For Kristy
In the Name of God: Father, +Son, and Holy Spirit.
MY SHEPHERD ---
The Lord my God my shepherd is; how could I want or need? In pastures green, by streams serene, he safely doth me lead.
To wholeness he restores my soul and doth in mercy bless, and helps me take for his Name’s sake, the paths of righteousness.
Yea, even when I must pass through the valley of death’s shade, I will not fear, for thou art here, to comfort and to aid.
Life Is Good, and loving a daughter like Kristy, and Kristy’s life of having and loving and being mother to two beautiful little children like Payton and Klayton is exquisite, the best that life offers; and to be robbed of that by nature seeming to turn against us is as cruel as the universe gets.
“In my father’s house are many mansions, I go to prepare a place for you” all well and good for those of us in our seventies and eighties and beyond. But for a young mother 29 years old just turning 30, the Gospel promise seems almost mocking, makes a shambles of hopes and dreams. With confidence in modern medicine, Kristy was planning and expecting to come home. Kim told me that just before she was put on the ventilator Kristy wrote on a pad, “Everyone is acting like I’m going to die.” And she was too soon gone. It is time to celebrate, yes; but it is also time to cry.
As a father, my grief is for anyone who loses a cherished and beloved child, as Kristy was cherished and beloved. We can make merry and rejoice and praise God, but it is God’s creation in which these things happen, and our question is WHY?, always WHY? and there is no answer, and we do not understand.
In his book When Bad Things Happen To Good People Rabbi Harold Kushner takes pains to be sure we realize that his discussion is about “WHEN bad things happen,” not “WHY bad things happen,” because there is no acceptable or satisfying answer to WHY? These terrible things do not happen because of anything we have done, they do no happen because God is angry with us as people believed in ancient times; and they do not happen “because God needs us in heaven” (which is pious, maudlin nonsense: God has no needs), or even because fate and the stars line up against us.
These terrible things happen, they just happen. Nearly everyone in this room this morning would willingly have traded places with Kristy so she could have the good and loving and full life that was God’s will for her, and God’s hope, God’s plan for her; but trading places is not the way of life and nature and creation. And that God does not intervene is a mystery of our being, and of I AM, the awesome Being of the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of Moses, and the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
We are here, and Kristy is there where we all, each of us, will be in time and eternity. This morning we celebrate all that Kristy was, beloved daughter, beloved mother, friend, niece, cousin, sister, loved, lover; and ultimately child of God, both in this life and throughout the ages of ages. It is not our will, nor is it the will of God that we be here this morning; but here we are, grieved and grieving, doing our best to celebrate, celebrate Kristy’s life, grateful for all that she was to so many who loved her so.
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Kristy, those who have loved you are here this morning to see you off. Go in peace. You have been loved more than anyone can imagine. Go in peace.
MY SHEPHERD again ---
Thou hast in grace my table spread secure in all alarms, and filled my cup, and borne me up in everlasting arms.
Then surely I can trust thy love for all the days to come, that I may tell thy praise, and dwell for ever in thy home.
Blessed be God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And blessed be God’s kingdom, now and for ever. Amen.
Kristy Lyn Nolan Keen (Sep 17, 1982 - Dec 26, 2012)
20130105 Grace Church PCB The Rev Tom Weller
The Hymnal 1982, #663, The Lord my God my shepherd is
F. Bland Tucker (1895-1984) para. of Psalm 23
Music: Crimond, Jesse Seymour Irvine (1836-1887)