servant Hezekiah. 17The king of Assyria wrote letters to heap scorn on the Lord, the God of Israel, and to speak against him by saying, “Like the gods of those foreign nations, which have not delivered their people from my hands, the god of Hezekiah will not deliver his people from my hand.”
18They shouted loudly in the language of Judah to the people of Jerusalem who were on the wall, in order to frighten them and terrify them so that they could take the city. 19They spoke about the God of Jerusalem in the same way that they spoke about the gods of the peoples of the earth, the work of human hands.
The Lord Saves Jerusalem
20Hezekiah the king and Isaiah son of Amoz, the prophet, prayed about this, crying out to heaven.
21So the Lord sent an angel, who wiped out all the powerful warriors, the commanders, and the officers in the camp of the king of Assyria, and he returned to his land in disgrace. There he went into the house of his god, and some of his offspring from his own body struck him down with the sword.
22So the Lord saved Hezekiah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem from the hand of Sennacherib king of Assyria and from the hand of everyone else. He gave them rest on all sides.

Colossians 1:1-23

Greeting
11Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,
2To the holy and faithful brothers[] in Christ at Colossae:
Grace to you and peace from God our Father.[]
Paul's Prayer for the Colossians
3We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, 4because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and the love that you have for all the saints 5because of the hope that is stored up for you in heaven. You have already heard about this in the word of truth, the gospel 6that is present with you now. The gospel is bearing fruit and growing in the entire world, just as it also has been doing among you from the day you heard it and came to know the grace of God in truth. 7You learned this from Epaphras, our dear fellow servant, who is a faithful minister of Christ on your[] behalf. 8He is the one who told us about your love in the Spirit.[]
9For this reason, from the day we heard about your love, we also have not stopped praying for you. We keep asking that you would be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding, 10so that you might live in a way that is worthy of the Lord. Our goal is that you please him by bearing fruit in every kind of good work and by growing in the knowledge of God, 11as you are being strengthened with all power because of his glorious might working in you. Then you will have complete endurance and patience, joyfully 12giving thanks to the Father, who qualified us[] to share in the inheritance of the saints in the kingdom of light.
What the Father Did Through Christ
13The Father rescued us from the domain of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, 14in whom we have redemption,[] the forgiveness of sins.
15He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation, 16for in him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, things seen and unseen, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. 17He is before all things, and all things hold together in him.
18He is also the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that in all things he might have the highest rank. 19For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, 20and through him to reconcile all things to himself (whether things on earth or in heaven) by establishing peace through the blood of his cross.
Reconciled Through Christ's Death
21At one time, you were alienated from God and hostile in your thinking as expressed through your evil deeds. 22But now Christ reconciled you in his body of flesh through death, in order to present you holy, blameless, and faultless before him— 23if you continue steadfast and firm in faith, without being moved away from the hope of the gospel. This is the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven and of which I, Paul, have become a minister.