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A Miracle on May 26th

A Miracle on May 26th

by Kaitlyn Bouchillon | May 26, 2015 | Broken and Raw, Community, Faithful, friendship

Hey Jesus, You know I whispered and shouted and repeated these words one thousand times and still they’re much too small, much too insignificant, completely unworthy of what You deserve. But thank you. Thank you one million times over. For the way grass feels in...

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MY BOOK // Even If Not: Living, Loving, and Learning in the in Between

Even If Not: Living, Loving and Learning in the in Between

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I checked my bag: wallet, phone, chapstick, kleene I checked my bag: wallet, phone, chapstick, kleenex, gum. Keys in hand, I quickly scanned the room, said “okay, I have everything I need” and turned toward the door.⁣ ⁣ Step. Step. Step. Freeze.⁣ ⁣ Usually, it’s a quick “okay cool, all set” or “do I have my phone? where is my phone?” before heading out the door. I didn’t mean it in any way other than, yes, I have everything I need before leaving the apartment.⁣ ⁣ But I’ve studied Psalm 23 for actual years now (Hi, yes, I’m sorry if you’re an email subscriber and you’ve heard me talk about it 187 times. But do you love it as much as I do now? Bet so. You’re welcomeeeee.) and apparently, when I wasn’t even looking, the words wove themselves in and then slipped right out.⁣ ⁣ I flipped the lights off, walked to the door, and turned the key. I unlocked the car, tossed the purse on the passenger seat, and sat still as the phrase played on a loop, there at the end of another difficult yet hope-full week. Do I? Beyond a purse filled with the essentials, on a much deeper level, do I really?⁣ ⁣ The Lord is my Shepherd,⁣ I have everything I need.⁣ ⁣ Do I have everything I want? The quick answer is, no. But do I have a kind Shepherd, one who looks out for and protects, who provides and is ever present, who leads with gentleness and wisdom, who is never in a rush but always full of care, who comes close and closer still, who sings through the long, dark night and sustains through the long, often tiring day? I do.⁣ ⁣ We may not have all we want (or so we think we want). But we have Jesus—and in Him, we actually already have it all.⁣ ⁣ Abundantly, immeasurably, outrageously⁣ more than we could ask or imagine.
“God is working in our waiting” sounds really “God is working in our waiting” sounds really pretty until we’re actually waiting. Until things fall apart. Until the diagnosis, the phone call, the silence, the pain, the day after day of the same. In all of it, it’s still true. It’s just a whole lot harder to hold onto.⁣ ⁣ I got stuck on the first part of Hebrews 11 recently. “Faith is confidence in what we hope for…” It begs the question: What are you hoping for?⁣ ⁣ And I’ll just tell you, on a particularly painful day this week, all I could speak before tears took over was: God, You made this exact body purposefully, intentionally and, You say, wonderfully. Help me say so too. Even when it just feels broken. You’ve asked Your children before, ‘Do you want to be well?’ God, I do. Please. Yes, I do.⁣ ⁣ When time passes and hope crashes down, it’s easy to become resigned, numb, or apathetic. It’s tempting to say “it is what it is,” stopping short of getting your hopes up so you don’t end up disappointed. Again.⁣ ⁣ In my experience, the longer the wait, the harder it is to hold onto hope. But I’m stuck in Hebrews 11 and struck by how even when hope feels flimsy, like it might slip through my fingers, Hope Himself is holding on, carrying me and every single thing that hurts in His nail-pierced hands.⁣ ⁣ It's okay to hope for something. (Do you want to be well?) But I think the question within the question of 11:1 is what (who) are you hoping for (in)? A prayer answered, or a person? That Hope, capital H, is solid and sure. The chapter goes on to list names I bet you’d recognize, people who waited and hoped and “died still believing what God had promised them” (11:13).⁣ ⁣ I believe He can heal. I don't know if He will. But I'll join the chorus with the familiar lyric: in Christ alone my hope is found. It's not a pretty bow; it's an anchor in the waves.⁣ ⁣ His goodness can’t slip through our grasp like shifting sand. It’s coming after us, holding us, surrounding us in every waiting room, all our days. Our circumstances don’t change His character. He isn’t flimsy and He doesn’t tease. Our waiting isn’t wasted. We won’t be put to shame. Our hope is not in vain. #evenifnotbook
This… I’m writing it out here so it doesn’t This… I’m writing it out here so it doesn’t disappear. Honestly, I was not prepared. 😭 Within minutes of posting these slides to IG Stories last night, there were half a dozen responses saying “Me. I’m the someone.”⁣ ⁣ “That’s me, and it was this afternoon!” + “Made medical decisions to dare to try again just this afternoon and then this evening. Thanks for making me feel seen on this long. long. road.” + “This was me today, sitting in my infusion center making a neurosurgeon appt.” + “Me too! In process of finding my birth mom and got the call today that the Children’s home I was adopted through thinks they found an address for her.”⁣ ⁣ It’s the tip of the iceberg of stories, each one unique and yet all with that same stubborn thread of hope woven through. If you’re the someone today, or if somehow you see this in the days to come and you need it then, I hope you hear it loud and clear:⁣ ⁣ Showing up⁣ can be an act of hope.⁣ Walking through a door⁣ can be a step of courage.⁣ Making an appointment⁣ can be a quiet declaration,⁣ a brave decision, a kind choice,⁣ a beautiful belief that perhaps⁣ there’s more to the story.⁣ ⁣ You are seen by the One who is still writing. There is a friend who walks beside, who goes with you through every door, sits with you at every appointment, holds you close and hears every cry, wipes every tear, knows all that it took to get here and all that is to come and still stays with you in the now, carrying you through to tomorrow.⁣ ⁣ You have a witness.⁣ Your step toward hope,⁣ no matter how small,⁣ is seen. 💛
