Daily Lectionary

March 14, 2025

March 13, 2025 March 15, 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.

Genesis 13:1-18

Abram and Lot Separate

13¹Abram went up out of Egypt into the Negev. He went with his wife and with all that he had, and with Lot too. ²Abram was very wealthy in livestock, in silver, and in gold. ³He went on his journeys from the Negev to Bethel, to the place where his tent had been at the beginning, between Bethel and Ai. ⁴He went to the site of the altar that he had made there earlier. There Abram proclaimed^[] the name of the Lord. ⁵Lot, who went with Abram, also had flocks, herds, and tents. ⁶The land was not able to support them if they lived close together, because their possessions were so great that they could not live together. ⁷There was conflict between the herdsmen of Abram's livestock and the herdsmen of Lot's livestock. (The Canaanites and the Perizzites lived in the land at that time.) ⁸Abram said to Lot, “Please, because we are close relatives, let there be no conflict between me and you and between my herdsmen and your herdsmen. ⁹Doesn't the whole land lie before you? Please separate yourself from me. If you go to the left, then I will go to the right. Or if you go to the right, then I will go to the left.”

¹⁰Lot looked up and saw the whole region around the Jordan River as you come to Zoar.^[] (Before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, it was well watered everywhere, like the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt.) ¹¹So Lot chose the region around the Jordan for himself. Lot headed out toward the east, and they separated from each other. ¹²Abram lived in the land of Canaan, and Lot lived among the cities of the region around the Jordan and moved his tent close to Sodom. ¹³Now the men of Sodom were extremely wicked sinners against the Lord.

¹⁴After Lot was separated from him, the Lord said to Abram, “Now, lift up your eyes, and look around from the place where you are. Look north and south, east and west, ¹⁵because all the land that you see, I will give to you and to your descendants permanently. ¹⁶I will make your descendants like the dust of the earth, so that if a man could count the dust of the earth, then your descendants could also be counted. ¹⁷Get up, walk through the length and breadth of the land, because I will give it to you.”

¹⁸Abram moved his tent and went to live by the oaks at Mamre, which are at Hebron, and built an altar there to the Lord.

Mark 5:1-20

A Demon-Possessed Man and a Herd of Pigs

(Matthew 8:28-34; Luke 8:26-39)

5¹They went to the other side of the sea, into the region of the Gerasenes.^[] ²As soon as Jesus stepped out of the boat, a man with an unclean spirit came out of the tombs to meet him. ³The man lived in the tombs. Nobody could bind him anymore, not even with a chain. ⁴For he had often been bound with shackles and chains, but he pulled the chains apart and broke the shackles in pieces. Nobody had the strength to subdue him. ⁵Night and day, in the tombs and in the mountains, he was constantly crying out and cutting himself with stones. ⁶When he saw Jesus from a distance, he ran and bowed down in front of him. ⁷He cried out with a loud voice, “What do I have to do with you, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you to swear by God not to torment me.” ⁸For Jesus had said to him, “Come out of the man, you unclean spirit!”

⁹Jesus asked him, “What is your name?”

“My name is Legion,” he replied, “because we are many.” ¹⁰He begged Jesus repeatedly that he would not send them out of the region.

¹¹There was a large herd of pigs there feeding on the hillside. ¹²The demons begged him, “Send us to the pigs so we may enter them.”

¹³Jesus gave them permission. The unclean spirits went out and entered the pigs. Then the herd of about two thousand pigs rushed down the steep bank into the sea and drowned. ¹⁴Those who were feeding the pigs ran and reported this in the city and the countryside.

People came to see what had happened. ¹⁵When they came to Jesus, they saw the man who had been possessed by the legion of demons sitting there clothed and in his right mind, and they were afraid. ¹⁶Those who had seen what had occurred described for these people what had happened to the demon-possessed man, and they told them about the pigs. ¹⁷They began to plead with Jesus to leave their region.

¹⁸As Jesus was getting into the boat, the man who had been demon-possessed begged to stay with Jesus. ¹⁹But Jesus would not let him. Instead, he told him, “Go home to your people, and tell them everything the Lord has done for you and how he had mercy on you.”

²⁰The man left and began to proclaim in the Decapolis everything Jesus had done for him. And everyone was amazed.