Watering Deeply

For the past few years, I have been in a very broken, parched, weathered place in life. Heavy burdens had become the norm for me. Our children have been in various places of faith or apathy. As a parent who gave a large portion of their life to homeschool eight children, with the primary goal of teaching them about God and the things of His Kingdom, there was a huge weight of sorrow for the children who had turned away. I compared myself with other homeschooling friends who had done the job much more successfully. “Failure” was stamped in all caps on my forehead, and I felt isolated and alone in my shame.

Additionally, my parents had both passed away one year apart, my mother in February of 2021 and my father in February of 2022. As the time approached, I knew that it would be difficult to lose them, but I was completely unprepared for this kind of grief. “Did I love them enough?” “Did I show them enough gratitude?” “Were they proud of me?” These and a multitude of other questions tormented my mind, bringing the deepest sorrows I have ever felt in my life. I stopped playing my guitar, stopped singing songs of worship, stopped reading my bible, stopped hoping for anything to ever change. Although I still prayed with the tiniest glimmer of hope, my heart was full of doubt, and I wasn’t sure He was listening anymore. Perhaps I had broken His heart the way I had broken my parents’ hearts. Grief has a weird way of distorting the truth. 

Recently, as I was watering the very dehydrated, limp, and almost dead plants in our garden, I realized that spiritually, I was just like those plants. They were trying so hard to stay alive, trying to produce fruit, but barely succeeding. Without watering soon, they would surely die. It became so clear to me that I was just like those plants… my heart was almost completely dried up. Suddenly, I remembered something that I had read many years ago about watering a garden… that it is better to water plants deeply but less frequently, rather than to give them a little bit of daily watering, to encourage deep root growth and to help them become more drought resistant. Hope that I had not felt in a very long time came rushing in, along with the realization that I needed watering – a very deep watering. I knew that the Vineyard National Conference was coming up. It may have been a silly prayer, but I asked Jesus for that deep watering that I knew I needed, barely believing that He would answer. 

Conferences, in general, are challenging for me, as I have a significant amount of social anxiety. I like being around people but am often too afraid to engage. The anxiety can be overwhelming at times. Over the years, with God’s help, I have learned to cope in these situations, but it’s still never very easy for me. At first, I felt the usual crowd anxiety and did my best to hide while attempting to worship. However, God has a way of finding us when we’re trying to hide our shame and our brokenness from other people and from Him. 

During the opening session, the sound of over two thousand people worshipping was indescribable. It was beautiful Holy Spirit warmth moving through the crowd of people with healing power and love. Struggling to enter into worship, I offered a simple prayer asking Jesus for help for our family. It was too big for me to carry alone anymore. The weight of it was killing me and I hung my head low in shame, asking God for His forgiveness. Almost immediately after that prayer, they sang the song “I Speak Jesus,” with these very powerful words in the chorus: 

Cause Your name is power

Your name is healing

Your name is life

Break every stronghold

Shine through the shadows

Burn like the fire

Shout Jesus from the mountains

Jesus in the streets

Jesus in the darkness over every enemy

Jesus for my family

I speak the holy name

Jesus

Though the crowd was enormous, in that moment, I was the only person in the room. He was speaking directly to my heart in a highly customized individual encounter. He took time to remind me that He loves and cherishes me in ways that I have never known, and that He not only hears me, but that my prayers to Him bring joy to His heart. He reminded me that He will take care of all the people I worry about and grieve over and that it is okay to let Him carry all of these burdens I have held. It’s too difficult to put into words, but in that moment, I knew that a great deal of my sorrow and grief was due to fear and trying to be in control of things that were not mine to control. It was not my job to try and make things happen and I could trust God to do things in His time, not my time. Jesus broke through the deepest hurts that I had experienced in my life… trauma, disappointment, heartbreak, abandonment, betrayal, loss. He also broke through the deep shame I felt for so many of my bad decisions and the many ways I had disappointed Him and the people I loved. 

