I sat across from Amy, my squad mentor, for my exit interview at final debrief in Gainesville during our last week of the race. There were a few questions written on the board to talk through to begin the process of moving forward and stepping into whatever is next for each of us. I read the first question and laughed.
What’s something you learned this year or what’s the most important thing you learned this year?
My first thought was what haven’t I learned this year, but my second thought was by far the most important thing I’ve learned and will probably ever learn in my life. I told her I felt silly and kind of cheesy saying it. She smiled and asked, “What? That you are loved by God?”
I know it sounds crazy, but yes. It’s the truth. I spent years of knowing and hearing the word of God, years of people loving me like Jesus, even some years of teaching and ministering the word of God myself, but this last year was different. This year I experienced the love of God in deeper and more ways than I have before, and I can finish this race knowing without a doubt that God loves me.
It’s the Gospel. The famous verse we’ve heard so many times. John 3:16-17, “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.”
So many times I have heard this. It’s one of the verses I have memorized from probably children’s church or VBS as a kid. But at some point, it became a verse I knew and believed for everyone else except Caroline Peavy. How can God love somebody like me? God can’t possible really love me for me. I’m not enough for God to love me. I’ve made too many mistakes and continue to make too many mistakes.
But he did, and he does. Over the course of the race, God began to slowly work in my heart as he began to show me his love for me as long as I was open to see it and believe it. Through encounters and conversations with God in repentance, worship, and prayer, through my incredible teammates, and through family and friends from home, God began to open my eyes to just how wide and long and high and deep his love is for me. It’s honestly incredible.
What’s next you may ask?
As far as a job goes, I don’t know yet. I’ll be sure to spend lots of time in prayer as the Lord and I figure that out. What I do know though is that he wants you to know just how incredibly loved you are. He loves immeasurable more than you even know. It doesn’t matter what we’ve done or the current circumstances of life we have gotten ourselves into. He didn’t come to condemn you! He came to save you, because he LOVES you that much! Many of us hear all our lives about how much we are loved by God and how he sent his son to die for us because of that love. And this last year, I experienced that love in a way I never have before and believe it. So, what’s next? Letting whoever I can know just how much they too are loved by the Father, Comforter, Guide, Merciful, and Most High God.
