Collect for Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany (1928 BCP)

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Collect for Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany (1928 BCP) is the collect appointed in the 1928 American Book of Common Prayer for "The Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany." It asks God, who knows human frailty amid "so many and great dangers," to give strength and protection sufficient for danger and temptation. In the 1928 propers, that prayer is joined to Romans xiii. 1-7 and St. Matthew viii. 1-13, so the Sunday gathers weakness, civil order, healing, Gentile faith, and Christ's manifested authority under one petition for divine support.

Text of the Collect

O GOD, who knowest us to be set in the midst of so many and great dangers, that by reason of the frailty of our nature we cannot always stand upright; Grant to us such strength and protection, as may support us in all dangers, and carry us through all temptations; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

[1]

The collect has five closely related clauses. "O God, who knowest us" begins with divine knowledge: the Church prays before the God who already sees its condition. "Set in the midst of so many and great dangers" names the Christian life as exposed, not self-secure. "By reason of the frailty of our nature we cannot always stand upright" confesses weakness in human nature itself, not merely hostile circumstance. "Grant to us such strength and protection" asks for grace fitted to the actual need. "As may support us in all dangers, and carry us through all temptations" joins outward peril and inward trial, and the conclusion locates that help "through Jesus Christ our Lord."

The prayer is therefore not a generic request for safety. It is a confession that the Church cannot stand by native strength, and that divine protection must both support the faithful under external pressure and carry them through temptation. The appointed Epistle and Gospel then show what that support means: ordered public life under God, and the authority of Christ to cleanse, heal, and gather those who come by faith.

Appointed Epistle

The appointed Epistle is Romans xiii. 1-7. In the 1928 Epiphany sequence it follows the Romans xii passages appointed for the First, Second, and Third Sundays after the Epiphany. After St. Paul's teaching on renewed minds, ordered gifts, charity, peaceableness, and the overcoming of evil with good, the Fourth Sunday turns to civil authority and conscience before God.

LET every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God; and they that resist shall receive to themselves condemnation. For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? do that which is good, and thou shalt have praise of the same: for he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil. Wherefore ye must needs be subject, not only for wrath, but also for conscience sake. For for this cause pay ye tribute also: for they are God's ministers, attending continually upon this very thing. Render therefore to all their dues: tribute to whom tribute is due; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honour to whom honour.

[2]

The Epistle gives the collect a public as well as personal scope. "So many and great dangers" include the danger of disorder, fear, vengeance, and contempt for lawful authority. Yet Romans xiii does not make the magistrate ultimate. Authority is "of God," and rulers are called "God's ministers" for public good. The collect's request for strength and protection therefore belongs to a world in which political order is real, conscience matters, and the Church prays to stand upright without making either private will or civil power absolute.

This also guards the prayer from a narrow inwardness. The congregation asks God to support it in dangers, and then hears an apostolic command about duties, tribute, fear, and honour. Prayer Book spirituality here is not escape from public obligation. It is the formation of a people who can live under God with conscience, obedience, and moral clarity.

Appointed Gospel

The 1928 American Gospel for the day is St. Matthew viii. 1-13. This is part of the 1928 American adjustment to the older Epiphany Gospel order: the Cana Gospel formerly appointed for the Second Sunday appears on the 1928 Third Sunday, and the older Third Sunday Gospel of healing and the centurion appears here on the Fourth Sunday.

WHEN he was come down from the mountain, great multitudes followed him. And, behold, there came a leper and worshipped him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean. And Jesus put forth his hand, and touched him, saying, I will; be thou clean. And immediately his leprosy was cleansed. And Jesus saith unto him, See thou tell no man; but go thy way, shew thyself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses commanded, for a testimony unto them. And when Jesus was entered into Capernaum, there came unto him a centurion, beseeching him, and saying, Lord, my servant lieth at home sick of the palsy, grievously tormented. And Jesus saith unto him, I will come and heal him. The centurion answered and said, Lord, I am not worthy that thou shouldest come under my roof: but speak the word only, and my servant shall be healed. For I am a man under authority, having soldiers under me: and I say to this man, Go, and he goeth; and to another, Come, and he cometh; and to my servant, Do this, and he doeth it. When Jesus heard it, he marvelled, and said to them that followed, Verily I say unto you, I have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel. And I say unto you, that many shall come from the east and west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven. But the children of the kingdom shall be cast out into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. And Jesus said unto the centurion, Go thy way; and as thou hast believed, so be it done unto thee. And his servant was healed in the selfsame hour.

[3]

This Gospel answers the collect's confession of frailty with Christ's authority. The leper says, "Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean"; Jesus answers by word and touch. The centurion understands command because he is "a man under authority," and Jesus praises his faith. The appointed Gospel therefore connects the collect's "strength and protection" to Christ's will, word, and power to heal.

