Struggle & Triumph | What God Says I HaveSample

I Have Peace With God

“Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we a have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we boast in the hope of the glory of God.” Romans 5:1,2

Have you ever struggled to gain the favor of a coach? You did everything they asked of you—and more, because you thought it was the only way to gain their approval and gain a sense of peace in your ability to perform. But no matter what you did, how hard you worked or how much better you got, they always had it out for you. What was that like? Frustrating? Discouraging? Demotivating? Did it dampen your ability to gain the peace you typically found playing your sport?

There was also a time when no matter what you did in life, you could not earn favor with God. God is not the same as the coach you never connected with, because He wants to be the focus of your life. But there was something that got in the way of you two. We’ve all been separated from God, thanks to sin. It didn’t matter how many “good deeds” you performed. It wasn’t enough to be great at your sport, and you could not be kind enough to earn God’s favor. Believe it or not, your best wasn’t good enough to make peace with God.

Instead, someone had to earn this peace for you. In Romans 5:1 it says we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Thanks to Jesus’ death on the cross, you gained that peace with God once you placed your faith in Him. Now, you are justified and forgiven by God, not because of what you did or didn’t do, but because of what Jesus did on the cross.

We are continually being gauged and judged on what we do. Our performance, whether competing in sport or other arenas in life, often becomes the benchmark for how we view ourselves or how we think others (including God) view us.

You might feel a lack of peace with God because you’ve fallen short in different areas of your life. You might also gain a false sense of peace based on how well you perform at your sport or when you’ve “been good.” But true peace with God has nothing to do with your performance, and being good can never serve as a way to please or make peace with God. You’ve already received that. You can be at complete peace because you have complete peace with God.

Application: Think of a teammate who is struggling with having peace because of his or her coach or performance. How can you be an encouragement to that teammate?