Then things went quickly. Before addressing the
prospects for surgery, the medical staff felt that Mom needed other, more
critical attention. The “day trip” ended with a hospitalization, and lots of
questions. Karen came home, then turned right around and spent most of the July 4 week sitting
with her mother in hospital. Then, after another two-day trip home, we went
back together. By now it was becoming clear that whatever would happen with Mom’s
health, coming back to her home was not likely to happen soon, if ever.
I have a sister who lives conveniently close to the
Hospital, and that is where Karen stayed – and later where we both stayed –
while sitting with her Mom. We
were not sleeping well through Thursday night, but from whatever sleep we were
woken at about 2:30am Friday, with a call from the nurse. No, we didn’t need to
come just then, she just wanted to be sure someone could be there before the
9am transfer to a hospice care facility. Well, then of course we weren’t
sleeping at all.
At 4:30am the nurse called again. Yes, now perhaps we
should call Karen’s brother and father, and come in. We threw ourselves together
and hopped in the car. That’s when Karen said to me:
“I want you to be my pastor now, OK?”
Well, I’d like to think I would have been. But I probably
needed the prompt. Maybe it isn’t common for a music pastor to have a lot of
hospital experience. A little death bed experience. I don’t know. I’ve had
enough that I hope I know how to comport myself, what to say (and not say),
what to read, how to pray. But I’m not sure that would have been my natural
mode in the wee hours at my mother-in-law’s bedside. My Karen is very pulled
together, capable, thoughtful but not emotional, and I’m not entirely certain I
would have slipped on my pastoral shoes for her. But of course, she had never
sat and watched someone die. And here she was headed to sit with her dying
mother.
I don’t really have a set litany of bedside readings.
There are some obvious passages; and then there’s the Holy Spirit, whom we have
to trust to lead us in our reading and our praying. We entered Mom’s room, spoke to her, stood by her bed, and took our (unprofessional) stock of
her condition. Karen did what she could to help her mom be comfortable. She
held her hand, spoke with her, stroked her forehead and put Vaseline on her
dried lips. I stood on the other side and read scripture, and prayed. We were
mostly quiet. Karen had some music on her iPad, that Mom had enjoyed in
previous days.
First I read John 14, “let not your hearts be
troubled.” 1 Corinthians 15, on resurrection. Revelation 21 and 22, on heaven.
Psalm 84, “How lovely is your dwelling place . . . The Lord God is a sun and
shield, blessed are all who take refuge in him." We prayed. We were quiet. More
hymns. Then I read from Psalm 62 and 63. Our friend Jerry Sundberg’s recording of our friend Ed Child’s arrangement of “This is my Father’s world” was the
last thing Karen’s mother heard on this side of heaven. (We are told that
hearing is the last remaining sense.) She was gone, and Karen put on a piano
recording of Mom’s favorite hymn, “Holy, Holy, Holy” (arranged and recorded by
our friend Levi Henkel).
So, in the end, I was Karen’s pastor. I was also her
husband. I may give a pastoral hug to the grieving, but not a neck rub, not an
embrace, and different tender words. I didn’t need an invitation to be her
husband. But I’m glad that Karen reminded me to be for her what I also have
been for others. If only for those ninety minutes, twenty-seven years of
preparation were worth it.
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