Did I take 62 sunrise pictures waiting for THIS to Did I take 62 sunrise pictures waiting for THIS to happen? With joy. ☺️🎉 The 4th started off with a few extra fireworks in our family. 🌅🎇 Big congratulations to my babiest brother and his fiancé!!!
4,384 days brain tumor free.⁣ ⁣ There have bee 4,384 days brain tumor free.⁣ ⁣ There have been 5 surgeries to remove a tumor or a cyst in those 12 years, but this week marks the date of the first, of the life-changing, perspective shifting, “even if not” one.⁣ ⁣ The day before surgery, I stood on this deck for a picture. Every July 6th since, I’ve added another photo to the camera roll, a time-lapse through the years. Wind-blown hair, squinting eyes, and sunburnt skin telling a story summed up in just a few words: I’m still here. And so I will remember, and I will give thanks.⁣⁣⁣ ⁣ I went back and forth on posting anything last year, worried that after a decade it would be a “we get it already” type thing.⁣ A friend commented (hi Sarah 👋🏻) saying she looks forward to it every year and I cried because isn’t that like God? To use a pixelated picture of His kindness to remind another that He will prove faithful?⁣ ⁣ He will.⁣ ⁣ Here’s what I know: God’s goodness isn’t tied to an earthly outcome.⁣ It just is, always and in all ways. It’s more than a quick sentence or a trite, pat on the back phrase—it’s a wrestled out truth, one I hold to every day while navigating the lingering daily “after effects” of surgery. I hold to it, and God holds true. Holds merciful. Holds faithful—every time.⁣ ⁣ Maybe you’re questioning or waiting or hoping today? If so, this picture, marking a dozen more years, is for you. The story isn’t over yet. Your story isn’t over yet.⁣⁣ ⁣⁣ But to me? It’s one more stone of remembrance piled up, one more picture on the deck to thank God for the gift of another year, one more declaration that I won’t forget to remember His kindness.⁣ ⁣ I’m grateful. Here, in the land of the living.⁣ #psalm2713 #evenifnotbook⁣⁣
On any other day, I would have been disappointed a On any other day, I would have been disappointed and then forgotten about it. Today, I walked and swatted sand flies and asked “What’s here? Show me what I don’t see.”⁣ ⁣ July 6th will forever be “brain surgery day” to me, and today the sky was just—gray. I stood there thinking how it’s true, how sometimes instead of sunshine the rain falls or the clouds cover. Sometimes, it’s just a glimpse of light or hope or joy against the seemingly unending gray stretching on, stretching wide. At the beginning of 2022, I wrote:⁣ ⁣ “I often want a guarantee on what I’m hoping for. More often than not, Hope just holds out a hand and joins me in the waves.⁣ One day we’ll look back on whatever story this chapter is going to tell, our eyes skimming the underlined and tear-stained and highlighted pages. Things will shift and change, storms will rage or maybe, may it be, the sea will still for a moment. Who knows what we’ll see when we look back, but we could still look forward with hope, let the armor rust and end the year a little softer. If I’m going to shift, I want it to be in the direction of hope. Not the cheesy, flimsy, rainbows and unicorns kind but the hard-fought, defiant, not giving up, anchor in the waves kind. Because it has yet to go how I think it will, but through every change this has stayed the same: I haven’t walked alone.⁣ So here’s to 2022. May we be surprised by joy and steadied by peace. May we trust in the dark what we know to be true in the Light, and may we never stop watching for redemption. May we learn to build altars in the ruins and may we always find a hand reaching out when all falls apart. May we become fluent in the language of hope.”⁣ ⁣ I stand there, expectant. Staring. Waiting. For the sun to rise higher, the gray to fade as the morning colors take their place, but the clouds hold steady and the waves crash on. It isn’t what I hoped for, but the sole pinkish orange pillar of light stops me, and it hits gently like the water lapping at my feet. All the way through the wilderness, all the way home, God’s presence led with fire and cloud.⁣ ⁣ They were never alone.⁣ There was always hope.⁣ ⁣ It’s just a glimpse.⁣ It’s more than enough.
