Worship: Sundays at 8:15 am | 9:40 am | 11:00 am, Wednesdays at 6:35 pm, Fridays at 7:00 pm

 

 

 

Luke 22: 39-46: 39 Jesus went out as usual to the Mount of Olives, and his disciples followed him. 40 On reaching the place, he said to them, "Pray that you will not fall into temptation." 41 He withdrew about a stone's throw beyond them, knelt down and prayed, 42 "Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done." 43 An angel from heaven appeared to him and strengthened him. 44 And being in anguish, he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground.[a]

 

45 When he rose from prayer and went back to the disciples, he found them asleep, exhausted from sorrow. 46 "Why are you sleeping?" he asked them. "Get up and pray so that you will not fall into temptation."

 

I Corinthians 15: 51-55: 51 Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed- 52 in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. 53 For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. 54 When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: "Death has been swallowed up in victory."[a]

55 "Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?"[b]

 

It's been nearly 40 years since the old, far more experienced surgeon spoke these oh, so truthful, words to a young surgeon, 'helping folks die is as important a part of our job as helping them live.' He went on to say that he could sit at the end of a hospital hallway and within a few minutes identify the rooms in which patients were dying by the reluctance of physicians and nurses to enter the rooms of these

patients, and if they did, the short time they would spend in the room would confirm his opinion. Perhaps his understanding of these events was informed by the loss of his only son in Viet Nam, but that sainted old surgeon brought a unique ability to care for those in the throes of death's struggle that allowed him to offer great comfort to them, and taught many physicians, young and old alike, what it truly meant to care for patients. As the late Episcopal priest, John Claypool, who also lost his young daughter to leukemia, wrote, "Grief poses a powerful spiritual temptation, for the simple reason that it cuts squarely across the desires of our hearts. Every bereavement is a Gethsemane of some kind; like Jesus entering the garden on the last night of his life, we go into our bereavement begging God for one thing and come out with the exact opposite of what we have requested." (Mending The Heart)

 

It is clear that the humanity of Jesus required him to view his impending death with the very human alternatives of annihilation or terror, but his death and resurrection forever changed humankind's perception of death-as-annihilation, so beautifully stated by the words of St. Paul, "Death has been swallowed up in victory." Death is only God's way of moving us from a less secure existence to a more loving home where the sting of death is no longer terrorizing. This understanding of the tranquility of this transition was made clear by a Vatican spokesman at the time of Pope John Paul's death when he announced to the world that the Pope had departed this world with all the confidence of one just going into the next room. Because of the Easter events, a confidence we all share.

 

Douglas Orvin Jenkins

 Contact Douglas Here 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

Holy Week in the Trinity Chapel @ Noon:  Stop in each day for a 40 minute service during Holy Week.  Speakers:  Monday, 3/30 - Margaret Jones; Tuesday, 3/31 - Elise Caton; Wednesday, 4/1 - Orvin Jenkins; Thursday, 4/2 -Margaret Myers; Friday,  4/3 - Rev. Esther & Rev. Aaron.

 

 

 

Trinity United Methodist Church
4000 NW 53rd Ave | Gainesville, FL 32653
352.376.6615
TrinityGNV.org

Office Hours: Monday - Thursday, 8:30 am - 4:00 pm | Friday, 8:30 am - 1:30 pm