a thread opens
And as for your nativity, in the day you were born your navel was not cut, neither were you washed in water to supple you; you were not salted at all, nor swaddled at all.
The Vigil
Today’s scroll, one verse at a time — each linked to the last by the cross-references rather than by any model of you. The same vigil for everyone, and a different one tomorrow.
Lest I strip her naked, and set her as in the day that she was born, and make her as a wilderness, and set her like a dry land, and slay her with thirst.
from Ezekiel 16:4 · a strong link
And in all your abominations and your prostitution you have not remembered the days of your youth, when you were naked and bore, and were polluted in your blood.
from Hosea 2:3
Because you have not remembered the days of your youth, but have fretted me in all these things; look, therefore I also will recompense your way upon your head, says the Lord GOD: and you shall not commit this lewdness above all your abominations.
from Ezekiel 16:22
And they that escape of you shall remember me among the nations where they shall be carried captives, because I am broken with their immoral heart, which has departed from me, and with their eyes, which prostitute themselves after their idols: and they shall loathe themselves for the evils which they have committed in all their abominations.
from Ezekiel 16:43
You that have escaped the sword, go away, stand not still: remember the LORD in the distance, and let Jerusalem come into your mind.
from Ezekiel 6:9
a thread opens
As concerning therefore the eating of those things that are offered in sacrifice to idols, we know that an idol is nothing in the world, and that there is none other God but one.
For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus;
from I Corinthians 8:4
And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we saw his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.
from I Timothy 2:5
I will declare the decree: the LORD has said to me, You are my Son; this day have I begotten you.
from John 1:14 · a strong link
And look, a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.
from Psalms 2:7 · a strong link
a thread opens
By this we perceive the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.
As the Father knows me, even so know I the Father: and I lay down my life for the sheep.
from I John 3:16
All things are delivered to me of my Father: and no man knows the Son, but the Father; neither knows any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him.
from John 10:15 · a strong link
O righteous Father, the world has not known you: but I have known you, and these have known that you have sent me.
from Matthew 11:27 · a strong link
a thread opens
But the anointing which you have received of him remains in you, and you need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teaches you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it has taught you, you shall remain in him.
Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teaches, but which the Holy Spirit teaches; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
from I John 2:27
But the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness to him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
from I Corinthians 2:13
These are the ones who separate themselves, sensual, having not the Spirit.
from I Corinthians 2:14 · a strong link
But you are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if perhaps the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.
from Jude 1:19
In whom you also trusted, after that you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that you believed, you were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise,
from Romans 8:9 · a strong link
Therefore being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has shed forth this, which you now see and hear.
from Ephesians 1:13
a thread opens
And God has set some in the church, first apostles, secondarily prophets, thirdly teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, governments, varieties of tongues.
Obey your leaders, and submit yourselves: for they watch for your souls, as they that must give account, that they may do it with joy, and not with grief: for that is unprofitable for you.
from I Corinthians 12:28 · a strong link
So you, O son of man, I have set you a watchman to the house of Israel; therefore you shall hear the word at my mouth, and warn them from me.
from Hebrews 13:17
You therefore tuck your cloak into your belt, and arise, and speak to them all that I command you: be not dismayed at their faces, lest I confound you before them.
from Ezekiel 33:7
And the hand of the LORD was on Elijah; and he tucked his cloak into his belt, and ran before Ahab to the entrance of Jezreel.
from Jeremiah 1:17 · a strong link
And Elisha the prophet called one of the children of the prophets, and said to him, Tuck your cloak into your belt, and take this flask of oil in your hand, and go to Ramoth-gilead:
from I Kings 18:46
a thread opens
I know also, my God, that you try the heart, and have pleasure in uprightness. As for me, in the uprightness of my heart I have willingly offered all these things: and now have I seen with joy your people, who are present here, to offer willingly to you.
Jesus saw Nathanael coming to him, and says of him, Look, an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile!
from I Chronicles 29:17
Blessed is the man to whom the LORD imputes not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile.
from John 1:47
Therefore laying aside all malice, and all guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and all slander,
from Psalms 32:2
Therefore seeing we also are surrounded with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us,
from I Peter 2:1
a thread opens
Clean out therefore the old leaven, so that you may be a new lump, as you are unleavened. For even Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us:
Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male of the first year: you shall take it out from the sheep, or from the goats:
from I Corinthians 5:7
For if the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies to the purifying of the flesh:
from Exodus 12:5
And he shall take of the blood of the young bull, and sprinkle it with his finger upon the mercy seat eastward; and before the mercy seat shall he sprinkle of the blood with his finger seven times.
from Hebrews 9:13
That is the whole thread.
Every verse the cross-references reach from Ezekiel 16:4 along this chain. Today’s own vigil is laid separately.
Each verse follows the one before it along the chain a study Bible draws — a century old, public, and compiled by people arguing about Scripture rather than about how long you stay. Every card says which verse it came from and opens the chapter it belongs to. Today’s vigil is the same for every reader and is worked out from the date alone, so there is no account, no counter, and nothing stored in your browser or ours.
The text is the Lantern Modern Standard. The links are openbible.info’s cross-reference set (CC BY), the same apparatus behind the reader’s Echoes drawer. Read a whole book · Today’s table