Jesus
saved me as a child of 10 yrs in a junior children's church. I recited the simple prayer of salvation as the teacher fed
me and other children that walked forward words that would lead us to accepting
Jesus into our hearts. Salvation was instant; Jesus sealed my spirit with the
stamp of the Holy Spirit, and because of my childlike faith I became a child of
God. A transformed life, however,
has been a very slow process since that day.
I was raised in a Christian home with
loving parents and 3 younger sisters, and really was not a rebellious child;
more anxious to be a pleaser instead.
No, rebellion didn’t enter into my life until I was 30…go figure! I married my husband at 22 (and he 32),
had my 3 healthy babies before I was 30, and struggled to identify the
chaos inside of me during those first several years. When the baby of the three was born it
was later diagnosed that my body was experiencing Chronic Fatigue
Syndrome piggy-backed with Cyclical Depression.
My arms annoyingly ached progressively and the depression taunted me more days out of
the month than not. I fought
with my emotions daily to the point of suicidal thoughts (which never played
out, praise God!). The picture I saw in my mind was being trapped in a dark pit with no light. God protected me, however, through my
baby. She was the content
one of them all as an infant, and I found comfort in holding and nurturing her…and she is what kept my
mind off the darkness.
As a
result, our marriage was floundering, heading down the road that this
world most often sees nowadays. My
husband would come home from work daily only to see that the house was a
complete mess, and I was still in my robe holding my infant, lying on the couch
reading Danielle Steele books!
He could not understand this nonsense, and, frankly, I could not either; I could not explain to him the
hellish feelings, the physical tightness of my head, the contradicting thoughts
of suicide and then love…it was impossible for me to voice at that time. Among the outer chaos I had a 2 year
old bouncing off the walls vying for ANYbody’s attention…especially mine! And my 4 year old coped with mommy’s
moodiness by hermit-ting in her bedroom playing with her dolls. It was not a positive time in the Davis
Family’s life. We did not have the
understanding to move forward in a good way…we moved forward, but with an
incredible amount of weight on our life.
We
moved a lot during this time, because of discontentment and unhappiness; and
every time we moved I would entertain the thought that MAYbe life would get
better, issues would resolve themselves; but they didn’t, they only grew
worse. During that season we
attended a church that we helped start in the first year of our marriage. We had a good support group. It took me a year after my 3rd was
born, though, to speak out the struggle inside of me. I was at a women’s bible study and prayer requests were
being offered, and I felt the prompting (you know, the pounding of the
heart…that’s how the Holy Spirit prompts me) to voice my struggle. Tearfully I shared that morning, and it
was freeing to say the least. A
flicker of light started to shine in that dark pit that I had been trapped in…because these
women could identify with the struggle.
When I heard them say that they had been through the same issues (post pardom depression, suicidal thoughts, stress, etc.), Hope began to enter into
my hopelessness. I was validated
for the first time, and for the first time I didn’t feel like I was the ONLY
woman that went through what I was going through. I hadn’t realized the commonality of these issues, and oh!
What a relief it was to not feel singled out.
During
this enlightenment I sought out medical advice from my family Doctor, who
prescribed an anti-depressant. It
helped some to keep me “stable” and made me groggy too; and I really did not
care for being controlled by a substance…still don’t. This took care of depression for a time, but it did not resolve the marriage troubles.
Finances were unkempt and confusing, we were behind in everything and
could not seem to ever get out of that black hole of debt. I became bitter and resentful while my
husband did his best with what he knew how to do (clearly, I see that now). He held the job and I “held” the kids,
the laundry, the whatever-it-was-I-did-at-home (it’s a blur); and my heart was
beginning to become hardened, critical, and self-pitying. I was an ugly person on the inside (of
course I didn’t realize that then…this is all hindsight). I became the self-righteous wife that
did absolutely nothing wrong, but held accountable everything HE did that was
not right; namely, the finances. I
felt very insecure and blamed him for not making enough money for us to “make
it”.
Meanwhile my husband’s mother passed away suddenly and it devastated all of
us. It drew us together for a
while, as sorrow most often does in marriages; however, shortly after the funeral, my husband
took a job transfer away from home and moved the family to the big city. It was depressing because we had to
live in a motel room, but it was only for a month before we found a small
apartment. Cost of living was extremely high though, and this did not help our situation. Again, my emotions ran high, I wanted to move back home,
nothing was going right…by me. I
took a part-time job working for the same retail company my husband was working
for but in a different location. I
actually liked what I was doing, getting out of the house while my oldest was
in Kindergarten and the other two stayed home with daddy (we worked opposite
shifts I guess, I don’t remember).
But it only took a few weeks of working, coming home to a stressful
home, and wanting so much to move back to where we had support, to gather
enough fantasy-making ideas to drum up the courage to do the unthinkable to my
family.
I ran away.
I had a backpack full of clothes for a
few days and hid it under my bed.
