The Wartburg Project

Daily Lectionary

May 31, 2025

May 30, 2025 June 1, 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.

Numbers 13:1-3, 17-33

Scouting Canaan
131The Lord spoke to Moses: 2“Send men to scout the land of Canaan, which I myself am giving to the Israelites. You are to send one man from each ancestral tribe, each one a tribal chief among the people of Israel.”
3Moses sent them from the Wilderness of Paran according to the Lord's command. All of these men were heads of the Israelites.
17Moses sent them to scout the land of Canaan and said to them, “Go up this way through the Negev[] and go up into the hill country.[] 18See what the land is like. See if the people who live in the land are strong or weak. See if they are few or many. 19See if the land that they live in is good or bad. See what kind of cities they live in. See if the cities are camps or fortified places. 20See what the land is like. See if the land is fertile or poor. See if there are trees in the land or not. Be courageous and bring back some of the fruit of the land.” This happened at the season of the first ripe grapes.
21So they went up and scouted the land from the Wilderness of Zin to Rehob, toward Lebo Hamath. 22They went up through the Negev and came to Hebron. Ahiman, Sheshai, and Talmai, the descendants of Anak, were there. (Hebron had been built seven years before Zoan in Egypt.) 23The scouts came to the Valley of Eshcol, and there they cut down a branch with one cluster of grapes. They carried it on a pole between two men, along with some pomegranates and figs. 24They named that place the Valley of Eshcol,[] because of the cluster which the Israelites had cut down from there. 25At the end of forty days, they returned from scouting the land.
The Report About Canaan
26They came back to Moses, Aaron, and the entire community of the Israelites at Kadesh in the Wilderness of Paran. They brought back a report to them and to the entire community. They showed them some of the fruit of the land. 27They reported to him and said, “We went to the land where you sent us. It really does flow with milk and honey, and here is its fruit. 28However, the people who live in the land are strong, and the cities are fortified and very large. We also saw the descendants of Anak there. 29The Amalekites are living in the land of the Negev. The Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites are living in the hill country. The Canaanites are living by the sea and along the Jordan.”
30Then Caleb quieted the people before Moses and said, “We should go up now and take possession of it, because we can certainly conquer it!”
31But the men who had gone up with Caleb said, “We are not able to go up against the people, because they are stronger than we are.” 32So they spread a negative report to the Israelites about the land that they had scouted. They said, “The land that we explored and scouted is a land that eats up its inhabitants. All the people we saw in the land were huge. 33We saw there the Nephilim[] (the descendants of Anak come from the Nephilim). In our own eyes we seemed like grasshoppers. We seemed like grasshoppers in their eyes too.”

Luke 18:1-17

The Parable of the Persistent Widow
181Jesus told them a parable about the need to always pray and not lose heart: 2“There was a judge in a certain town who did not fear God and did not care about people. 3There was a widow in that town, and she kept going to him, saying, ‘Give me justice from my adversary!’ 4For some time he refused, but after a while he said to himself, ‘Even though I do not fear God or care about people, 5yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will give her justice so that she will not wear me out with her endless pleading.’”
6The Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. 7Will not God give justice to his chosen ones, who are crying out to him day and night? Will he put off helping them? 8I tell you that he will give them justice quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?”
The Pharisee and the Tax Collector
9Jesus told this parable to certain people who trusted in themselves (that they were righteous) and looked down on others: 10“Two men went up to the temple courts to pray. One was a Pharisee, and the other was a tax collector. 11The Pharisee stood and prayed about himself like this: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people, robbers, evildoers, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. 12I fast twice a week. I give a tenth of all my income.’
13“However the tax collector stood at a distance and would not even lift his eyes up to heaven, but was beating his chest and saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’
14“I tell you, this man went home justified rather than the other, because everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”
Jesus Loves Little Children
(Matthew 19:13-15; Mark 10:13-16)
15People were bringing even their babies to Jesus, so that he would touch them. When the disciples saw this, they began to rebuke them. 16But Jesus invited them, saying, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. 17Amen I tell you: Whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.”