The Gospel also gives the collect an Epiphany horizon. The centurion's faith leads Jesus to speak of many coming "from the east and west" into the kingdom. The manifestation of Christ is not merely private consolation for the frail; it is the disclosure of the Lord whose authority reaches beyond Israel and whose word is trusted by Gentile faith.

Epiphany Manifestation

The 1928 Prayer Book gives the season a concise Eucharistic interpretation in the Proper Preface for Epiphany. Though the preface is appointed "Upon The Epiphany, and seven days after," its language names the doctrinal pattern that continues through the Sundays after the Epiphany: Christ manifests glory in mortal flesh in order to bring his people from darkness into light.

THROUGH Jesus Christ our Lord, who, in substance of our mortal flesh, manifested forth his glory; that he might bring us out of darkness into his own glorious light.

[4]

This preface keeps the Gospel from being read as only a moral example. The Lord who cleanses and heals in Matthew viii is the incarnate Christ whose glory is manifested in mortal flesh. The collect's plea for support through danger and temptation is therefore christological: God protects his people through Jesus Christ, whose manifested glory brings them into light.

The Daily Office gives the same Epiphany theme in the Morning Prayer sentence appointed for the feast and its octave:

The Lord hath manifested forth his glory : O come, let us adore him.

[5]

The collect is thus prayed inside the adoring life of the Church. Human frailty is real, but it is named before the manifested Lord. The Church asks to be carried through temptation while worshipping the one whose glory is already shown.

Prayer Book Continuity and 1928 Arrangement

The collect and Epistle are inherited from the older English Prayer Book tradition. The Church of England's official 1662 text prints the same collect for the Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany, though with the older Gospel from St. Matthew viii. 23-end rather than the 1928 American Gospel from St. Matthew viii. 1-13.

O God, who knowest us to be set in the midst of so many and great dangers, that by reason of the frailty of our nature we cannot always stand upright: Grant to us such strength and protection, as may support us in all dangers, and carry us through all temptations; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

[6]

The Society of Archbishop Justus comparison page notes the 1928 American Gospel shift:

In the 1928 Book, the Gospel Readings for the second and third Sundays after the Epiphany are shifted to the third and fourth Sundays, respectively.

[7]

This matters for interpretation. In 1662, the Fourth Sunday collect was heard with the storm at sea; in the 1928 American book, it is heard with Christ cleansing the leper and healing the centurion's servant. The inherited collect still prays over dangers and temptations, but the appointed 1928 Gospel gives that petition a sharper connection to frailty, healing, authority, and Gentile faith.

Francis Procter and Walter Howard Frere describe the broader Prayer Book rationale for reading collects with the lessons:

At a far earlier date a change came about which affected the position and rationale of the first variable Collect: originally it was connected with the Litany, either processional or stationary, which formed part of the introductory section of the Mass, and was the summing up in Collect-form of the petitions there offered in Litany-form: but as the Litany shrank into smaller dimensions and prominence, this connexion became obsolete, and then the Collect acquired a new connexion and became closely bound to the Epistle and Gospel: this new connexion has been further developed in the course of the changes in the Prayer Book.

[8]

For this article, that principle means the collect should not be isolated from Romans xiii and Matthew viii. The prayer's support in dangers is interpreted by the appointed readings: ordered life under God, and the healing authority of Christ.

Procter and Frere also summarize the Epiphany-season logic in which these readings stand:

From Christmas to Epiphany the design of the proper services is to set forth the humanity of our Saviour; and from Epiphany to Septuagesima to show the divine nature of the Son of Man by relating in the Gospels some of His first miracles. The Epistles here show signs of being part of a continuous series which apparently began with the Epistles to the Romans and went through the Pauline Epistles in order at least as far as the end of the Colossians.

[9]

That reading fits the 1928 Fourth Sunday: Romans xiii continues the Pauline moral sequence, while Matthew viii manifests Christ's divine authority through healing and the praise of faith. The collect gathers both strands by asking for the divine strength without which frail human beings cannot stand upright.

Anglican Interpretation

Anthony Sparrow's seventeenth-century rationale interprets the older Fourth Sunday after Epiphany, where the same collect and Epistle stood beside the storm Gospel. His comments remain important because they show how Anglican writers connected the collect, civil authority, and the safety of the Church:

The Gospel treats of Christs miraculous stilling of the waves and the wind. By the tempest on the Sea, may be signified the tumultuous madness of the people, which endangers the peace of the Church, Christs ship: so the Psalm expounds it, Thou stillest the raging of the Sea, and the madness of the people: which would never be quiet, unless Christ by his word and power should command it to be still: And because he does now rule the peoples madness by Ministers of his vengeance to whom he gives his power: therefore the Epistle teaches and exhorts us to submit conscientiously to that power of Christ, that so the ship of the Church may be still and safe.

