Sundaes With Kimberly

     “I don’t care if you are a preacher! You ain’t listening to me! Ya’ll can ALL kiss my *** cause I’m going HOME!!” Smelling of Kool menthols and the detergent used to clean hospital sheets, and wearing nothing but the little gown they gave her upon admission, Kimberly started down the hall of the hospice floor towards the elevator. Her short, strawberry blonde hair was just beginning to grow back in enough to style, but today it was all natural curls misshapen on one side by a pillow that had mashed it to the side of her head. Her pale, freckled face was a mixed mask of anger and pain. At just 27 years old she was the mother of five, fathered by three different men, and had stage four, terminal melanoma. Now all she wanted was to die at home. It would seem like a simple request to most, but the circumstances of her life had brought her here to the last place that would take her and give her medicine for the unimaginable amount of pain she was in. It was her last hope of a less painful existence and death. And she wanted NO part of it. But that was Kimberly, willful, headstrong, and determined that the world wouldn’t dictate how she lived… or died. I think about this incident now and smile, but at that time it was just exhausting. The irony is that in spite of all of her bluster, bad language, and worse choices, Kimberly taught me a few things about my life, my faith and my practice as a minister.

     While we all know that “none of us is promised tomorrow” as the clichéd phrase goes, I still tended to have a very cavalier response to the idea that our time is limited. “If it’s God’s will, then it’s my time and there’s nothing I can do about it anyway,” was my response to the thought of my own demise. Still, somewhere in the back of my mind I assumed that I had, and would have, PLENTY of time to do the things I wanted to do, or right the wrongs in my life. That is of course, until I met Kimberly.

     In her short time on this earth, she had made quite a mess of her life. Having to turn to what I’ll just politely call “alternative means” to make money to support her family seemed, at least to me, to be about as low as she could have fallen. You see, despite my earlier description of her on these pages, at one time not so long ago, Kimberly had been a really attractive, young, vibrant woman who still had all the time in the world to correct any mistakes she had made. She had had a figure that made men twist their necks backwards to look twice as she walked along a side walk. She had a sly, half smile that hinted at all the wrong things she might do, while still managing to look totally innocent. She was living to have fun today, tomorrow didn’t matter.

     That changed abruptly with a crushing diagnosis. By the time the doctors found out about the cancer it had already spread too far to stop or remove. And in that instant tomorrow became all too real, because it could very well be the last tomorrow she would get. For me that was a very real reminder of my own lack of perspective. I was a preacher. I had great amounts of faith, or so I thought. It turns out I had great amounts of expectations as to how my life would turn out, and those expectations are not faith. Oh how my views on life changed when I met, and began to minister to, Kimberly. And I would never take tomorrow for granted again if I could help it.

     In the discussion of expectations and faith, I’ve come to the realization that faith is believing when you don’t know what to expect. Kimberly taught me that as well. When I first began my visits with her, I knew that she was not the saintly, angelic picture of a woman who was trying to “get into Heaven” as people would say. But I wasn’t necessarily expecting the angry young woman who I met. All venom and acid swirling at the surface of a face far too young to be that weathered. Burned spots on her clothes from dropped ashes of cigarettes chain smoked, one after another, even though some of the medicine had a tendency to put her to sleep while she still held the lit butt in her hand, or dangling between dry lips. Still, I had faith that God in His powerful way could change this situation! Secretly however, I thought, “I don’t know how or why He would.” I expected her to fail. It was obvious she wouldn’t change. It was evident in our first conversation when she let loose with a string of colorful “adjectives” and told me she wouldn’t change the way she was “just ‘cause you’re a preacher. That’s just me.” I had faith… faith that she couldn’t be helped. And it turns out that that wasn’t faith at all; just an expectation based on my own limited understanding of this woman and her circumstance.

     Time and again I wanted to quit visiting with Kimberly. When she would call at literally all hours of the night wanting a ride to the emergency room to get a pain shot, I wanted to say, “Call back when it’s light outside!!!!” But I didn’t. None of this was making a difference. She wasn’t changing. There was never a, “Thank You.” There was no evidence of Godliness in her life. But I kept going and doing because that’s what I was supposed to do. I kept trying to explain that if she would just let go of the anger and accept God’s plan, she would have an easier time. I read scripture, quoted platitudes and shared all the wisdom I had gained in my expansive (at the time) 35 years on this planet, all to no avail. She wasn’t hearing any of it. She even told me that I ran my mouth “too damn much!” Can you believe that? As it turns out, she was right.

     One night at about 11 o’clock, I received a call from Kimberly asking if she could come and sit at the altar of the church. I went and opened the doors and met her when she arrived obviously in great pain. She limped slowly in and sat in the sanctuary that at that time of night was far removed from the joyous hymns, and loud fellowship and preaching of a Sunday morning. Quiet was all that could be heard there now. Deep silence. Silence that was so complete, you could hear her heart break.

     I left her alone there on the first pew to have her time, and went to busy myself with some made up task. Kimberly wrestled with, cussed, begged and cursed God for the next hour and a half. The tears streaming down her face were mixed with eyeliner and mascara. Small black rivers running over the leathered landscape of her face represented 27 years of fear, regret, anger, and pain. Then, with a subtle change to her features, finally, acceptance and forgiveness. All of it came out there, without a single word spoken by me, a preacher. All that Kimberly needed in that moment was for someone to listen. Jesus did just that. Listened. I had been trying to run my mouth too much. It’s no wonder she didn’t make more progress... I wouldn’t let her get a word in edge wise. In that moment Kimberly taught me that I needed to change how I approached ministry. It wasn’t about the answers I had, but was more about listening to the problem and praying before giving answers or advice that were wrong.

     When she had finished, I made us some ice cream sundaes using toppings that I had found from an earlier youth meeting, and we sat and talked for a long while. She seemed to have found some peace in that conversation with Jesus. And she was finally ready to stop being mad at Him, and the world. She was still Kimberly though. She let me know I was a little heavy on the chocolate syrup, and that it was a good thing I was a preacher man and not an ice cream man. Of course she was smiling that half smile of hers now...

     We buried Kimberly in a small grave behind a small, country church early one morning a few weeks later in February. It was a short service as she had requested. In fact part of the conversation was, “I don’t want people cryin’ over me… especially them people that didn’t like me anyway. And don’t go talkin’ too much. It’ll be painful enough for my kids to deal with without you boring them to death.” There was a genuine smile on her face as she told me what she wanted this time… and on mine as well.

     I still think of her every now and again. When I do, I shake my head, and then I grin. In the end, Kimberly is still teaching me; unknowingly pushing me to be better at living. Causing me to get better at understanding that faith is more than a plan... it’s trusting in God’s plan. And reminding me to do better about not running my mouth too much. Well, I guess two out of three ain’t bad as the song goes. 

Love in Christ always,

Chris