Liberty University Club Sports Athletics
Team USA gold medal-winning gymnast Shawn Johnson East and her husband Andrew East share a laugh with Liberty's gymnastics team, including Head Coach Jessie Lowe (back right) and Assistant Coach Annabella James. (Photos by Megan Lovelace)
National champion gymnasts interact with Olympic gold medalist Shawn Johnson East
9/29/2026 4:24:00 PM | Gymnastics
The Lady Flames entertained Team USA's 2008 balance beam champion and her husband, Andrew, in the Club Sports Complex after the couple’s Convocation visit on Sept. 2.
Johnson, who won a gold medal on the balance beam and three silver medals for Team USA during the 2008 Summer Games in Beijing, China, and East, a former NFL long-snapper, are parents of three young children and co-authors of the recently released book, "The Courage to Commit."
At Convo, they discussed having the courage to commit to opportunities God has placed in their path. On their visit with the gymnastics team, they coached the girls on balancing individual and team goals — including defending their national title — with answering God's calling.
"She was so great with the girls," Lady Flames Head Coach Jessie Lowe said. "She was very open to answering their questions, and they asked really great questions. It was really special to hear her messaging on how their identity doesn't have to be rooted in gymnastics or in their performance, but it can be completely rooted in Christ."
"That was a really great way to start our year, meeting her and being able to be inspired by the way that she has done really well and performed the best at the highest level while also living out her faith," Lady Flames senior team captain Sarah Dyk added. "Just talking with her set our eyes on what our mission and our goal is for this season. She's really been an inspiration for a lot of the girls on the team growing up, so it was cool being able to watch her compete and to hear her story and how she's been able to use gymnastics as a way to be a testament to the Lord and His faithfulness."
She said she was better equipped to use gymnastics as a platform for sharing the Gospel after hearing from the couple.
"I'm not at the Olympics, but I can still use gymnastics in the level that I'm doing it to inspire other people, too," Dyk said.
Lowe said prioritizing holistic development of her student-athletes as Champions for Christ over strictly emphasizing performance at gymnastics meets is a focus of her coaching staff.
"That's definitely something that we try to help these girls understand as they're navigating gymnastics through college here in our program," she said. "Getting (Johnson's) perspective on how much achievement in the sport is not going to be fulfilling the way that having a relationship with Christ is, is just a huge deal for these girls to hear."
"In sports that's a really hard thing to separate sometimes, kind of tying your worth to your performance and your identity in that," Dyk added. "I'm a senior, so I'm about to be done and go off into the world, and I haven't lived without gymnastics for a long time, so it was really inspiring to hear her advice on how she handled that transition."
Lowe said the Lady Flames do not feel pressure to repeat their national crown but are free in Christ to exercise their routines to reflect His glory and not strive to gain their own fame.
"It's fun coming off of winning, obviously," Lowe said. "That was our gymnastics goal, and it's always our gymnastics goal. But I think it's more exciting that we have a program that is so much more than what these girls achieve in gymnastics. It's so much more about developing these girls into strong Christ-followers and people who know who they are outside of the sport. If these kids in my program can walk away and know who they are is who God says they are and much more than any performance they've given to Liberty Gymnastics, that's my ultimate goal."
Video by Patrick Strawn/Club Sports Director of Video & Media
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