Most nights, I fall asleep between 4-5am. That sen Most nights, I fall asleep between 4-5am. That sentence is so… small. The truth of it impacts everything. When they took out the tumor in my brain 12 years ago, the symptoms stopped and the insomnia began. I’ve prayed and waited, trusted and believed, tossed and turned until the sun begins to rise and it’s time to begin the day.⁣ ⁣ Friends have prayed night after night for a decade, heard me say over and over that I’m clinging to, struggling with, holding onto, fighting for hope.⁣ ⁣ Honestly? There would be a relief in saying “it is what it is” and attempting to make the best of it, firmly shutting the door on the hopeful expectation that something will change. After 12 x 365, after it getting worse with each passing year, choosing to hope has started to feel, well, foolish. But the thing is, at my core, I don’t actually believe “it is what it is.” I believe it’s so much more, so much better, that what was dead can literally rise again. More than 12 years of history tells me the Author is good.⁣ ⁣ So this year, I started saying it on repeat: I’m getting my hopes up. And this spring, it got worse. I got on a waiting list and before the first of what will be many months of weekly appointments that will hopefully, I pray, heal something in my brain that was impacted by surgery, I took this picture. I take one every week, each its own parking lot prayer, a stone of remembrance, taken in advance and in belief, a marker to look back on one day and give thanks even as I cross the gravel and climb the flight of stairs and walk through a door I’d much rather need not cross.⁣ ⁣ Maybe this is the year my brain heals. Maybe not. But I’ll risk getting my hopes up & risk sharing this publicly for the first time, trusting that Hope will be the anchor and no matter the waves, I won’t sink. Because if you swipe through the slides above, you'll see—there’s a miracle in the breaking: Hope is here and He’s enough. Emmanuel, walking us, you and me, all the way home.⁣ ⁣ This is my invitation to you: Let’s just go ahead and get our hopes up. The Author is good and He doesn’t tease. Hope will not put us to shame. ♥️ Amen? Amen.
“You have a brain tumor,” he said. Time seemed “You have a brain tumor,” he said. Time seemed to slow. The room stilled. Whatever words came next became a soundtrack turned down, my attention oddly focused on the random artwork on the wall, just over his shoulder. The filing cabinets. The low coffee table where he sat perched on the edge, there in the Serious News room I had only seen briefly while walking past visit after visit, on my way to sit on crinkled paper and hope for an answer. The very thing I offhandedly guessed months prior while the thin sheet wrinkled beneath my weight was real, and it was in that exact moment I felt an overwhelming peace—like nothing I had ever known before.⁣ ⁣ The rest of life felt like a question mark but He was a period, a certainty.⁣⁣ ⁣ It sounds cheesy until it’s real, until you’re face to face with your fragile humanity and all the things you say you believe. ⁣ ⁣⁣ I wrote it the week I got the news: If God chose not to heal me, it would not make Him any less of a healer. He is just as good and faithful and true, even if He doesn’t do what we believe He can do. Tomorrow I’ll tell you some of “part two” I’ve held close, one of the lingering “after effects” of surgery, the thing I believe He could heal and, so far, hasn’t.⁣ ⁣ It’s June 30th, again, and my body is broken in ways I struggle to put into words. It’s June 30th and this afternoon I’ll go to a doctor’s appointment I wish I didn’t have on my calendar. But it’s June 30th, twelve whole years later, and I’m here to see it. That is no. small. thing. And so I laced my shoes this morning and ran with tears streaming because I could, because I’m here. I’m here and I’m grateful.⁣ ⁣ I don’t know the miracle you’re praying for today, the answers you’re hoping for, the questions you hold. But I can tell you this: I believe it still. He is good and He is faithful and there really is a peace that can’t be put into words. No matter what the day may hold, you will not face it alone. ♥️ #evenifnotbook
“Not to diminish your pain, but I bet my sufferi “Not to diminish your pain, but I bet my suffering is worse than yours.” Blink. Blink. My eyes matched the cursor, frozen in place, mouth wide open as I read the words in my inbox.⁣ ⁣ Flabbergasted. Angry. Shocked. Confused. Repeat.⁣ ⁣ This sentence, tucked inside a lengthy message of Advice and Some Thoughts from a stranger, arrived last Tuesday in response to Monday’s mention of insomnia and offer/invitation to pray for others who are struggling. I journaled paragraphs, processing. I shared the message with a few friends who have known me really well for years, watching their faces and listening intently to their responses, waiting to see if they recognized anything I should hold onto in it, anything to consider that I missed.⁣ ⁣ What I saw: foreheads crease in confusion, eyes widen, two bodies freeze and another physically recoil at the words.⁣ ⁣ What I heard: shock, anger, kindness, and then an idea, a wondering, a “What if you made a list of words that have been loving and helpful? Sentences people could remember and then hopefully never say something like… well, that... to anyone again?”⁣ ⁣ I designed a list of “say this, not that” phrases for @holleygerth last year. I wholeheartedly echo her thoughtful words, and wrote out my own above. 💛 I don’t share this for sympathy, etc. (I’ve debated posting it for days.) I’m okay, really. Tender, sure, but mostly just grateful for friends who speak truth and love well and prompt me to write down what might, maybe?, help. At least, that’s the hope. :) That’s my only ‘why’ for sharing this. If you’ve heard words like these—I’m so sorry & you are so very loved. If you aren’t sure what to say to a friend who is going through a hard time—here are a few suggestions. (Also: sometimes silence, just presence, is the greatest gift.)
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