While it doesn’t take a conference to have a Holy Spirit encounter with Jesus, it does help to be in intimate relationship with the people of God, in worship, prayer, and friendship. We try so hard to put a good face forward, but when we are in intimate fellowship, we know when one of our own is struggling. We learn to recognize the signs of a person hiding their struggles and putting their good face forward. We can let our hair down and be authentic with our Jesus-friends, boldly engaging in prayer for one another without forcing anything to happen. We can share our struggles without fear of being judged or criticized. Jesus will take care of the sin in another’s heart for judging what they are not called to judge. It’s okay to throw caution to the wind when it comes to confessing our sin, our shame, and our struggles within our circle of close friends. It’s okay to actually BE the church! We are not only called to pray for one another, but to confess our own weaknesses to one another so they may pray for us to be whole and healed. Authenticity works both ways.

Make this your common practice: Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you can live together whole and healed. The prayer of a person living right with God is something powerful to be reckoned with. James 5:16 The Message

We are called to water one another deeply and to allow others to water us deeply. We are meant to share one another’s burdens. We are meant to “disrobe” our protective exterior in the presence of God. He does the rest. We can trust Him with our hearts. We can trust His imperfect people with our confessions. We can trust Him with their hearts, too. 

Most important of all, continue to show deep love for each other, for love covers a multitude of sins. 1 Peter 4:8 NLT

“If you get rid of unfair practices, quit blaming victims, quit gossiping about other people’s sins, If you are generous with the hungry and start giving yourselves to the down-and-out, Your lives will begin to glow in the darkness, your shadowed lives will be bathed in sunlight. I will always show you where to go. I’ll give you a full life in the emptiest of places— firm muscles, strong bones. You’ll be like a well-watered garden, a gurgling spring that never runs dry. You’ll use the old rubble of past lives to build anew, rebuild the foundations from out of your past. You’ll be known as those who can fix anything, restore old ruins, rebuild and renovate, make the community livable again. Isaiah 58:9-12 MSG

May there be restoration where needed, trust where broken, hope where sorrow and darkness have taken residence, Holy Spirit life where long term shame has destroyed. May you be deeply watered.

My Daddy

My daddy died yesterday. February 18, 2022. It seems so unreal. He was larger than life, a wonderful father, better than a girl could ever hope for. He taught me so many useful life skills. My only comfort is that he is no longer suffering and he is reunited with my mama in eternal glory with Jesus. 

Here is a poem I wrote for him for Father's Day in 2002, and revised in 2022 to read at his funeral:

My Daddy

It doesn’t seem so long ago

When Daddy was so tall

I remember looking up at him

And feeling very small

I knew he was invincible

No harm could make its way

Near this little girl

His life for mine he'd pay

He often wiped my tears away

When neighbor kids were mean to me

Taught me his version of the golden rule

And how to have integrity

Precious are the memories

Of nature talks and forest trails

And time spent in Daddy's lap

Hearing his boyhood tales

Fishing, crabbing, camping, laughing

Our childhood was filled with fun

Along with his fatherly guidance

Not just for us but everyone

Every year at Christmastime

Daddy read how God in Heaven

Came to earth born in the flesh

The redemption of all men

My dad's a lot like Jesus

With quiet strength he took life's cross

And humble love he spent himself

Never mentioning dreams he lost

I love you daddy!

Amelia Avila 2002

Revised 2022

The original is below:

Daddy

It seems so very long ago

When Daddy was so tall

I remember looking up at him

And feeling very small

 

I knew he was invincible

No harm could make its way

Near this little girl

His life for mine he'd pay

 

He wiped my tears away

When neighbor kids were mean to me

He taught me the golden rule

And how to have integrity

 

Precious are the memories

Of nature talks and trails

And time spent in Daddy's lap

Hearing his boyhood tales

 

Every year at Christmastime

Daddy read how God in Heaven

Came to earth born in the flesh

The redemption of all men

My dad's a lot like Jesus

With quiet strength he took life's cross

And humble love he spent himself

Never mentioning dreams he lost

  

Amelia Avila ©2002

Beautiful Dirt

A couple of years ago, our pastor asked us to think about what God might say about us in a Fatherly way, and then gave us an assignment for the following week to share what we had discovered. At the time, I was in a low place, feeling like a failure as a mom, wife, Christian...  I told Jesus there was no way I could complete that exercise. The only thing I could come up with was dirt... I felt like dirt, but I probably couldn’t share that. Sigh. “I am no better than dirt,” I said to God.

