Bible Readings - Feb. 16, 2024

Reading 1

Isaiah 58:1-9a

Thus says the Lord GOD:

Cry out full-throated and unsparingly,

lift up your voice like a trumpet blast;

Tell my people their wickedness,

and the house of Jacob their sins.

They seek me day after day,

and desire to know my ways,

Like a nation that has done what is just

and not abandoned the law of their God;

They ask me to declare what is due them,

pleased to gain access to God.

“Why do we fast, and you do not see it?

afflict ourselves, and you take no note of it?”

Lo, on your fast day you carry out your own pursuits,

and drive all your laborers.

Yes, your fast ends in quarreling and fighting,

striking with wicked claw.

Would that today you might fast

so as to make your voice heard on high!

Is this the manner of fasting I wish,

of keeping a day of penance:

That a man bow his head like a reed

and lie in sackcloth and ashes?

Do you call this a fast,

a day acceptable to the LORD?

This, rather, is the fasting that I wish:

releasing those bound unjustly,

untying the thongs of the yoke;

Setting free the oppressed,

breaking every yoke;

Sharing your bread with the hungry,

sheltering the oppressed and the homeless;

Clothing the naked when you see them,

and not turning your back on your own.

Then your light shall break forth like the dawn,

and your wound shall quickly be healed;

Your vindication shall go before you,

and the glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard.

Then you shall call, and the LORD will answer,

you shall cry for help, and he will say: Here I am!

Psalm 51:3-6ab, 18-19

(19b) A heart contrite and humbled, O God, you will not spurn.

Have mercy on me, O God, in your goodness;

in the greatness of your compassion wipe out my offense.

Thoroughly wash me from my guilt

and of my sin cleanse me.

For I acknowledge my offense,

and my sin is before me always:

“Against you only have I sinned,

and done what is evil in your sight.”

For you are not pleased with sacrifices;

should I offer a burnt offering, you would not accept it.

My sacrifice, O God, is a contrite spirit;

a heart contrite and humbled, O God, you will not spurn.

see Amos 5:14

Seek good and not evil so that you may live,

and the Lord will be with you.

Gospel

Matthew 9:14-15

The disciples of John approached Jesus and said,

“Why do we and the Pharisees fast much,

but your disciples do not fast?”

Jesus answered them, “Can the wedding guests mourn

as long as the bridegroom is with them?

The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them,

and then they will fast.”

John 14:15-18, 21-26

“If you love me, you will keep my commandments.

And I will ask the Father, and he will give you

another Advocate to be with you always,

the Spirit of truth, which the world cannot accept,

because it neither sees nor knows it. But you know it,

because it remains with you, and will be in you.

I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you.

Whoever has my commandments and observes them is the one

who loves me. And whoever loves me will be loved by my Father,

and I will love him and reveal myself to him.”

Judas, not the Iscariot, said to him,

“Master, [then] what happened that you will reveal yourself to us

and not to the world?”

Jesus answered and said to him, “Whoever loves me

will keep my word, and my Father will love him,

and we will come to him and make our dwelling with him.

Whoever does not love me does not keep my words;

yet the word you hear is not mine but that of the Father who sent me.

“I have told you this while I am with you.

The Advocate, the holy Spirit that the Father will send in my name

—he will teach you everything and remind you of all that [I] told you.