Bible Readings - Aug. 27, 2025

Reading 1

1 Thessalonians 2:9-13

You recall, brothers and sisters, our toil and drudgery.

Working night and day in order not to burden any of you,

we proclaimed to you the Gospel of God.

You are witnesses, and so is God,

how devoutly and justly and blamelessly

we behaved toward you believers.

As you know, we treated each one of you as a father treats his children,

exhorting and encouraging you and insisting

that you walk in a manner worthy of the God

who calls you into his kingdom and glory.

And for this reason we too give thanks to God unceasingly,

that, in receiving the word of God from hearing us,

you received it not as the word of men, but as it truly is, the word of God,

which is now at work in you who believe.

Psalm 139:1, 7-12ab

You have searched me and you know me, Lord.

Where can I go from your spirit?

From your presence where can I flee?

If I go up to the heavens, you are there;

if I sink to the nether world, you are present there.

If I take the wings of the dawn,

if I settle at the farthest limits of the sea,

Even there your hand shall guide me,

and your right hand hold me fast.

If I say, "Surely the darkness shall hide me,

and night shall be my light"–

For you darkness itself is not dark,

and night shines as the day.

1 John 2:5-6

But whoever keeps his word, the love of God is truly perfected in him. This is the way we may know that we are in union with him:

whoever claims to abide in him ought to live [just] as he lived.

Gospel

Matthew 23:27-32

"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites.

You are like whitewashed tombs, which appear beautiful on the outside,

but inside are full of dead men's bones and every kind of filth.

Even so, on the outside you appear righteous,

but inside you are filled with hypocrisy and evildoing.

"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites.

You build the tombs of the prophets

and adorn the memorials of the righteous,

and you say, 'If we had lived in the days of our ancestors,

we would not have joined them in shedding the prophets' blood.'

Thus you bear witness against yourselves

that you are the children of those who murdered the prophets;

now fill up what your ancestors measured out!"