The Wartburg Project

Daily Lectionary

March 4, 2025

March 3, 2025 March 5, 2025

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.

Job 36:1-21

361Elihu kept talking and said:
2Be patient with me a little longer.
I intend to inform you further,
since I have more to say on God's behalf.
3I will provide you with comprehensive knowledge,
and I will justify my Maker.
4You can be sure that none of my words are false.
A man with complete knowledge is here with you.
5Yes, God is mighty, but he does not despise people.
He is mighty and has great understanding.[]
6He does not keep a wicked man alive,
but he does give justice to the oppressed.
7He does not turn his eyes away from the righteous.
He seats them on thrones with kings
and exalts them forever.
8But if people are bound in chains,
and they are held captive by cords of affliction,
9he declares to them what they have done—
how arrogantly they have committed rebellious deeds.
10He opens their ears to accept discipline,[]
and he tells them to turn back from wickedness.
11If they listen and serve him,
they will complete their days in prosperity,
and their years will end in pleasure.
12But if they do not listen,
they will be overwhelmed by a stream.[]
They will breathe their last without knowledge.
13Godless hearts nourish anger.
They do not cry out for help even when he imprisons them.
14Their souls die while they are still young,
and they end their lives among the male prostitutes at their shrines.
15God delivers the afflicted by means of their affliction,
and he gets their attention through their suffering.
16Certainly he is drawing you out of the jaws of distress
to a wide-open place, where you will not be hemmed in.
You will be comfortable at your table covered with rich food.
17But now you are caught up with the judgment of the wicked,
and judgment and justice have taken hold of you.
18Watch out, so that no one lures you with luxury.
Do not let a large payment turn you aside.
19Can your affluence arrange for your security,
so that you do not suffer want?
Can even your strongest efforts accomplish that?
20Do not long for night time, when nations vanish from their place.[]
21Watch out. Do not turn to evil,
because that is why you have been tested by affliction.[]

John 11:38-57

38Jesus was deeply moved again as he came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. 39“Take away the stone,” he said.
Martha, the dead man's sister, told him, “Lord, by this time there will be an odor, because it has been four days.”
40Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?” 41So they took away the stone.
Jesus looked up and said, “Father, I thank you that you heard me. 42I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the crowd standing here, so that they may believe that you sent me.” 43After he said this, he shouted with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!”
44The man who had died came out with his feet and his hands bound with strips of linen and his face wrapped with a cloth. Jesus told them, “Loose him and let him go.”
The Plot
(Matthew 26:1-5; Mark 14:1-2; Luke 22:1-6)
45Therefore many of the Jews who came to Mary and saw what Jesus did believed in him. 46But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done. 47So the chief priests and the Pharisees called a meeting of the Sanhedrin. They asked, “What are we going to do, because this man is doing many miraculous signs? 48If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him. Then the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation.”
49But one of them, Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, said to them, “You know nothing at all. 50You do not even consider that it is better for us[] that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish.” 51He did not say this on his own, but, as high priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus was going to die for the nation, 52and not only for that nation, but also in order to gather into one the scattered children of God.
53So from that day on they plotted to kill him. 54Therefore Jesus no longer walked about openly among the Jews. Instead he withdrew into a region near the wilderness, to a town called Ephraim. And he stayed there with his disciples.
55The Jewish Passover was near, and many went up to Jerusalem from the country to purify themselves before the Passover. 56They kept looking for Jesus and asking one another as they stood in the temple area, “What do you think? He certainly won't come to the Festival, will he?” 57The chief priests and the Pharisees had given orders that if anyone knew where Jesus was, he should report it so that they could arrest Jesus.