For everything there is a season and a time for every matter under heaven.
My friends Erin & Mitch were married today, Friday the 13th, a day that black cats and broken mirrors cannot touch superstitiuosly. But this particular Friday the 13th holds particular significance; Erin's grandparents were married 50 years prior on that same Friday the 13th. What a celebration: a new marriage, a golden anniversary!
I am sad that I couldn't be there. Being in Ohio doesn't afford for that. Nevertheless, through pictures and conversations with friends in attendance, the day was as beautiful as the bride.
Friday the 13th for me involved a funeral.
Last Sunday, one day after the flood, one day after musing about the ubiquitous page, call, tolling bell that seems to surround Colin's internship and my experience thereof, I received my first page, my first call. The bell was tolling for one of my patients.
The call came when I was as scrubby looking, hungry and active as possible. I was surprised to hear the phone ring, it never had before. In the car on my way to the grocery store, I fumbled toward my holster, flipped it open and sheepishly said, "This is Jeni." It was the nurse on call who asked if I could assist with a patient who was actively dying. A decision needed to be made and the family needed help in making it. I arrived 45 minutes later, cleaner, better looking, but still hungry for lunch. One hour and thirty minutes later, the patient breathed his last, surrounded by some family and one awkward yet calm chaplain.
They say you never forget your last death. I wonder if that is true. I guess time will tell.
I attended the funeral on Friday, a great service and a surprisingly good eulogy. The text was from Ecclesiastes 3, the same text used at my grandfather's funeral. The preacher talked about the different seasons in this man's life; a person's life is made up of seasons and seasons change. Nevertheless, God's promises don't change. God gives us our seasons, God is with us in our seasons, God brings us through our seasons, especially the season of death, and gives us life.
I find it pleasing to have had a funeral on this Friday the 13th, this same day as my friends' wedding, this same day as the 50th wedding anniversary, for these seasonal feastings are enveloped in God's great love which calls us all to the great feast, now and forever. While our seasons may be different, our lives woven at different times, at different places and with different materials, the promise remains: in Christ Jesus, God is with and for us and nothing can separate us from that.
Hey Friend! It was fun to read about me in your blog!!! We miss you guys and thought about you both last week. Good call on the gin :) I'll talk to you soon! Love, Erin
Posted by: Erin Nelson | July 20, 2007 at 09:15 AM