I headed out the door one morning while the rest of the family was
asleep; this was routine when I went to work. I drove the same direction towards work, the only
difference was, I didn’t turn on the off ramp to go to work, but kept going
straight in the direction of where my sister lived, two hours away. My wallet was deplete of money (what was I
thinking!?), just my clothes and my “fantastical freedom”. Or so I thought.
Caught
by surprise, my sister still welcomed me in. She and her husband took me out to dinner, and allowed me to
stay the night; but not without the tender questions. And then the guilt entered in, and I was overwhelmed with
conflicting emotions; I felt convicted to call my husband to tell him I was ok and where I
was. Oh! The fear I arose in that
man (he called all the hospitals in the area!), the confusion I caused in my
little girls (more so with my oldest, she was 5 yrs old, the other two were not old enough to consider what was
happening), and the disappointment that haunted me all night. I was not free.
The
bird had flown the coop only to find out that the coop was indeed inside a
larger holding cage.
I
went home the next day to a merciful husband who embraced me and a little 5 yr
old girl asking, “mommy why did you leave without saying goodbye?” My heart sank, and I wanted to
die.
Soon after this “event”
we moved to the high desert that was soon to be a 4 hour drive to work round
trip for my husband; but it was much more affordable. The temperatures during the summer were 110 degrees every
day, and of course it was 3 months of the summer that we stayed put. It was during this season of driving
for my husband and lots of pool time for us girls that life turned for the
worse. Finances were worse and out
of control, communication between my husband and I was zilch, we were miserable, temptations rose
to their heights, and resistance to those temptations was counteracted by
self-pity, self-righteousness, and lack of self-control…and I’m talking about
me here. My mind was heading for
divorcing my husband and voiced it a few times. He sadly, but willingly, moved out and bedded down closer to
work, while I continued the fantasy that we were already divorced; and during
this deceitful time I searched the scriptures inside and out for any
justifiable way out of this marriage.
He had to be unfaithful to me in order for divorce to “biblically” take
place. So, with ignorance and
foolishness, I prayed just that…that he would make the choice of unfaithfulness.
Little
did I know that my faithfulness was being tested, and I failed
disastrously. Slap the scarlet
letter on me, because I just gave my husband a justifiable reason to divorce
me!
I became the adulterer.
My
husband found out, threw up, was tempted to take the girls and go away…but he
did not. Again, grace was given to
me and my husband yearned for me to come back to him. The humbling part of all this was how God was working in my
husband during this knowledge of sin.
I was away on a “getaway” to my parents house seeking out divorce
lawyers, and he stayed home with the girls. As he was busy puking, the thoughts of “how could I have let
it get this far” came into being and God was putting forgiveness into his heart
already. On the other hand, I was
already divorced in my mind and had not acted on the conviction that was very gently poking my heart of sin yet.
When my husband called to inform me that he knew what I had done (via a journal that I kept on our shared computer. I
had written all the hurts that I was experiencing from my husband, that he hadn't known about previous) and that he read my journal, he was, in one sentence, threatening
to take the girls and wanting me to come home. I was angry and hurt and did not want any part of him anymore, but I listened anyway. The conversation eventually ended with an agreement that he and the girls join me at my folks and I
agreed to go see our Pastor together.
My pastor asked me, “are you willing to give your marriage another
try?” and I replied, “what do I do
about my feelings for this other man?”
He said the most profound thing he could have ever said to me…because it
snapped me out of myself.
He said,
“That is just a fantasy, it is not real.”
And something inside me changed, and the next thing I said was, “what.
Did. I. do?” “What did I just do
to my family?” I was
horrified. I was devastated. I felt dirty. I felt ashamed.
I felt disgusted. Sick.
But
God.
Where
there is Truth spoken there is freedom!
And
that’s when the healing began.
We
began to reconcile our marriage.
We moved back to “home” where all our support had been. God brought me a prayer partner that
lasted a year and a half, meeting together weekly and having positive words
spoken into me and about my husband, things that I hadn’t realized that I was
taking for granted in him. Oh what
a wonderful time that was! My
husband was meeting with a small group of men as well.
During
this year of reconciliation the Lord prompted me to write a 12 week devotional
for a group of people that I had worked with; one devo per week. That was an amazing time of growth in
my life; that of hearing God in the wee hours of the night, and learning to
step out of my comfort zone. It
was a glorious year of renewal and rest, spiritual growth and grace, and
personal thanksgiving of God’s mercy that I had not contracted a disease or was
pregnant. Even though that year
still came with it’s own struggles, we were on the road of healing. And then it happened.
Almost
a year later to the day of my sin, I received an email from my husband that
would have answered my “prayer” a year previous; you know, the justifying
factor for divorce. It was a
letter of shame, and guilt, and asking for forgiveness, but understanding if I
did not; it was a letter of confession and coming clean; a letter from a man
that was releasing a very heavy load that he had been carrying for a very long
time. Yet, I was still devastated.
