Hieromartyr Zenobius and His Sister Zenobia; Holy Apostle Cleopas; St Joseph I, Patriarch of Constantinople (1283)

For you, brothers, became imitators of the assemblies of God which are in Judea in Christ Jesus; for you also suffered the same things from your own countrymen, even as they did from the Jews ¹⁵who killed both the Lord Jesus and their own prophets, and drove us out, and don’t please God, and are contrary to all men, ¹⁶forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles that they may be saved, to fill up their sins always. But wrath has come on them to the uttermost.

¹⁷But we, brothers, being bereaved of you for a short season in presence, not in heart, tried even harder to see your face with great desire, ¹⁸because we wanted to come to you—indeed, I, Paul, once and again—but Satan hindered us. ¹⁹For what is our hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing? Isn’t it even you, before our Lord Jesus at his coming? ²⁰For you are our glory and our joy.

“He who is not with me is against me. He who doesn’t gather with me scatters.

²⁴The unclean spirit, when he has gone out of the man, passes through dry places, seeking rest; and finding none, he says, ‘I will turn back to my house from which I came out.’ ²⁵When he returns, he finds it swept and put in order. ²⁶Then he goes and takes seven other spirits more evil than himself, and they enter in and dwell there. The last state of that man becomes worse than the first.”