[10]

Sparrow then condenses the collect:

The Collect prayes to God to keep the Church safe amidst the many storms and waves that shake it.

[11]

Sparrow's older reading is not identical to the 1928 arrangement, but it remains useful. It shows that the collect was historically read as ecclesial, not merely individual, and that Romans xiii was heard as part of Christ's providential ordering of public life. The 1928 Gospel shift does not erase that older layer; it adds the healing of frailty and the centurion's faith as the controlling Gospel proclamation for the American Fourth Sunday.

David Curry, writing for the Prayer Book Society of Canada, describes the Epiphany sequence as a doctrinally ordered manifestation of Christ:

The Prayer Book design of the Epiphany season is to manifest the glory and set forth the divinity of Christ through an ordered sequence, comprising first, divine wisdom, and second, divine power (cf. the collect for the First Sunday after Epiphany, Cdn. BCP, 1962, p. 123). The manifestation of divine wisdom -- Christ teaching in the Temple of Jerusalem (Epiphany I) -- precedes the manifestations of divine power: Christ turning water into wine at the Wedding of Cana (Epiphany II); Christ healing the leper (Epiphany III); Christ stilling the sea-storm by his words (Epiphany IV); Christ gathering in the wheat and tares of the world for judgement (Epiphany V); and Christ in the glory of his second coming (Epiphany VI).

[12]

Curry's account helps explain why the 1928 Fourth Sunday should still be read within Epiphany manifestation. The article must respect the 1928 American appointment, but the doctrinal logic remains clear: Christ's power is manifested in the Gospels, and the Epistles teach the Church how to live under that manifested Lord.

Theological Summary

The collect's theology can be summarized clause by clause.

"O God, who knowest us" teaches the Church to pray from reality, not self-deception. "Set in the midst of so many and great dangers" names the exposed condition of human life. "By reason of the frailty of our nature we cannot always stand upright" confesses that danger is not only outside us; weakness is also within. "Grant to us such strength and protection" asks for a gift appropriate to that condition. "Support us in all dangers, and carry us through all temptations" joins preservation and sanctification, outward deliverance and inward perseverance.

The appointed Epistle shows one form of that support: conscience ordered under God in public life. The appointed Gospel shows the source of that support: Christ's authority to cleanse, heal, command, and gather the faithful from east and west. The collect therefore prays neither for self-reliance nor for escape from ordinary duty, but for the grace by which frail people can stand, obey, trust, and persevere under Jesus Christ our Lord.

In worship, the collect is used at Holy Communion with the appointed Epistle and Gospel, and as the collect of the day in the Prayer Book's weekly rhythm. It is strongest when heard with the whole proper: the God who knows frailty supports his Church, the apostolic word orders conscience and public duty, and Christ's manifested authority heals human need and calls forth faith.

