Prophet Nahum; Saint Philaret the Merciful of Constantinople (762); Our Venerable Father Eligius (Eloi), Bishop of Noyon (660)

Now, brothers, concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to him, we ask you ²not to be quickly shaken in your mind or troubled, either by spirit or by word or by letter as if from us, saying that the day of Christ has already come. ³Let no one deceive you in any way. For it will not be unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of destruction. ⁴He opposes and exalts himself against all that is called God or that is worshiped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, setting himself up as God. ⁵Don’t you remember that when I was still with you, I told you these things? ⁶Now you know what is restraining him, to the end that he may be revealed in his own season. ⁷For the mystery of lawlessness already works. Only there is one who restrains now, until he is taken out of the way. ⁸Then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord will kill with the breath of his mouth and destroy by the manifestation of his coming; ⁹even he whose coming is according to the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, ¹⁰and with all deception of wickedness for those who are being lost, because they didn’t receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. ¹¹Because of this, God sends them a powerful delusion, that they should believe a lie, ¹²that they all might be judged who didn’t believe the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.

On one of those days, as he was teaching the people in the temple and preaching the Good News, the priests and scribes came to him with the elders. ²They asked him, “Tell us: by what authority do you do these things? Or who is giving you this authority?”

³He answered them, “I also will ask you one question. Tell me: ⁴the baptism of John, was it from heaven, or from men?”

⁵They reasoned with themselves, saying, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ he will say, ‘Why didn’t you believe him?’ ⁶But if we say, ‘From men,’ all the people will stone us, for they are persuaded that John was a prophet.” ⁷They answered that they didn’t know where it was from.

⁸Jesus said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.”