If someone asked me what the biggest thing I took from or learned from the race (which I am anticipating will happen a lot when I return home), I would be able to answer confidently and passionately in one word.
Grace.
Grace is something that I’ve come into deep understanding and awareness of, as opposed to the past. I’ve grown into enough self awareness to know that I needed to be seeking more understanding and working endlessly on my heart posture and pride to be able to truly give others what I should be giving them, which is unending grace. Of course, this subject deserves more than a one word explanation, so I will attempt to explain how Jesus radically changed my heart, soul, and life over this past year.
The definition of grace that I’ve used to guide the changes in my life: The love, forgiveness, and mercy given to us by God, because his only desire is to love and be with us, not because of anything we’ve done to earn it.
As humans, by nature we continuously turn ourselves away from God (AKA sin). We literally did/do nothing to deserve God’s grace. He created eternity to love us, and he created life to give us the chance and the freedom to choose and love Him. It is because He desires us deeper than anything we could imagine here on earth, that he gives us grace, and will forever.
I don’t take the phrase “saved by grace” lightly anymore. To be saved by grace means to be delivered from the righteous judgment of God (that he has every right to).
And now how grace has played into my life.
Certainly, I have always been passionate about things that I either thought were right or wrong. In the past it was based on how I saw things through my eyes, and now it’s where I feel strong personal conviction from God, but the same problem remained. Being an advocate and a challenger is something that I am proud of, but it has been a long and hard road of learning how to steward that.
As far back as I can remember, I have been the person to stand up for the “underdogs”. For example, that may have been a person who was bullied, ignored, or from what I could assume, misunderstood. I was fighting for the people that from my perspective, were getting the short end of the stick in situations. I felt so strongly that it was my place in this world to make them feel seen and to be the one fighting for them (that part hasn’t changed).
But, within those things, I was missing something. I was missing grace. To put it frankly, I would just “go in”, “cut deep”, (however you want to put it), on the people that I thought were doing wrong, didn’t care, or who I considered the bullies in a lot of scenarios.
In turn, I was actually giving the people I saw as “in the wrong”, the short end of the stick.
I was doing no better myself to serve and love my brothers and sisters of this earth, than the people that made me so angry. To the people I saw doing things that I didn’t think were okay, I retaliated in the exact way that I was allegedly fighting against. I have now learned that it is possible for me to communicate with these people out of love while simultaneously having grace for them.
This is where grace came in and radically changed me forever. If Jesus did it and does it for us, and I’m trying to be like Him, and do what He did, then why wouldn’t I be including this aspect. If Jesus said that we were worth dying for on the cross, so that we would forever have grace from God, then shouldn’t I say its worth it to me to show that grace to others, so they can see God through me?
Specific things that I’ve dissected about Grace:
I’ve learned how to be passionate and still give others grace.
I’ve learned that EVERYONE deserves grace, because I know that God wouldn’t exclude anyone.
I’ve learned how to fight for people without destroying others in the process.
I’ve learned that I can’t pick and choose how I want to be working towards being more like Jesus.
I’ve learned that nothing anyone does ever gives me the right to withhold grace for them.
To conclude, I’ve had a radical change in my heart, and I do understand a lot more about this now, but that doesn’t mean I’ll never get this wrong again. So I’m asking for grace in return.
Thanks for reading this blog and hearing the same word an excessive amount of times (It had to be that way).
So much love,
Lexi