A little while later, that still small Holy Spirit voice spoke to me, in the gentlest, sweetest way possible. “Dirt?” “Ha, ha, ha! Amelita, Let me tell you about dirt! Do you know how many billions of living microorganisms and macro-organisms there are beneath the square foot of dirt you are standing on? And look at all of the beautiful trees, flowers, fruits, vegetables that grow up out of the ground to decorate the earth and provide for its inhabitants. Dirt, the thing you think is so terrible, is TEAMING with life. It is what I chose to create and breathe life into the first human. It is death resurrected, a living example of my sacrificial love for this world and the perfect picture of what I have done in your life.” Needless to say, I was completely blown away. Wow!

In recent weeks, I confess, I have struggled and have been buried in big emotions for reasons that are beyond my control.  I’ve been discouraged, ashamed, remorseful, feeling terribly alone, and basically feeling like, well, “dirt.”  I even told God, “I feel like dirt.” At that moment, the memory above came flooding in once again, reminding me of God’s beautiful dirt, so full of dead and decaying things, yet bursting at the seams with an abundance of the promise of life. In my mind’s eye, I pictured the dark soil beneath my feet pulsing with the life hustling and bustling within, much like a pregnant woman’s belly dances back and forth with the movements of the growing baby inside her body. 

Isn’t this just like Jesus? He takes something dirt-y and turns it into a vessel for the purpose of bringing forth His Kingdom. He takes nothing and turns it into something. That which was lost, He restores. The broken, useless stone which the builders rejected, is the very stone God chose as His foundation. The one sheep gone astray is the one He relentlessly pursues. The promise of eternal life in the midst of all the death and destruction around us may not be seen with our tired, discouraged eyes, but yet, it is there, pulsing beneath the surface of our present realities and circumstances. 

Dirt, in spite of all its death, is filled with God’s glory, a miraculous representation of His desperate love for this world. 

I am His beautiful dirt. And so are you…

Photo by Gabriel Jimenez, on Unsplash

Becoming One

(This is something I wrote to read at my daughter's wedding back in May)

“And the two shall become one flesh.”  

We often hear this quote from Genesis 2:24 in the Bible at weddings, in marriage counseling, in our readings about marriage. What exactly does this mean? Besides sexual union, what exactly does becoming one entail?

In our nearly thirty-eight year marriage, my husband and I have had the opportunity to live this out. It’s been wonderful and it’s been not so wonderful at times. Two people will never always agree on everything. Though it sounds nice, a relationship without challenges would probably be mighty boring, cookie cutter molded, and would certainly be unrealistic. Our creator knew that we needed to grow in our understanding of what intimacy is, grow in our comprehension of His great love and mercy, and gave us the institution of marriage as a means of discovery. Two people will have times where they dislike one another, keep secrets, feel unloved, misunderstood, or even just become tired of the relationship. They will also have many opportunities of giving and receiving grace, mercy, forgiveness, love. There will be many happy times, and there will be some times of sadness. There will be hard times where they have the opportunity to come through holding each other up. There will be times of close companionship, and times of loneliness. These are all normal cycles in a healthy marriage.

In becoming one, you not only learn about your spouse’s strengths, the things that drew you to them, but you also learn about their weaknesses.  In discovering their strengths and weaknesses, you will also discover more about your own strengths and weaknesses. In the early years, I remember often being shocked at some of the things I learned about my husband, and I also remember feeling ashamed as my husband learned some of the realities of who I truly was. However, in a positive light, we have had so many opportunities to practice unconditional, accepting love. There have been the big life events, like having babies, moving to new duty stations, starting new jobs, buying homes and cars, having children start leaving the nest, becoming grandparents, that have given us ample opportunity to discover more about becoming one. 

More often, it’s the little every day things that give us the most practice in oneness; things like choosing paint colors, picking up socks for the twenty thousandth time, endless laundry piles and dishes, getting up at 5 am every day to go to work when you’d rather sleep, taking kids back and forth to extracurricular activities, coming home to your stay at home wife who looks like she hasn’t showered in days because she’s been so busy caring for toddlers and a newborn and hasn’t really slept for months. This very natural ebb and flow of everyday life, like the tide coming in and going out again, are what truly test and shape the bonds of love.

