Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts for Great and Holy Monday

LITURGY OF THE PRESANCTIFIED GIFTS

At Psalm 140

In Tone 1

Lead my soul forth from prison* that I may give thanks to Your name.

Going freely to His Passion,
the Lord said to His disciples along the way:
Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem,
and the Son of man shall be delivered up, as it is written.
Come, let us purify our thoughts that we may go with Him;
let us be crucified with Him;
in Him we shall die to the pleasures of this life,
that we may live with Him and hear Him say to us:
I am no longer going to the earthly Jerusalem to suffer,
but I am going to My Father and your Father,
to My God and your God;
you shall go with Me to the heavenly Jerusalem
in the Kingdom of Heaven.

The just shall gather around me* when You have been good to me.

In Tone 5

Out of the depths I cry to You, O Lord;* O Lord, hear my voice!

O faithful, let us hasten to the saving Passion of Christ our God;
let us glorify His long-suffering which is beyond expression,
that He may save us from sin and death,
and that He may also raise us in His goodness and love for humankind.

Let Yours ears be attentive* to the voice of my prayer.

If You mark iniquities, Lord, who can stand?* But with You forgiveness is that You may be revered.

When You were going to Your Passion, O Lord,
You reassured Your disciples by taking them aside and saying:
How can You forget the words I have spoken to you?
The Scriptures say that all the prophets die only in Jerusalem!
Now the time of which I have spoken to you has arrived:
Behold, I shall be delivered into the hands of sinners;
they shall mock Me and nail Me to the Cross;
and after burying Me, they shall number Me among the dead.
Take courage, however, for I shall rise on the third day,
to bring joy and eternal life to all the faithful.

I have waited for You as You have commanded; my soul patiently relies on Your promise,* for it has trusted in the Lord.

From the morning watch until night* let Israel trust in the Lord.

Not understanding the depth of the ineffable mystery of Your plan of salvation,
the mother of the sons of Zebedee came to You, O Lord;
she asked You to grant them the places of honour in a temporal kingdom.
But in place of these honours,
You proclaimed to Your friends that they would drink from the cup of death,
the same cup from which You shall first drink
to cleanse us of our sins.
Therefore, we cry out to You:
O Saviour of our souls, glory to You!

For with the Lord there is mercy, and with Him there is plentiful redemption;* and He shall redeem Israel from all its iniquities.

Praise the Lord, all the nations;* proclaim His glory, all you people.

When You taught Your disciples to seek that which is higher,
You said to them, O Lord:
Do not imitate the pagans by lording over those who are weak;
it shall not be that way with you.
For I have chosen to be poor;
so the first among you shall become the servant of the rest;
the one who commands shall be as the one who obeys;
the most noble shall be as the lowest.
For I Myself have come to serve the poverty of Adam
and to give My life as a ransom for the many
who now sing: O Lord, glory to You!

Strong is the love of the Lord for us;* eternally will His truth endure.

In Tone 8, Glory…

O faithful, let us fear the punishment of the fig tree
which was dried up for not having borne any fruit;
let us offer worthy fruits of repentance to Christ,
who grants us His great mercy.

Now…

The Serpent thought he found a second Eve in the Egyptian woman,
who tried to make Joseph succumb to her words of flattery.
But he avoided sinning;
he left his garment behind, but was not ashamed of his nudity,
as were our first parents after their disobedience.
Through his prayers, O Christ, have mercy on us.

Prokeimenon I, Tone 6
May the Lord bless you from Sion,* and may you see prosperity of Jerusalem.
verse: Blessed are those who fear the Lord, who walk in His ways.

