Audrey Mapuyan
Before Jesus, I knew there had to be more.
I spent so much of my life trying to be enough. I wanted to be good at everything, liked by everyone, and worthy of love.
I thought if I could just get everything right, I would finally feel fulfilled. But I was tired, and deep down, I knew there had to be more.
Then one day on my university campus, I was stopped by a Catholic club. I had no idea that such a small interaction would become the beginning of the rest of my life.
I joined CCO’s faith studies thinking I already knew my faith. I grew up Catholic, went to
Catholic school, and thought I understood it all. But God had so much more to show me.
I realized I had been living my faith as if I had to earn God’s favour, when I had already been favoured all along. I was trying to earn salvation when Christ had already paid the price.
I remember sitting in adoration one day feeling like I had nothing left to give. And in that moment, I realized Jesus never asked me to prove myself to Him. He simply wanted me to receive His love.
Six years later, I look back and see little glimpses of how much God has changed me. Sometimes He lets me see them because He knows I still need the reminder.
He never needed me to prove that I was His. He knew long before I did. But in His mercy, He gives me moments where I can see for myself that I really do choose Him, that I don’t want to compromise Him, and that His grace has changed me.
Not so I can prove my faithfulness to Him, but so I can recognize His faithfulness to me.
The glory is not in who I was or even in who I have become. It is in who He has been through it all.
I spent so many years trying to become worthy of love, only to realize I was already loved.
I don’t have to earn His love. I get to live from it.
And the more I receive His love, the more I can love others, not with my own strength, but with His.
All glory to Him.
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