I’d be lying, though, if I said we passed those tests with flying colors. More often than not, we struggled for our own way, our own opinions, our own understanding. In those early years, I think it’s fair to say that we were both pretty selfish, and most arguments were based on what we wanted, rather than considering what our spouse wanted or needed. 

I can’t pinpoint an exact time when things changed. It was a slow process, the kind that happens over years… Little by little, the tests got easier. Little by little, we started overlooking one another’s faults, stopped trying to change each other, stopped getting angry about things that didn’t really matter, like the messy squished toothpaste tube versus the neatly rolled one. Little by little, when we saw one another’s struggles, we stopped taking them personally and started choosing to cover one another’s faults and love each other through them. Little by little, I found myself waking in the morning after a particularly difficult series of these “becoming one” struggles, and just staring at the man sleeping next to me. I wondered at how I could ever deserve to be so blessed. Little by little, that man lying next to me became my hero, the man who could do no wrong (in spite of the wrongs he did do), the man who I wanted so badly to please and to share my life with. I wondered what struggles he might be facing, and wondered how I could make them easier. Then it hit me, I truly loved this man even more than ever, more than I did on the day I said, “I do,” and I realized that I could not possibly live without him. 

Becoming one teaches us to let go of control, to put another person first, to forgive, to embrace a person in spite of their faults. Becoming one is a lifelong journey of learning about grace and commitment. Becoming one is true love that never stops growing. The journey, while not always easy, is absolutely rewarding and so worth it!

The beautiful thing about this “becoming one” journey called marriage, is that the adventure of becoming one continues through our whole lives. As my husband and I grow older, we are still discovering new things about each other, still getting to know one another, and we are still growing and changing individually in ways we never thought possible. In truth, I think perhaps that our honeymoon is only now really just beginning!

Well, I am averaging writing on this blog once a year. Not bad!

I just realized, we are beginning our twenty-seventh year of homeschooling. My, how our homeschool style has evolved! In the beginning, we had a chalkboard and little desks. I was very organized, and we followed a very stringent curriculum. I soon found that this didn't really work, especially as our family grew. Simply finding pencils wasted a good chunk of time before we would ever get started for the day. I would feel so discouraged that the kids were going to turn out to be illiterate bums. It was my son's unquenchable desire to learn math (so much so that he secretly taught himself facts beyond what the curriculum contained because I kept telling him he wasn't ready for those concepts), that made me first realize that curriculum is but a tool. Follow it too rigidly, and you actually squelch the desire for learning.

The funny thing about homeschool curriculum is that it repeats every year. In first grade and second grade, kids spend the year learning the basic math facts. When they begin third grade, they will pretty much review everything they learned in first and second grade. And so on. What takes them a year to learn in first grade, takes them a week to learn in fifth grade, unless a child has bonafide learning disabilities. You could literally wait until fifth or sixth grade to really begin a formal education, and have them caught up by the end of the year. So don't stress. Let your kids play and enjoy their childhood...

Homeschools are not classrooms. They are a place where learning is always happening. It isn't restricted to the desk. It can happen in Mom's or Dad's lap while reading books together. It can happen with a child lying on the floor in his room so he can work on that math workbook he found that mom doesn't know about. Learning happens when the kids help with grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning, etc., all the while developing real life skills that will make them responsible, independent adults.

I'm not writing this to make anyone who sends their kids to school feel bad. You are doing what you feel is best for your kids. That is what being a parent is all about. I am not trying to discount the hard, self-sacrificing work of school teachers. You are indeed angels who are very much appreciated by me!!! Instead, I am addressing the parents who are perhaps discouraged in their homeschooling efforts. Perhaps you are one of those who has fallen behind grade level wise and you are wondering if you should just give up and put the kids on the next bus. I am here to tell you that you are not alone. It has taken me these twenty-six years of homeschooling to finally realize that it's completely okay to ditch the schedule to take a meal to a friend in need, or to go clean an elderly person's home! Serving the community with your kids gives them opportunities to learn things much more important and necessary than academics.