Reading I
Exodus 1:1-20
Now these are the names of the children of Israel who came to Egypt; each man and his household came with Jacob: Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah; Is-sachar, Zebulun, and Benjamin; Dan, Naphtali, Gad, and Asher. All those who were the seed of Jacob were seventy-five persons (for Joseph was in Egypt already). Now Joseph died, as well as all his brothers and all that generation. Then the children of Israel increased and multiplied, became numerous, and grew exceedingly mighty; and the land was filled with them. But there arose a new king over Egypt who knew not Joseph. Then he said to his nation, “Look, the race of the children of Israel is a great multitude and is stronger than we; come, let us outwit them, lest they multiply, and it happen in the event of war that they also join our enemies and fight against us and so escape out of the land.” Therefore he set taskmasters over them to afflict them in their works; and they built for Pharaoh strong cities—Pithom and Raamses and On, which is Heliopolis. But the more they humbled them, the more they multiplied and grew; and the Egyptians greatly abhorred the children of Israel. So the Egyptians tyrannized the children of Israel by force. They made their lives bitter with hard labor—in mortar, in brick, and in all manner of service in the field. All their labor in which they made them serve was by violence. Then the king of the Egyptians spoke to the Hebrew midwives, of whom the name of one was Shiphrah and the name of the other Puah; and he said, “When you do the duties of a midwife for the Hebrew women and see they are about to give birth, if it is a male, then you shall kill him; but if a female, let her live.” But the midwives feared God and did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but saved the male children alive. So the king of Egypt called for the midwives and said to them, “Why have you done this thing and saved the male children alive?” Thus the midwives said to Pharaoh, “Because the Hebrew women are not like the women of Egypt; for they are lively and give birth before the midwives come to them.” Therefore God dealt well with the midwives, and the people multiplied and grew very mighty.

Prokeimenon II, Tone 8
We bless you* in the name of the Lord.
verse: “They have oppressed me from my youth,” this is the song of Israel.

Reading II
Job 1:1-12
There was a man in the land of Ausitis whose name was Job. That man was true, blameless, righteous, and God-fearing, and he abstained from every evil thing. Now he had seven sons and three daughters, and his cattle consisted of seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen, and five hundred female donkeys in the pastures. Moreover he possessed a very large number of house servants. His works were also great on the earth, and that man was the most noble of all the men of the East.

His sons would visit one another and prepare a banquet every day, and invite their three sisters to eat and drink with them. When the days of their drinking were ended, Job sent and purified them; and he rose early in the morning and offered sacrifices for them according to their number, as well as one calf for the sins of their souls. For Job said, “Lest my sons consider evil things in their mind against God.” Therefore Job did this continually.

Then as it so happened one day that behold, the angels of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and the devil also came with them. The Lord said to the devil, “Where did you come from?” So the devil answered the Lord and said, “I came here after going about the earth and walking around under heaven.” Then the Lord said to him, “Have you yet considered my servant Job, since there is none like him on the earth: a blameless, true, and God-fearing man, and one who abstains from every evil thing?” So the devil answered and said before the Lord, “Does Job worship the Lord for no reason? Have You not made a hedge around him, around his household, and around all that he has on every side? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his cattle have increased in the land. But stretch out Your hand and touch all he has, and see if he will bless You to Your face.” Then the Lord said to the devil, “Behold, whatever he has I give into your hand; but do not touch him.” Thus the devil went out from the Lord.

Gospel
Matthew 24:3-35
At that time, as Jesus sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to Him privately, saying, “Tell us, when will these things be? And what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?”

And Jesus answered and said to them: “Take heed that no one deceives you. For many will come in My name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and will deceive many. And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places. All these are the beginning of sorrows.

“Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and kill you, and you will be hated by all nations for My name’s sake. And then many will be offended, will betray one another, and will hate one another. Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many. And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold. But he who endures to the end shall be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come.

“Therefore when you see the ‘abomination of desolation,’ spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place” (whoever reads, let him understand), “then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. Let him who is on the housetop not go down to take anything out of his house. And let him who is in the field not go back to get his clothes. But woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing babies in those days! And pray that your flight may not be in winter or on the Sabbath. For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be. And unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be saved; but for the elect’s sake those days will be shortened.

“Then if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Christ!’ or ‘There!’ do not believe it. For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you beforehand.

“Therefore if they say to you, ‘Look, He is in the desert!’ do not go out; or ‘Look, He is in the inner rooms!’ do not believe it. For as the lightning comes from the east and flashes to the west, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be. For wherever the carcass is, there the eagles will be gathered together.

“Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And He will send His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.

“Now learn this parable from the fig tree: When its branch has already become tender and puts forth leaves, you know that summer is near. So you also, when you see all these things, know that it is near—at the doors! Assuredly, I say to you, this generation will by no means pass away till all these things take place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away.