Out of the depths I cry to you, LORD;

Lord, hear my voice.
Let your ears be attentive
to my cry for mercy.

If you, LORD, kept a record of sins,
Lord, who could stand?

But with you there is forgiveness,
so that we can, with reverence, serve you.

I wait for the LORD, my whole being waits,
and in his word I put my hope.

I wait for the Lord
more than watchmen wait for the morning,
more than watchmen wait for the morning.

Israel, put your hope in the LORD,
for with the LORD is unfailing love
and with him is full redemption.

He himself will redeem Israel
from all their sins.

—Psalm 130 (TNIV)

Today’s reflection is terribly personal.

Back on July 13 of this year, I wrote a blog entry about a stray little kitten who adopted my wife and me at the local cemetery as we were riding our bike. He was about 4 months old at the time and cute as he could be. He was tooling right along, enjoying his new family and growing nicely, until yesterday morning when we noticed his breathing was labored. We took him to the vet and then to the vet ER where we discovered he had irreparable heart disease. He didn’t respond to aggressive treatment to get the fluid off his lungs and the docs pretty much gave him no more than three months to live, if that, which forced us to make the painful decision to have him euthanized yesterday evening about 6:30. All of this in a span of about 8 hours.

Some of you reading this will probably scratch your head over what I am about to say. “What’s the big deal over a cat?” you may ask. But we are both devastated by this sudden turn of events because we loved the little guy and he brought great joy to our home. Now he is gone, yet another stark reminder that we live in a world created good but which now struggles under the curse caused by human sin, and about how terribly fragile and transient mortal life is.

My wife and I are grieving mightily today, in part because we did not see this coming at all nor did we have time to process it. All of this is made worse by the fact that Woody basically adopted us. We rescued him from starvation and a sure death, only to have him die an untimely and premature death. He was a very trusting and friendly little kitten that picked up everyone’s spirits in a family where there has been grievous loss and separation of all kinds of late. In short we loved him and quickly made him part of our family.

These are the times, then, when all we can do is to follow the psalmist and cry out to God for help, and to be reminded of God’s great love and mercy for his creatures, sometimes despite evidence to the contrary. In other words, these are times that demand a human response of faith and trust in God’s great love for us in Christ and the promise of New Creation. While there is no scriptural warrant for this, I hope (as in wish) that God in his tender mercy will redeem his innocent little creatures who loved his human creatures and who loved them. After all, if Christ died for someone the likes of me so that I might have a chance to live with him forever, he can surely redeem a sweet little creature like Woody.

Thank you, merciful God, for blessing our house with your little creature, even if it was only for 5 weeks. Help mend our broken hearts.