There Are Good Things Here

In these two entries from early 2015 (dated January 12 and 14), Katie laments how judgmental she feels as a parent. She has been hard on our son's faults while ignoring her own. She considers the example of the father in the parable of the prodigal son and expresses how much she wants to be generous, rather than judgmental. She also journals about an encouraging word on parenting from a friend. You just show up with what you have—your five loaves and two fish—and trust God for the rest.

"In everything give thanks ..."

As a parent, show up with your five loaves and trust God

"I feel like I have so much to learn."

In case you're wondering, I did ask our son Tom if it was OK for me to share these entries. His response blessed me greatly: "Yeah I’m fine with it honestly. Not scared of my past ... ."

Katie did not shy away from the fatigue and fear that were her constant companions during her years of living with cancer. She was open to the Lord about her fears, her longings, and her concerns. She felt keenly her inadequacies as a mom living with cancer."I don't know how to handle any of this—and how do you handle it when you don't ever feel well?"

I would suggest that one of the ways she handled it was by speaking continually with the Lord about her heart. You'll see in the journal entry above that she also tried to focus attention the Good News, too. This is a pattern you can observe in the Psalms, where the writer often expresses his fear in one stanza and his hope in the next.

Katie managed the pressure she felt to write by writing ... in her journal.

Anytime you write something for others to read, there’s a bit of felt pressure that sneaks in with it. Katie’s journals, of course, were her private prayers and meditations. She also kept up a blog for many years on Caring Bridge. Many of you probably kept up with her life story there. In fact, I encourage you to visit her Caring Bridge page to read her writings for yourself.

What you’ll discover is that Katie was an amazing writer with depth of soul and keen wit. Almost every time she posted an entry, people would say to her, “You should write a book!" I told her that so many times, I lost count. Every time, she would unfailingly look at me and say, "I have four children. When am I supposed to find time to write a book?”

Even so, she was often thinking about it and making notes about her book, which she provisionally titled, “Good Things Here”. What I didn’t know is that she was also inwardly processing the pressure she felt to write. In short, she concluded that she would only write for the glory of God. She never published a book, but she left behind 50 journals that reveal even more of her soul than her public posts did.

This was one of Katie's final journal entries, written about two weeks before she passed away.

When Katie wrote the journal entry featured in today's podcast, she was dying from cancer but growing in faith. You can actually see the toll cancer was taking by observing her unsteady handwriting. With about two weeks to live, however, she was steadying her heart by expressing her trust in her Savior and Lord, Jesus.

Katie used to say—and believe with all her heart—that There Are Good Things Here. She often said that would be the title of her book, if she ever wrote one. No matter how difficult the season with cancer or how barren her soul seemed, she believed that there was goodness to be found in God, his word and his world right here, right now. Only the person whose mind was steadied by faith-filled surrender could find such goodness in the midst of such hardship, though. That's what you see in this journal entry.