Paul says that we have peace in Romans 5:1, “Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” It seems that the world is at war at all levels. There are wars in the Middle East, Ukraine-Russia, Thailand-Cambodia, and other regions. There are also wars of tariffs over goods, drugs, crimes, poverty, oppressions, human rights, and so on. There are wars of ideologies, too. Once upon a time, there was a generation that fancied there would be no more battles and fighting in the world. After all, now we are living in the 21st century and not expecting barbarism happening in the world. However, all such fantasies were shattered at the hands of ISIS that brought people to the slave markets for sales and women into humiliating conditions. The whole world is fighting to determine the meanings of “gender and sex,” and struggling to defend and define the freedom of speech at the rapid growth of fake news and AI technologies. We are at both physical and non-physical wars. There is also spiritual war against the power of darkness. Because of wars, gentle and simple blood is being shed, and many of the best and bravest men and women are laying cold in untimely graves. Hearts are broken by sudden, stunning, and crushing bereavements. Minds are affected and disturbed even to lose their quietness and sanity. People cry for peace, but it is not easy to find and experience it.
Now I am attempting to bring your attention to the best peace of all, the peace with God. By the fact that this is peace with God, we should immediately notice that this is a kind of peace that this world can neither give nor take away. This peace does not depend on any earthly government. It does not need any carnal weapons either to win it or preserve it. In fact, “peace with God” is the chief privilege of a true Christian.
First, there is a reason why I call it a privilege of a true Christian. Man is a sinner by nature. A natural man fulfills the desires of the flesh and of the mind. He is a child of wrath by nature (Ephesians 2:3). There is no righteous man by nature in this world. What is lawfully waiting for such a man is only destruction and misery, and he cannot know of the way of peace (Romans 3:10, 16-17). Evil principle within him works against him. He is at war against his spiritual welfare day by day. He also finds the influence and power of Satan, his adversary. This evil being wages on endless battles with this helpless man’s soul. The peace with God that only believers can have is a calm, intelligent sense of friendship with the Lord of heaven and earth. He who has it, feels as if there was no barrier and separation between himself and his holy Creator.
Second, even death cannot take peace from the believers. They, of course, know that death is God’s appointment for them. Nonetheless, they are not greatly moved. They are fully aware that their eyes will be closed someday, and they will have to give up their last breaths on earth. Their bodies will be buried under the ground and return to dust. They also understand that their physical death is not the end of their existence. They will launch forth into a world they have neither seen nor experienced before, though they have heard of it. Yet they still have peace. Can you?
Third, the thought of eternity will not be able to greatly move the believers from peace. What they have seen and experienced is only this temporal world. The never-ending existence in the presence of God is found only in their imaginations. It is true that even this temporal world offers lots of pleasure and enjoyment like a calm sea after a storm, a blue sky after a black thunder-cloud, health after sickness, light after darkness, or rest after toil. However we enjoy such pleasurable things in this world, they will not be able to give us more than a feeble idea of the comfort which we enjoy. They cannot bring us into the state of peace with God. It is because the peace we are talking about is a kind of “peace which passeth all understanding” (Philippians 4:7).
Fourth, the want of this peace plays some tricks in the minds of people. The lack of this peace takes the sense of happiness away from us. People may own everything that may give them pleasure, but are never satisfied. It is because the human mind could be like a bottomless pit. Nothing can satisfy it for ever. When it is not satisfied, it begins to produce negative and unhappy feelings. Then, people begin to experience emptiness within, and this feeling can be intensified. It happens when they do not have peace with God. They begin to look for alternatives, which might give them satisfaction. The most outstanding example is, probably, idol worship and idolatrous religions. Many (hundreds of thousands, or hundreds of millions) people have attempted to mortify their bodies and vex their flesh in the service of idols, which their own hands have made. Why is it so? Because they have not found the peace they need. Or, some may pursue everything to please the eye and gratify the ear – forms, ceremonies, services, and sacraments, and yet no good is done to the soul. The grand question that should try all is the state of a man’s conscience. Do you have peace with God?
Fifth, then we should know the source from which true peace is drawn. The peace of the true Christian is not a vague, dreamy feeling, without reason and without foundation. It is none other than “justification.” Without justification it is impossible to have real peace. Conscience forbids it. Sin is a solid barrier between a man and God. In order to have peace with God, it has to be removed. Unpardoned sin will murder peace. The true Christian knows all this well. His peace arises from a consciousness of his sins being forgiven, and his guilt being put away. His house is not built on sandy ground. His well is not a broken cistern, which can hold no water. He can have peace with God, only when he is justified.
The importance of justification is found in that his sins are forgiven. However many, and however great, they are cleansed away, pardoned, and wiped out. They are blotted out of the book of God’s remembrance. They are sunk into the depths of the sea. They are cast behind God’s back. They are searched for and not found. They are remembered no more. Though they may have been like scarlet, they are become white as snow. Though they may have been red like crimson they are as wool. And so he has peace.

He is justified, and thus he is counted righteous in God’s sight. The Father sees no spot in him and reckons him innocent. He is clothed in a robe of perfect righteousness, and may sit down by the side of angels without feeling ashamed. Even the holy law of God, which touches the thoughts and intents of men’s hearts, cannot condemn him. The devil, the accuser of the brethren, can lay nothing to his charge, to prevent his full acquittal. And so he has peace. Though he naturally is a poor, weak, erring, and defective sinner, he is reckoned complete, perfect, and faultless before God, because he is justified. He has escaped from the wrath of God. Are you a justified child of God? Then, you are pardoned, forgiven, and accepted before God.
Lovingly,
Pastor Emeritus Rev Okman Ki

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