Olive Crest United Methodist Church
7180 North 60th Street
Omaha, Nebraska 68152

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Rev. Debra Tompsett-Welch

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The Spiritual Life

December 1998

What Does Christmas Mean When We Hurt Can God Come To Me Where I live?

By Rev. Michael Lee Burgess

The big word "Incarnation" is what Christmas is all about. It means "Spirit In Flesh" or Body. The Spirit of God being born as a baby, coming to live with us where we live. God in the Son, through the Holy Spirit, is reaching out to all creation to bring healing and renewal. Christmas is not just historical, or only for December. It is not just decorations and carols. It must also be Easter, Good Friday and all of your life the whole year long, or it is empty and illusion. But I see that it is real. I see Christmas, the renewal of healing and redemption all around me, when I start using my Christmas glasses. When I look for the Christ child being born in the lives of those around me. This month I want to share with you at time when the Spirit of Christ reached out to touch "Radar" and Angela Kroeger and bring her world back into harmony with God. The real work Jesus has been doing since his birth 2000 years ago.

"I arrived home and had not even removed my coat or set down my purse when the phone rang. When I heard my mother's voice, I knew something had to be wrong. Mom never calls after 10:30 p.m. She heard my tired voice and asked if I was feeling alright. I admitted I felt a bit sick. She said, "Well, what I have to say isn't going to make you feel better." Suddenly wide awake and fully alert, I felt my muscles chill and stiffen with dread. What had happened? Who had it happened to?

Mom told me about Radar, how he'd been laying in the same spot for day, how he'd stopped eating, how he'd stopped using the litter-box. Radar was dying, slowly and painfully. They were taking him to the vet first thing in the morning. Would I like to come and say goodbye?

Radar had been a part of my life since I was six or seven years old. Just after my mother married Dave and we moved to Bellevue, we adopted this little white kitten with black spots. We named him "Radar" because his oversized ears were constantly rotating, like little radar dishes. He was a hunter from day one, stalking the crickets in the basement. We were forever finding cricket legs in the carpet. Radar grew up to be a large cat with long, silky fur.

When I was a little girl, I'd drag Radar upstairs to my room and set him up in little scenes with stuffed animals and other props, putting hats and other such things on him and taking photos. All this he endured with a seemingly infinite patience. Radar had been my buddy, my special pal.

I grew and moved out on my own, and Radar got old. He slowed down a lot as he aged. He spent a lot more time indoors, sitting in the window and just looking outside. The other two cats were both gluttons, and they hogged all the food. Radar lost the energy to fight for his share. Never overweight, Radar grew distressingly thin. Mom starting feeding him on the side, giving him the best food in a secret dish upstairs that the other cats didn't know about. He also got his own water dish in the upstairs bathroom.

Now Mom was telling me that Radar had been just laying by that water dish for about a week. He had stopped eating altogether. He had been drinking a lot of water recently, but in the last day or so, he'd stopped even that. He hadn't even used the litter-box in two days. It seemed that his kidney's had given out.

I said I'd be there at 7:30 a.m. to say my goodbye to Radar. When I arrived Radar was still laying beside his water dish. He was so motionless, I worried that he'd already died.

I sat down on the floor by Radar's side. I reached out and started to stroke his once luxurious white and black coat. Beneath the tangled mats of fur, I could feel Radar's ribs. When I stroked his back, I could feel his vertebrae protruding like spikes. I found that beneath the thick fur, his tail was no bigger around than a pencil. He was nothing but a skeleton with fur stretched over the bones.

At my touch he lifted his head, but he didn't open his eyes. They were crusted shut. Radar slowly and painfully staggered to his feet, turned around, and lay down on his other side, facing me. He'd lost the ability to retract his claws, and curled under, pressing into the pads of his feet. I petted the top of his head and just behind the ears. All of his fur was matted and tattered except the patch right there on the top of his head. That was soft. That fur felt young.

I began to cry as I petted this old cat. I cried so hard I had to take off my glasses and set them aside. Then I said a prayer, my voice a horse whisper, "Holy One, Creator, on this day we give Radar back to you. Amen." I couldn't say anymore, because I was crying again.

At 7:50 a.m., five minutes until the time we were supposed to leave for the veterinarian's. Radar slowly hauled himself to his feet. Without a cry, he walked out of the bathroom. Every agonizing step seemed to require all of his strength, be he was determined, and he made his way down the hall. He crossed the master bedroom the to balcony door. Mom opened the door for him, and as Radar stepped across the threshold, his legs gave out and he collapsed. But he got right back up and when outside. He fell down a second time, and a second time he got back up. He took a few more steps, then he lay down on the wood. The short walk had taken him about four minutes.