People always ask me or the kids about what grade they are in. I always say the grade level they would be in if they were in school, but they are never in the grade they are supposed to be in. They are "behind" in some subjects, but they are not uneducated. I am confident that this will be a year of new beginnings, and that many exciting homeschool adventures await!

Time Flies

Parenting little ones can be tough sometimes. Endless days and nights run together, overflowing with laundry piles, cooking, dishes, nights being up with babies or sick children. It's been said many time before, but now I am another voice of experience sharing, yet again, these words of wisdom. Try to enjoy your little ones, and don't worry so much about everything else. Pretty soon, they'll be all grown up and leaving the "nest." You'll be left with the memories of those warm, sticky little hands you once held, those adorable little faces that trusted you so much, those miniature arms that once held your neck and flooded your heart with love. You'll remember their sweet little toddler voices asking you to stay until they fell asleep because they were afraid. When they are grown up and walking out of your door, you won't regret the sleep you lost or the dreams you gave up so that you could be a parent. You won't care whether you got all the nice things you wanted, or saw the places you longed to see. You'll only regret the time that got away. And boy, does it get away...

Powerful Spiritual Warfare

           Since I became a Christian, the subject of spiritual warfare has come up quite often over the years. Until recently, I had a skewed view of what exactly spiritual warfare entails, and would immediately envision the spiritual aspect of folks praying continuously for long periods of time, perhaps loudly in tongues; the louder, the better it was heard. That is not to say that praying loudly for long periods of time is ineffective. On the contrary, we are to pray without ceasing, and to pray fervently. However, one important aspect of spiritual warfare that is often completely overlooked is on a much more practical level.

Romans 12:19-21 says, "If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head. 21Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” In this example, by showing compassion to those who do evil to us, the evil is overcome by the good. Perhaps we have someone in our life who mistreats us, someone who is close to us or who we work with, or someone such as that cashier at the local grocery store. Maybe we have felt justified in our defensive reactions in response to those who have threatened our sense of security. However, I submit to you that returning kindness to those who mistreat us wields a powerful and fatal blow to the enemy’s plan to destroy both us and them.

In proverbs we read the famed verse, “A soft word turns away wrath.” Have you ever seen this in action? I am one prone to putting up my defenses and losing my temper, especially if the person is criticizing me or losing their temper with me. When I have put this verse into practice, or have been the subject of someone else putting this into practice toward me when I’ve been the offender, I have witnessed the enemy’s plan to destroy relationships completely thwarted. Hearts soften in response to kind words or deeds, and there breaks through the powerful sword of the love of God, conquering all that the one who hates us meant for our destruction.

In the movie version of Victor Hugo’s, Les Miserables, the character Jean Valjean is released from prison after serving out his sentence of nearly twenty years for stealing a loaf of bread. He is required to carry a document that brands him as a thief, and as a result cannot find a place to lodge. Bishop Myriel lets him stay for a night, and Valjean ends up sneaking off with the silver, fulfilling the curse, “Once a thief, always a thief,” placed on his head by society. Myriel does not accuse him when he is caught and brought before him. Before the accusers, he tells Valjean that he forgot the candle holders that he had given him, which were far more valuable, and Muriel gives them to him. In essence, he covers the man’s sin against him with an act of extreme kindness, generosity, and love, rather than with an act of vengeance and acusation. This act changes Valjean’s life forever, and he dedicates his life to educating himself and helping others. Great darkness was broken with a humble and selfless act of love. In the same way, Jesus, who was and is of far greater worth than silver candleholders, stood before our accuser and gave Himself in exchange for our sinfulness, an act which covered our sins forever and made it possible for us to be called God’s very own dear children.

Because of the Great Love who dwells in us, we do not need to argue for our defense. Jesus has already done that. Instead, we can safely and confidently surrender our place of being right to that of forgiving offences against us. We must not underestimate the power of that Sword of Love that has been given to us. It is a love that enables us to break through the deepest pit of darkness and render powerless any scheme the enemy tries to use to divide, devour, or keep us and those around us enslaved and imprisoned by hatred, resentment, unforgiveness, addiction, fear, anger, and so on. May God help each one of us to pour out His relentless and pursuing love to a broken, lost, and hurting world, beginning with those closest to us, in the same manner that it was poured out upon us.

Amelia

September 15, 2007