GRACE THE CAT

Barbara Fox

I named my rescue cat “Grace” because I thought she could remind me to always keep God’s grace at the top of my mind. When I heard that the sermon series would be focused on grace (as a theological concept) and grace (as in the hymn Amazing Grace) I tried to make some comparisons using Psalm 139.

The psalm writer begins by admitting that God knows his intimate thoughts: You have searched me and known me. You know when I sit down and when I rise up. You discern my thoughts from far away. (Grace the Cat, if I even THINK about taking you to the vet, you run so I can’t find you.)

You search out my path and my lying down. (Grace the Cat: When YOU want to go to bed, you search me out and tell ME to lie down.)

And are acquainted with all my ways. (Grace the Cat: If I start to empty the wastebaskets, you know the cleaning lady is coming and hide).

Even before a word is on my tongue, O Lord, you know it completely. (Grace the Cat: When I am sad or upset, you make a special point to stay with me, to sit on me and purr.)

You hem me in, behind and before. (Grace the Cat: If I lie on my right side, you snuggle on the left, so I can’t turn over.) And lay your hand upon me. (You like to put your paw on my face, which seems sweet when you have just had your nails clipped.) Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is so high that I cannot attain it (You are spontaneous. I can never figure out what you are going to do next.)

Where can I go from your spirit, or where can I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there. If I make my bed in Sheol you are there. (If I sit on the sofa, she is there. If I lie on my bed, she is there. She bumps her nose against my cheek.)

Grace the Cat, nevertheless, needs me to offer grace to HER. If she takes the wings of the morning and settles at the farthest limits of the sea (if she hides from me when I need to help), even there my hands shall lead her, and my right hand shall hold her fast.

Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light around me becomes night. Even the darkness is not dark to Grace the Cat, for darkness is as light to her.

I praise God, for she is fearfully and wonderfully made. Grace the Cat is indeed wonderfully made. To take just one example – her whiskers are a delicate and elegant navigation system.

Unlike God, Grace the cat is anxious, exceptionally anxious. Her previous owner must have abused her. SHE would say the penultimate verse of this psalm: Oh that you would kill the wicked, O God, and that the blood thirsty would depart from me.

The psalm concludes with an invitation: Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me, and know my thoughts. See if there is any wicked way in me. Grace the Cat is helping me find God’s grace, so that God can lead me in the way everlasting.

May we all find grace in amazing ways.

He explains the contrast between the podium at Carnegie Hall and the games with youngsters in green choir robes: “With every situation your expectations are different. The people before you have different backgrounds and in what they are bringing musically. I love the Pre-K group. They love games, singing, everything. The 2nd-5th grade group also have a love for what they are doing, even though sometimes they don’t act like they do. And this youth choir, with only eight people, sings better than any group I have ever had.”

Surely that’s because they’ve been coming to choir practice all their lives? Yes, he’s known some since kindergarten. “You know who they are, you are not starting over. It’s a trust factor. The best choir is where everybody feels confident to sing by themselves. They can sing in four parts and are very brave.”

One favorite ‘grace’ opportunity here is that he can write music for these singers. During Covid, he wrote and produced “I See God” for 15 children, ages four through eleven, using their words to create songs about prayer, baptism, and the beatitudes. “I took all their ideas and put them into where they see God.” Tom is also especially grateful for the diversity of the PUMC community. “I grew up in the South. I love that our church is truly a melting pot – it makes me so happy.”

How will grace infuse his life in the future?

“I think music is a gift from God,” says Tom. “When you are a musician, and it’s what you choose to do with your life, you have an emotional connection to the lyrics you sing. No matter how old you are, make sure there is something in your life to connect to that song – or it’s just words, and the message that comes across is totally different.”

He tells about a third-grade class in North Carolina that was so rambunctious he had to be very strict. But one day when he had them sing a really pretty little song, one girl ended up sobbing. It reminded her of her grandfather who had just died. Then a little boy started crying about his dog that had passed away. Then a third person cried. “The teacher asked, ‘What have you done to my class?’ That’s when I realized that even young kids can connect text and music to life’s experiences, and it makes a difference in their lives.”

Music is so important to Christian Formation, he says. “What you are teaching – stories, love, about Jesus – they will remember for the rest of their lives. They will remember scriptures, but they will REALLY remember songs.

See the fruits of Tom’s grace-ious leadership on May 14th at PUMC’s Children’s Musical, “Called.”

One of the reasons why I love music is seeing how happy it makes people. Having people come up to me after the service and them telling me how happy my music made them makes me the happiest! All the practice I put in makes it all worth it.

I think that is how I feel god’s grace.

Leanne

Singing in church is fun because I like to practice different things!

-

Raphael Aryeetey,

Jr.

I like playing instruments and singing solos! I like the songs we sing a lot. And the Christmas pageant.

- Andrew Aryeetey