Mom, Dave, and I all looked at him laying there on the balcony. He wasn't laying as he'd lain on the tile. On the tile in the bathroom, he'd lain on his side as one already dead. On the balcony, he lay only because he could no longer stand, but he was alert, savoring every sensation. He smelled the outside air. He felt the wind in his fur, and the wood planks beneath him. He listened to the birds. He seemed to be impressing these things into his memory. I believe he knew what was coming next.

He only had a minute outside, when Mom said, "I'm sorry, but it's time." I felt a pain in my heart. Couldn't we give him one more minute? He'd worked so hard to get to the balcony. Couldn't he have just a little longer? No, it was time. Mom picked Radar up gently, and he cried.

Then we wrapped Radar in a towel and took him to the truck. We drove to the vet, and the closer we got, the more Radar cried. It was unbearable. We arrived at the vet's, and Dave went inside to get things in order. Mom didn't want to subject Radar to a waiting room full of dogs during his last moments, so we waited in the truck. Radar burrowed into the towel, trying to hide. Mom and I petted him and tried to offer comfort. Dave emerged from the building and signaled us. The room was ready. So soon! Too soon! The room was ready but we weren't.

We took Radar into the examination room and the vet came in to examine him. He had a lump in his abdomen nearly the size of a closed fist. It might be a tumor. It might be one of his kidneys. Either way, there was nothing that could be done to save him. He was an old cat, with nineteen years of life behind him. Mom signed the form, and the vet made preparations.

We lay Radar on the folded towel. He didn't struggle. He didn't even move. He even stopped crying. Mom stroked the top of his head, that patch of kitten-soft fur. I stroked behind his ear. Dave stood a few feet away, unsure of whether he could even stand to stay in the room. Mom told Radar that she loved him. The veterinarian put the needle in Radar's leg, and then she pressed her stethoscope to his chest. "He's already gone." So fast! Too fast! How could it have been so fast?

Mom and I continued to stroke Radar's fur for several minutes after he was gone. I'd never been present at the time of death of anyone before. Radar wasn't just a cat - he was family. We weren't ready to let him go. "I can't believe I just did that," Mom sobbed, "He was my favorite."

The drive back was somber. We talked a little, but mostly we drove in silence. Suddenly I heard music in my mind, and a choir sang Hymn of Promise through my thought. "In our end is our beginning; in our time, infinity; in our doubt there is believing; in our life, eternity. In our death, a resurrection; at the last a victory, unrevealed until it season something God alone can see." I knew that it was for Radar. I know that from now on, every time I hear or sing this hymn, I will think of him.

Sunday evening, I spoke to Mom on the phone, and she told me a story that lifted my heart and proved to me that everything was alright, that we'd done the right thing for Radar.

Mom got up early on Sunday morning, feeling troubled. She said a silent prayer, "Give me a sign. If Radar's alright, if he's where he's supposed to be, let me see a cardinal." She went out on the balcony for a while, she went outside in the back yard, she wandered around for quite some time, and she saw grackles and sparrows, but no cardinals. Sunrise came and went, but no unusual birds appeared. She went inside and read the newspaper, looking up every time a bird flew by the window. No cardinals. Mom went to the living room and sat in the rocking chair, looking our through the windows. All of the interesting birds generally showed up in the backyard, where all the trees were, but Radar has so loved to sit on the shelf with all the plants, looking out these windows. So this is where Mom sat. After a while, she saw a couple of purple finches. Their heads were kind of reddish. She wondered if that was close enough.

Dave came into the room, knowing nothing of her prayer, and stood with his hand on her shoulder, trying to offer comfort. He looked out the window, to the green post. "Is that a cardinal?" Mom followed his gaze, and sure enough, a female cardinal was perched on that post. She was soon joined by the male, brilliantly red. And suddenly purple finches, rose-breasted grosbeaks, red-headed woodpeckers, and every native Nebraska bird that had a speck of red anywhere on it flew onto the scene. Dozens of red marked birds congregated together briefly, with the two cardinals, and then they all departed as suddenly as they came. The cardinals paused a moment in a tree across the street, allowing Mom one final glance, and then they were gone.

Dave glanced at his watch. It was almost exactly the same time of morning that we'd taken Radar to the veterinary office. Almost exactly twenty-four hours since he taken his final breath. It was like Radar had asked God, "Please send a red bird for Mom, and send a lot of them so she doesn't miss it."

Mom had asked for a sign, and the Holy One had responded. Radar is at peace and with the Creator. And we here on earth are left knowing that God is with us, listening to us, actively participating in our lives, and making sure that everything works out exactly as it should." Angela Kroeger

Once you look past all the tinsel and noise, this is what Christmas is actually about, "peace on earth, and good will to all". God bringing healing to a broken creation. Let that healing be born in your life this Christmas. If you do, Christmas can last, not only for your whole year, but for eternity too. May God continue to bless you and may you have a joy filled Christmas. Your brother in Christ,

Your brother-in-Christ, Reverend Michael Lee Burgess

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