Arts: Ava Lynn Williams
16 ICSA TODAY
I am Ava Lynn Williams, and my
life’s story has often been called
an odyssey of more than thirty
years. One would hope that such
a life belonged to ever so few. I
was startled to learn that some
research indicates 3,000,000
people in the United States of
America have been involved in
cultic groups at some point in
their lives.
Just as I was, most people are not
aware of a group’s ability to destroy
the very essence of who you are, your
autonomy to change your belief
system and worst of all to remove
you from society and your family.
In my early teens, my mother placed
me in the hands of a small Christian
group. I became one of the original
members of what was to become
one of the most infamous and
destructive cults. I was brought up
to love the Lord, commit scripture
to memory, and evangelize. Coming
from what I now understand was a
very dysfunctional family with
strong controls and limited
socialization, I was predisposed to
join a high-demand group.
In the beginning, this environment
was so much better than my home
life. The era was the 1960s, what
some now call “the last innocent
generation.”The only literature we
used in evangelism was a little red
verse book from the Gideon Bible.
Witnessing straight from the Bible
felt wonderful. The beatniks and
then the hippies had just begun to
emerge, and at the same time a
revival of Christian faiths occurred.
Many churches and Christians began
to have Bible studies in private
homes. We would join in with them
and also keep our bigger ministry to
those outside the churches. We sang
and held Bible studies, taught
witnessing, and worked with the
youth in the churches. But most of
the time we lived in the midst of the
hippies, dressing like them with our
guitars on our backs and Bibles in
hand.
Many have said we were the
beginning of the Jesus revolutions,
with our skits, beach baptisms, and
the three-finger sign of our spiritual
rebirth. Many young people wanted
to become members of our group as
well as other congregations, so that
our generation could reach Christ
and go into the world to preach the
Gospel. We patterned our lives on the
early church in the book of Acts.
While still in our virgin days, many of
our teams of young people left for
foreign countries and to preach.
However, as our numbers increased,
obedience to our leader as God’s
prophet slowly became a greater goal
than preaching God’s Gospel. A cult
of personality emerged. My mother
and three of my brothers joined and
left my oldest brother remained and
married and had four children. He
later left with his children, many years
before I did, while his wife remained.
Early in 2001, one of his daughters
rejoined her mother in the group,
only to lose her life shortly after.
Members of my family were pierced
through our hearts.
My adult children and I lived and
worked in 25 different countries
around the world, and I bore children
in 9 of those countries. Each of my
two marriages within the group had
other wives and children. Instead of
bringing more unity and the
promised utopia, this practice
brought even more separations
without individual choice or control.
In addition, living daily with the belief
that marriage to the group was more
important than my own marriage
stole the last vestige of my personal
feelings and hopes. One good result
for me was that I have 12 children,
and three wonderful stepchildren by
a second wife. Our children have
given me 17 fabulous grandchildren.
Happily, we are now all former
members.
We had both great and terrible times,
but it seemed we were always
“running against the wind. I was
away from America for 19 years and
absent from my immediate family for
twenty-four and a half years, except
for two brief times when they visited
me. My last husband remained in the
group and is to this day a full-time
member. I know very little about his
present life, and he has sporadic
contact with our children.
Trauma Memories: I have represented my trauma and abuse by broken glass. This piece
expresses my moral dilemma living in a biblical cult with nonbiblical practices such as
polygamy, isolation, and other forms of punishment separations from children and spouses
and emotional, physical, and sexual abuse of people of all ages.
Broken Perspective (Detail):
This is the breakage I
had to look through
to see the world.
Healing: This is my brain healing. Each bottle is a blessing that grew out of my
past life. Instead of broken glass, there are beautiful glass beads inside.
A 30-YEAR
OdyssEy
VOLUME 4 |NUMBER 2 |2013 17
ICSA_volume4Issue2_Final 8/9/13 8:31 PM Page 18

VOLUME 4 |NUMBER 2 |2013 19 18 ICSA TODAY
Driftwood Dolphin: Driftwood from a lake reminded me of my favorite
animal, the dolphin. You can see my art moving to a place of healing and
fond memories.
There Is Beauty in My Mind Now
Personal Affirmations: Disconnection ruled my existence. I needed to touch and
use my senses to keep myself in the present. Just repeating affirmations wasn’t
enough, so I put them on rocks I could hold and feel as I read them.
Memoryscape: Random rocks pieces of old, fallen, broken wood I found separately
but together they show a different kind of beauty.
When I Finally Walked Away
When I finally walked away from
this group, my parents took me,
eight of my children, and a
granddaughter into their humble,
two-bedroom home. I had to start
over at 47 years of age in an
America that was a foreign
country to me. We had to adjust
to a different society in a small
Southern town where newcomers
were not accepted. My children
had never lived in their own
country. We spoke English and
looked the same as everyone
else but when folks found out
our background and began to
see the difference between our
history and theirs, they rejected
us. We had little money and few
resources or job opportunities,
no vehicle, and no credit history.
We were mistrusted even by the
churches who knew my relatives
well.
Despite all of this, I was bringing
myself and my children home. Not
only was it their first encounter
with their biological family and
our roots and heritage, but it also
was a new reality. Neither they nor
I had been able to become
bonded to anyone, not even each
other, because we lived as a group
with no individuality. We each had
to find our own identity and begin
to find our autonomy. Doing these
things is still a struggle at times
for all of us, as my children have
grown and entered American
culture and politics. My parents’
and brothers’ open arms and
loving hearts made all of this
possible.
These past fourteen and a half
years have been a traumatic
journey. I have struggled daily, to
parent so many children while
going back to school myself, to
help my children transition from
home schooling to a public-
school environment, and then to
care for my elderly parents until
their life’s journey ended. I have
been more fortunate than most
my children have not let their
integration back into society
prevent them from helping one
another and me as they are able.
My oldest children living at home
were my right arm and worked the
hardest to fill the gap the absence
of a father had made.
Coming home, I closed the door on
my past and threw away the key,
just as I had done 30 years earlier
when I went into the group. I was
now beginning a third life with
three sets of four children. None of
these three sets of four siblings
knew each other very well because
there had been so many
separations. Even though I was
born in America, my mother had
sheltered and taught against “The
World.”This upbringing included
very little TV, and no worldly music
or movies or outside friendships so
American society was still foreign.
It was as if I just woke up from a 30-
year coma. I didn’t know where or
how to begin.
I was at the center of a hurricane,
but there was no peaceful “eye” in
my personal storm. My emotions
had all but died, and then this
figurative hurricane blew the
skeletons out of my mental closet.
One thing I knew, and that was
how to work hard and persevere
every day as if it were my last, to
keep up a brave front, and make
the best of the worst. I worked
hard at moving on, stayed positive,
and attended self-help workshops
and all kinds of counseling for
both myself and my children. No
one understood my situation, least
of all the churches. (I have not lost
my Christian faith however, it is
deeply scarred and I am easily
triggered by “religious”
associations.)
I tried to give my children a normal
life, but they carried the damage of
trauma and abuse, just as I had.
This damage only festered as the
years passed. All of these issues are
another chapter in my life I wish
not to write more of them here—
only to express that there is such a
vast need for us to help the second
generation and their children. How
to stop this cycle of trauma? Before
tackling these questions, I first had
to work on my own recovery.
ICSA_volume4Issue2_Final 8/9/13 8:31 PM Page 20