April 26, 2024
GETTY IMAGESI can only remember two sentences that Coach Roach ever spoke to me.
Coach Roach was his real, given name. Well, Roach was. Coach was just a title. I guess when you have a last name like Roach, you just have to go all in and find a career that gives you a rhyming title. That way, thirty years later, people will still remember you and at least two sentences you said to them.
Coach Roach was my seventh grade football coach. I played for the Adamson Indians. We were terrible. More specifically, I was terrible. But we had nice uniforms. Mine was especially nice.
One day, on our way down to the field from the locker room, I asked Coach Roach how my uniform looked. I have no idea why I did this. To the best of my knowledge, it’s the first and only time I ever asked a grown man to evaluate my looks. On top of that, Coach Roach was legally blind. No, I’m not making that up.
I still remember what he told me in his thick accent that I thought sounded like something straight out of Brooklyn.
“Ya look like a million bucks, son.”
Man, I was so proud. Coach Roach thought I looked like a million bucks! But my pride faded by the time the game was over and I was walking back up to our locker room. I still looked like a million bucks. There were no blood or grass stains on my pants. My jersey had no rips in it. The other team’s helmet paint wasn’t smattered across my helmet.
I looked like a million bucks.
It’s just too bad that I didn’t play that way. Come to think of it, I barely played at all.
I think that I still remember those words because they give a perfect assessment of today’s church. Many people who claim to be Christians look the part. They listen to radio stations with words like Fish and Love in the title. They live by a strong moral code. They are good boys and girls.
They look like a million bucks.
But they aren’t in the game. In many cases, they aren’t even on the team.
The Pharisee in Jesus’ parable from Luke 18 was this way. He was good. And in case God forgot, he was willing to let him know.
“I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.” Luke 18:12 (ESV)
But there was another man in Jesus’ story. He barely felt worthy to put on the uniform, much less to ask Coach Roach how he looked. When he prayed, rather than running through his stellar spiritual résumé, he asked God for his mercy.
And Jesus gave a stunning assessment of the two men.
The sinner who asked for mercy was made right with God, not the man who looked like a million bucks.
For all of his shortcomings, the sinner in Jesus’ story understood something that the Pharisee and many of us do not. Being right with God has nothing to do with our performance or how well we look while performing.
That brings me to the second sentence I remember Coach Roach saying to me.
“Sandaz, ya gonna get crooooooooo-suh-fied!”
That’s what Coach Roach would say to me during tackling drills. I was too small and too scared to do well at those drills so usually I ended up looking more like a frightened ballerina than an actual football player. But hey, at least I made my coach think about Jesus. That’s got to count for something.
No matter how good you think you are, your sin was so great that it took the death of Jesus to make you right with God. Only through faith and repentance, not fasting and tithing, can you be made right with God.
My football career came to an end after that season with Coach Roach. But I’m thankful for him, if for nothing else, because of those two sentences that he spoke to me. I didn’t know it at the time but I was learning something about grace.
I wasn’t able to fake my way into a right relationship with God.
God did not accept me because I looked the part.
I am right with God because the crucified and risen Lord had mercy on me.
A sinner.
This post originally appeared at JasonlSanders.com.
