Livestreaming every Sunday at 9:30 am
19th Sunday after Pentecost
Saturday October 18 & Sunday October 19, 2025
Pray always. Do not lose heart. This is Christ’s encouragement in the gospel today. Wrestle with the word. Remember your baptism again and again. Come regularly to Christ’s table. Persistence in our every encounter with the divine will be blessed.
Readings for this week
First Reading: Genesis 32:22-31
First Reading: Genesis 32:22-31
First Reading: Genesis 32:22-31
Returning to the home he had fled many years before after stealing his brother’s birthright and his father’s blessing, Jacob wrestles all night long with a divine adversary who ultimately blesses him and changes his name to “Israel,” a name that means “he wrestles with God.”
22 The same night [Jacob] got up and took his two wives, his two maids, and his eleven children and crossed the ford of the Jabbok. 23 He took them and sent them across the stream, and likewise everything that he had. 24 Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him until daybreak. 25 When the man saw that he did not prevail against Jacob, he struck him on the hip socket, and Jacob’s hip was put out of joint as he wrestled with him. 26 Then he said, “Let me go, for the day is breaking.” But Jacob said, “I will not let you go, unless you bless me.” 27 So he said to him, “What is your name?” And he said, “Jacob.” 28 Then the man said, “You shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven with God and with humans and have prevailed.” 29 Then Jacob asked him, “Please tell me your name.” But he said, “Why is it that you ask my name?” And there he blessed him. 30 So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, “For I have seen God face to face, yet my life is preserved.” 31 The sun rose upon him as he passed Penuel, limping because of his hip.
Psalm 121
First Reading: Genesis 32:22-31
First Reading: Genesis 32:22-31
My help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth. (Ps. 121:2)
1 I lift up my eyes | to the hills;
from where is my | help to come?
2 My help comes | from the Lord,
the maker of heav- | en and earth.
3 The Lord will not let your | foot be moved
nor will the one who watches over you | fall asleep.
4 Behold, the keep- | er of Israel
will neither slum- | ber nor sleep;
5 the Lord watches | over you;
the Lord is your shade at | your right hand;
6 the sun will not strike | you by day,
nor the | moon by night.
7 The Lord will preserve you | from all evil
and will | keep your life.
8 The Lord will watch over your going out and your | coming in,
from this time forth for- | evermore.
Second Reading: 2 Timothy 3:14—4:5
Second Reading: 2 Timothy 3:14—4:5
Second Reading: 2 Timothy 3:14—4:5
The writer of this letter continues his instruction of Timothy, his younger colleague in ministry, by emphasizing the importance of faithful teaching despite opposition.
14 But as for you, continue in what you have learned and firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it 15 and how from childhood you have known sacred writings that are able to instruct you for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. 16 All scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, 17 so that the person of God may be proficient, equipped for every good work.
4:1 In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and in view of his appearing and his kingdom, I solemnly urge you: 2 proclaim the message; be persistent whether the time is favorable or unfavorable; convince, rebuke, and encourage with the utmost patience in teaching. 3 For the time is coming when people will not put up with sound teaching, but, having their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own desires 4 and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander away to myths. 5 As for you, be sober in everything, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, carry out your ministry fully.
Gospel: Luke 18:1-8
Second Reading: 2 Timothy 3:14—4:5
Second Reading: 2 Timothy 3:14—4:5
Jesus tells a parable of an unjust judge who is worn down by a widow’s pleas. Jesus is calling God’s people to cry out for justice and deliverance. For if an unethical judge will ultimately grant the plea of a persistent widow, how much more will God respond to those who call.
1 Then Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart. 2 He said, “In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor had respect for people. 3 In that city there was a widow who kept coming to him and saying, ‘Grant me justice against my accuser.’ 4 For a while he refused, but later he said to himself, ‘Though I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone, 5 yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.’ ” 6 And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. 7 And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? 8 I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them. And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”
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