JANUARY 04

First Reading:  Psalm 147:12-20                          

 Extol the LORD, O Jerusalem! Praise your God, O Zion!  For he strengthens the bars of your gates; he blesses your  children within you. He grants peace within your borders; he  fills you with the finest of wheat. He sends out his command  to the earth; his word runs swiftly.  He gives snow like wool;  he scatters frost like ashes. He hurls down hail like crumbs—  who can stand before his cold? He sends out his word and  melts them; he makes his wind blow, and the waters flow.  He declares his word to Jacob, his statutes and ordinances  to Israel. He has not dealt thus with any other nation; they do  not know his ordinances. Praise the LORD!

 Second Reading:  John 1:1-18                                   

 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God,  and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with  God. All things came into being through him, and without him  not one thing came into being. What has come into being in  him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light  shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overtake it.

 There was a man sent from God whose name was John. He  came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might  believe through him. He himself was not the light, but he  came to testify to the light. The true light, which enlightens  everyone, was coming into the world. 

 He was in the world, and the world came into being through  him, yet the world did not know him. He came to what was  his own, and his own people did not accept him. But to all  who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power  to become children of God, who were born, not of blood or of  the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.

 And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we  have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of  grace and truth. (John testified to him and cried out, “This  was he of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me ranks ahead  of me because he was before me.’ ”) From his fullness we  have all received, grace upon grace. The law indeed was  given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus  Christ. No one has ever seen God. It is the only Son, himself  God, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him  known.