"We have left undone those things which we ought to have done; And we have done those things which we ought not to have done; And there is no health in us."
As Fleming Rutledge put it, “Understanding Sin requires us to recognize its power lodged in ourselves” (Crucifixion 197).
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So the 1662 IE offers two daily office lectionaries, one Tudor (1662 is more or less 1559) and one mid-century modern.
(For lectionary nerds: the Canadian 1962 daily office lectionary reproduces a non-final draft of what became the Church of England 1961, reprinted in the 1662 IE appendix).
One last note: The 1662 IE also has a second daily office lectionary in an appendix. It's the Church of England's 1961 daily office lectionary--a final form revision of the 1922. It follows the church year, but inter alia respects the canonical form of the gospels (no harmony of the gospels).
The 1662 International Edition has the original 1662 daily office lectionary, along with the 1662's table of special first lessons for Mattins and Evensong on Sundays. That's what the thread is about.
But the Mattins and Evensong lectionaries are different. The Oxford/Cambridge 1662s don't have the original 1662 lectionaries. They have an 1871 daily office lectionary and a 1922 daily office lectionary (civil calendar vs. ecclesiastical calendar).
They're the same on the Holy Communion propers, so they both have a passage from Joel 2 appointed for the epistle on Ash Wednesday. (And they both have Joel 2:13 as one of the sentences in the daily offices.)
In short, in the 1662 lectionary, the season devoted to the ordinary life of the church draws from the Minor Prophets three basic lessons and teaches them every year: justification by faith alone, the necessity of doing justice, and the gifts of God for all the people of God.
And what other chapters from the Minor Prophets get read as Sunday first lessons in this season of the ordinary life of the church? Habakkuk 2—the just shall live by faith—and Micah 6—do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your God.
The choice of when to read Joel 2 is the church’s structuring of how to read Joel 2. The Spirit of God poured out on sons and daughters who prophesy, on old men and young men, “even on the male and female slaves,” belongs in Trinitytide, the ordinary season of the life and growth of the church.
The choice to read Joel 2 here is not just an accident of canonical order. Most chapters in the Minor Prophets are not read as proper lessons, and most that are get read as proper lessons are tied to events in the first half of the church year (Presentation, Holy Week, John the Baptist’s Day).