See Also

References

  1. ↑ Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, The Book of Common Prayer, Standard Book accepted in 1928, "The Collects, Epistles, and Gospels," "Collect for Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany" under "The Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany," PDF p. 14 of the Society of Archbishop Justus scan; The 1928 Book of Common Prayer: The Collects, Epistles and Gospels. Complete collect compared word for word with local source sources/justuspropers/ReadingsA.htm, lines 962-970, and with tmp/revision-research/collect-for-fourth-sunday-after-the-epiphany/1928-propers-pypdf.txt, lines 806-813. PDF extraction spacing artifacts were ignored; the words through "Amen." agree with the independent 1928 transcription at Epiphany 4 Propers (1928 BCP).
  2. ↑ Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, The Book of Common Prayer, Standard Book accepted in 1928, "The Collects, Epistles, and Gospels," The Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany, Epistle, Romans xiii. 1; Society of Archbishop Justus PDF, The 1928 Book of Common Prayer: The Collects, Epistles and Gospels. Quotation checked against tmp/revision-research/collect-for-fourth-sunday-after-the-epiphany/1928-propers-pypdf.txt, lines 814-831, and the independent 1928 transcription at Epiphany 4 Propers (1928 BCP), lines 103-123. The local comparison page sources/justuspropers/ReadingsA.htm, lines 980-996, preserves the older printed setting but has OCR errors such as "damnation" in the left-column tradition and "tire"; the 1928 PDF's "condemnation" was used as controlling text.
  3. ↑ Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, The Book of Common Prayer, Standard Book accepted in 1928, "The Collects, Epistles, and Gospels," The Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany, Gospel, St. Matthew viii. 1; Society of Archbishop Justus PDF, The 1928 Book of Common Prayer: The Collects, Epistles and Gospels. Quotation checked against tmp/revision-research/collect-for-fourth-sunday-after-the-epiphany/1928-propers-pypdf.txt, lines 832-860, and the independent 1928 transcription at Epiphany 4 Propers (1928 BCP), lines 125-154. OCR spacing artifacts in the PDF extraction were corrected against the transcription; the Gospel appears in the Society of Archbishop Justus comparison file at sources/justuspropers/ReadingsA.htm, lines 931-955, in the older Epiphany placement, while the 1928 PDF controls its appointment on the Fourth Sunday.
  4. ↑ Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, The Book of Common Prayer, Standard Book accepted in 1928, "The Order for the Administration of the Lord's Supper, or Holy Communion," Proper Preface for Epiphany; Society of Archbishop Justus transcription, The 1928 Book of Common Prayer: Holy Communion. Quotation checked against local source sources/justus1928/HC.htm, lines 479-485.
  5. ↑ Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, The Book of Common Prayer, Standard Book accepted in 1928, "The Order for Daily Morning Prayer," seasonal invitatory sentence "On the Epiphany and seven days after, and on the Feast of the Transfiguration"; Society of Archbishop Justus transcription, The 1928 Book of Common Prayer: Morning Prayer. Quotation checked against local source sources/justus1928/MP.htm, lines 320-322.
  6. ↑ Church of England, The Book of Common Prayer (1662), Cambridge University Press 2006 edition hosted by the Church of England, "The Fourth Sunday after The Epiphany," collect; The Fourth Sunday after The Epiphany. Quotation checked against fetched source tmp/revision-research/collect-for-fourth-sunday-after-the-epiphany/coe-1662-epiphany4.html, lines 8698-8704. The 1662 punctuation after "upright" differs from the 1928 American semicolon, but the petition is materially continuous.
  7. ↑ Society of Archbishop Justus, "The Collects, Epistles, and Gospels: The Sundays after the Epiphany," comparison of the 1786, 1789, 1892, and 1928 American Prayer Books; Collects, Epistles, and Gospels, 1789 and 1892. Quotation checked against local source sources/justuspropers/ReadingsA.htm, lines 973-977. The same local file shows the older St. Matthew viii. 1 Gospel after the Third Sunday collect at lines 931-955, and the 1928 PDF extraction places it under the Fourth Sunday at tmp/revision-research/collect-for-fourth-sunday-after-the-epiphany/1928-propers-pypdf.txt, lines 832-860.
  8. ↑ Francis Procter and Walter Howard Frere, A New History of the Book of Common Prayer, with a Rationale of Its Offices, revised edition (London: Macmillan and Co., 1907), p. 525, chapter XIII, "Collects, Epistles, and Gospels"; Society of Archbishop Justus transcription, A New History of the Book of Common Prayer: Chapter 13. Quotation checked against tmp/revision-research/collect-for-fourth-sunday-after-the-epiphany/procter-frere-ch13.html, lines 162-177.
  9. ↑ Francis Procter and Walter Howard Frere, A New History of the Book of Common Prayer, with a Rationale of Its Offices, revised edition (London: Macmillan and Co., 1907), p. 531, chapter XIII, "Collects, Epistles, and Gospels"; Society of Archbishop Justus transcription, A New History of the Book of Common Prayer: Chapter 13. Quotation checked against tmp/revision-research/collect-for-fourth-sunday-after-the-epiphany/procter-frere-ch13.html, lines 347-358.
  10. ↑ Anthony Sparrow, A Rationale upon the Book of Common Prayer (London, 1672), "4. Sunday after Epiphany"; Project Canterbury transcription, A Rationale upon the Book of Common Prayer: Epiphany, Gesima, Lent. Quotation checked against tmp/revision-research/collect-for-fourth-sunday-after-the-epiphany/sparrow-epiphany.html, lines 105-117. Sparrow is interpreting the older Fourth Sunday Gospel, not the 1928 American Gospel placement.
  11. ↑ Anthony Sparrow, A Rationale upon the Book of Common Prayer (London, 1672), "4. Sunday after Epiphany"; Project Canterbury transcription, A Rationale upon the Book of Common Prayer: Epiphany, Gesima, Lent. Quotation checked against tmp/revision-research/collect-for-fourth-sunday-after-the-epiphany/sparrow-epiphany.html, lines 118-119.
  12. ↑ David Curry, "Doctrinal Instrument of Salvation: The Use of Scripture in the Prayer Book Lectionary," paper dated May 11, 1985 and republished May 11, 2021 by the Prayer Book Society of Canada, part II, note 62; Doctrinal Instruments of Salvation. Quotation checked against tmp/revision-research/collect-for-fourth-sunday-after-the-epiphany/prayerbook-ca-doctrinal-instruments.html, line 505. Curry is summarizing the traditional Prayer Book Epiphany sequence; the 1928 American book shifts the Cana and healing Gospels one Sunday later, as noted above.

External Links

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