I won’t go into the details of his end because that’s his testimony, but I will
share that his sin happened a year after we were married…8 years before this
email. I called my
prayer partner and she rushed over to be with me. We prayed, we cried, and we talked. And the choice that I made that August
day was
“I will stay with my husband because I do not want to miss out on God’s
blessings.”
Do you see how God
worked in this? I had to forgive
my husband because a year before I had received the same forgiveness…and that’s
how God works. His grace is
sufficient.
This
is when the spirit of ministry entered into our hearts as a couple. God was creating good out of the bad in
our life to be able to identify with other couples going through similar
circumstances. And I would share with
the women who wanted to give up, “the grass is definitely NOT greener on the other
side, it’s prickly, painful, poisonous, full of pride, deceitful, and harmful
to you and others around you; it leaves scars!” And my husband would speak to the men about loving their
wives like Christ loved the church.
God began to “train us up” as I was mentored into leading worship in
corporate church settings; and my husband began to have a heart to seek out
ministry opportunities instead of the retail he was working in. And God provided 9 months after I chose
to stay with my husband. We moved
several states away to our first ministry position in the Christian Camping
world that was located in the beautiful Northern part of the Sangre de Cristo
mountains in Colorado… and from there God continued to move us like he did with
Abraham. We were learning to obey
when He called us to move…and blessings followed.
That
was my 30’s. And then I turned 40
when I thought life was only going to get better. I had imagined that 40 was a magic number and “poof!” things
changed! You see the marriage
still had work, and I still needed more transformation, a heart remolding,
because every now and then the past temptations would haunt me and I would entertain
the thoughts…never acted upon them…and God would always remind me “My
forgiveness will not be mocked!” and I would be allowed to remember the details
of my sin. God will always have
the victory!
And He will always
pick me back up and dust me off to set me on that continued path that He sets
before me.
Nevertheless,
40 came with, yet, a new set of difficult circumstances all it’s own. It was a year of physical pain and
relational heartache. I was
scheduled for my first Mammogram and I had heard rumors of the horrors of the
event. But that wasn’t horrible at
all; what brought horror to my life was the phone call I received two days
after the procedure letting me know that another Mammogram was crucial as soon
as possible to view an area that looked abnormal. The memory of my mom with a mastectomy due to breast cancer
and the death of my Aunt at 39 years of age for the same, penetrated my inward
being, and my life fell apart in an instant. I sobbed in my husband’s arms, and
all the imaginings of “what if’s” came into view, and that made me cry even
more. My husband sent out an email
of urgent request to all of our friends for intercession on my behalf that
day. It was a day of embrace, not
only to each other, but embracing all the things we should not take for
granted…like family.
The
2nd Mam came out normal and we praised God and did not forget His
faithfulness to us.
A
couple of months later a couple of close friends turned on me …my perspective of course. I thought I had been a good friend when
speaking truth into them, because I felt God was prompting me to do this. I had asked permission from my friends
to do so in fact, but the relationships turned and I took it very personally
because it was hurtful and offensive as they criticized and harassed my family
and me. Unfortunately, we had to
cut them off completely; and because of this I became cautious with future
possible relationships with women.
But God!
Within the past
year and a half God has worked on me in this area and has taught me how to
forgive…again! He has introduced
me to the topic of soul ties…positive and negative ones. He has identified for me more in detail
what my ministry is…and guess what?
It’s to women…shocking! And now more reconciliation has been introduced back into my
life with these past relationships, and what freedom that brings!
Here
we are, now, in Red River, NM, located in the Southern part of the Sangre de
Cristo mountains…which, interestingly is translates “blood of Christ” (and
that’s no coincidence in light of what God has done for the Davis Family), our
11th move since that first year of ministry, 9 1/2 yrs later, and 7 states pinned.
What an adventure it has been, the journey of a life-time!
To this day, I do not take any meds for
depression, because I was healed in Jesus Name 4 years ago at the church we are
now attending … for the 3rd time. I still claim that healing! My marriage with Steve is a whole lot healthier and
freeing…and in fact we will be married for 20 years come November…, our finances
are in order and we are living by faith, our girls are grown up in the Lord and
seeking Him daily as they venture out in the world of public high school, and
we are once again living in a motel room…well, 2 bedrooms and a living area,
but in different circumstances and hearts full of joy seeking God in Everything
we do and say. Jesus is our Lord,
He is our Provider, He is our Healer and there is not another life that I’d run
to that would be more thrilling than this life I live now. Everything in my past, my rebellion and
sin, I know is forgiven and forgotten, and I only talk about it to bring Hope
where hopelessness invades, hoping and praying that but one heart might come to
a saving knowledge of my Savior, Jesus Christ.
The
journey continues…
Embracing My Kup...
Cindy
