Twenty-Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time

Habakkuk 1:2-3, 2:2-4  | The upright man will live by his faithfulness

How long, O Lord, am I to cry for help

while you will not listen;

to cry ‘Oppression!’ in your ear

and you will not save?

Why do you set injustice before me,

why do you look on where there is tyranny?

Outrage and violence, this is all I see,

all is contention, and discord flourishes.

Then the Lord answered and said,

‘Write the vision down,

inscribe it on tablets

to be easily read,

since this vision is for its own time only:

eager for its own fulfilment, it does not deceive;

if it comes slowly, wait,

for come it will, without fail.

See how he flags, he whose soul is not at rights,

but the upright man will live by his faithfulness.’

Psalm 95:1-2, 6-7, 8-9 | O that today you would listen to his voice! ‘Harden not your hearts.’

  Come, ring out our joy to the Lord;

  hail the rock who saves us.

  Let us come before him, giving thanks,

  with songs let us hail the Lord.

O that today you would listen to his voice! ‘Harden not your hearts.’

  Come in; let us bow and bend low;

  let us kneel before the God who made us:

  for he is our God and we

  the people who belong to his pasture,

  the flock that is led by his hand.

O that today you would listen to his voice! ‘Harden not your hearts.’

  O that today you would listen to his voice!

  ‘Harden not your hearts as at Meribah,

  as on that day at Massah in the desert

  when your fathers put me to the test;

  when they tried me, though they saw my work.’

O that today you would listen to his voice! ‘Harden not your hearts.’

2 Timothy 1:6-8, 13-14 | Never be ashamed of witnessing to our Lord

I am reminding you to fan into a flame the gift that God gave you when I laid my hands on you. God’s gift was not a spirit of timidity, but the Spirit of power, and love, and self-control. So you are never to be ashamed of witnessing to the Lord, or ashamed of me for being his prisoner; but with me, bear the hardships for the sake of the Good News, relying on the power of God.

  Keep as your pattern the sound teaching you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. You have been trusted to look after something precious; guard it with the help of the Holy Spirit who lives in us.

Speak, Lord, your servant is listening: you have the message of eternal life. | 1S3:9,Jn6:68

OR

The word of the Lord remains for ever. What is this word? It is the Good News that has been brought to you. | 1 Peter 1:25 

Luke 17:5-10 | Say, 'We are merely servants'

The apostles said to the Lord, ‘Increase our faith.’ The Lord replied, ‘Were your faith the size of a mustard seed you could say to this mulberry tree, “Be uprooted and planted in the sea,” and it would obey you.

  ‘Which of you, with a servant ploughing or minding sheep, would say to him when he returned from the fields, “Come and have your meal immediately”? Would he not be more likely to say, “Get my supper laid; make yourself tidy and wait on me while I eat and drink. You can eat and drink yourself afterwards”? Must he be grateful to the servant for doing what he was told? So with you: when you have done all you have been told to do, say, “We are merely servants: we have done no more than our duty.”’

'Scripture readings taken from The Jerusalem Bible, published and copyright 1966 by Darton, Longman and Todd Ltd, and used by permission of the publishers'