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Don’t do what only God can do.

Don’t do what only God can do.

JULY 7, 2021

/ Programs / Key Life / Don’t do what only God can do.

Steve Brown:
Don’t do what only God can do. Okay? Let’s talk on Key Life.

Matthew Porter:
If you’re sick of guilt and manipulation, and if you’re looking for an honest and thoughtful presentation of Biblical truth, you’ve come to the right place. This is Key Life with the founder of Key Life Network, Steve Brown. Keep listening for teaching that will make you free.

Steve Brown:
Thank you Matthew. If you have your Bible open into the second chapter of the book of Acts. And we’re looking at Pentecost and we have a question, and the question is, is Pentecost reproducible? And I move the previous question. In fact, I sorta answered it yesterday. No, it’s not. It really isn’t. Romans 9:14-16.

What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God’s part? By no means! For he says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.” So it depends not upon man’s will or exertion, but upon God’s mercy.

Now don’t look at me that way. I didn’t say that, God said it. And Isaiah 55:8.

For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

In every revival that I know about, there were, and we’re going to talk about these things, because they ought to be present in the people of God. But those things are present and there is no revival. And those things are present and there is a revival. The Welsh revival was amazing. God used Evan Roberts in that revival. You know what happened? God just poured out his heart and his Spirit on the Welsh. When Evan Roberts would walk into a church, he didn’t even have to preach. He’d walk down the aisle and people on both sides of the aisle would fall under conviction and run as fast as they could to Jesus. Now nobody planned that, you can’t plan that, that is something that God does. And so we need to learn in the church that God does his thing, and he does it regardless of we, of us. I’m doing the best I can for you English teachers. God does as he pleases and he does it right well. And that includes revival and awakening and another Pentecost, you can engineer it. There aren’t any steps that you can take to make it happen. God is not our servant. We are his servant and he does as he pleases. And he does it right well. So the question, and I move it again, is Pentecost reproducible? No, it isn’t. The Wesleyan revival, for instance, didn’t happen because necessary factors moved on a God who didn’t want to do anything, that they were really, really good people, and God said, alright, I’ll bless you. No, that didn’t happen that way. God has his plan. God is sovereign. He knows what he’s doing. And when it’s time for awakening, it’s time for awakening. When it’s time for Pentecost. Do you know what led up to Pentecost and Peter references that in his sermon in this second chapter of Acts, he references the history. Of all that went before, until this moment, that God had planned for all of these thousands of years, for this moment, when he, now when he poured out his Spirit. God is outside of time and we can trust him. And that’s one of the reasons as I said yesterday, I think that we are bordering on awakening in America, because there’s not, there’s no hope. And when there’s no hope, God becomes our hope. When there’s no meaning, God gives us meaning. When we’ve reached the end of our rope, God does the salvaging, not us. So is Pentecost reproducible? In other words, are there things you can do to see God bring revival? Actually there really aren’t, but I think it’s important that we as Christians in this kind of culture where we’re living right now. And we talked about that a long time yesterday, we’re living in a very difficult time, a time of unbelief, a time when Christians are mocked, a time, we interviewed Ken Starr yesterday, on our talk show. And it was an amazing program. Ken Starr, as you know, was the head of the Pepperdine Law School. He’s pled lots of cases before the Supreme Court. He was the chancellor of Baylor University. He was the chief prosecutor when Bill Clinton was impeached. And he is a humble, kind, gentle man, who has unbelievable steal in his back. And he talked about the dangers of us losing our religious liberty. And he’s right. We’re in some kind of trouble here. That’s bad. No, that’s good. We don’t know what to do. That’s bad. No, that’s good. We have reached the end of our rope. That’s bad. No, that’s good, because those are the places where the God of the universe begins to move. No Pentecost isn’t reproducible, unless you reproduce it with your sin and your failure and your weakness and your neediness and you’re being marginalized. Once you’ve been there a long time, you know that if God doesn’t get you out of that hole, you’re going to stay there. And we’re at that point now in America, but things ought to be present in the people of God, especially in this kind of cultural planet. And tomorrow I’m going to start giving you a list of some of those things, that I want you to consider. I’m not going to tell you, you gotta be perfect. But I am gonna say, you gotta be better than you are. You think about that. Amen.
It’s Wednesday, and sometimes when I have time on Wednesdays, I answer a question or two. We get a lot of questions from you guys. And as you know, Pete comes in on Fridays and we spend the entire broadcast, just answering some of the hundreds and thousands of questions we get from you. And we love to get your questions. You can ask a question anytime you want, 24 seven, pick up the phone, dial 1-800-KEY-LIFE and then press the right button. Record your question. And sometimes we put your voice on the air. Or you going to send your question to

Key Life Network

P.O. Box 5000

Maitland, Florida 32794

In Canada, it’s

Key Life Canada
P.O. Box 28060
Waterloo, Ontario N2L 6J8

Or you can e-mail us at [email protected]. And, those, and you knew I was going to say this, are all places where if you can, we would appreciate you helping us financially. And we realize that not all of you can, but I promise that when you do help us, we’ll help your brothers and sisters in Christ. And we’ll squeeze every dime for the glory of God. And if you can’t and you don’t feel led to help Key Life, then say a prayer for this ministry. It is expensive. I’d like to say we’re getting ready to go down. And if you don’t send your money, God will let us die, but that’s not true. The bills are paid. We don’t have a slush fund, but the bills are paid. And if you will help, we promise to help others with your gifts. Oh, by the way, you can give on your phone. You can text Key Life at 28950, that’s 28950 and just follow the instructions there. Okay, let’s turn to one or two of these questions. This is an e-mail. Who can, or should we confess to? Well, to each other, the Scripture is pretty clear about that. In Galatians Paul said.

Confess your sins and God’s going to heal you.

So, we’re called to confess to one another. But don’t be dumb about that. I mean, you’ve got to be careful. You ought to have one person in your life who knows it all, who knows your sins and you don’t have to hide anything from, and that probably shouldn’t be your wife or your husband or your children or your father or your mother. It ought to be somebody from the outside who loves you, who also confesses his or her sins to you. That’s called trading off bits of your soul. Now, when you say, who do you confess to, well you always confess to God. I can’t tell you how often I use that old Puritan prayer.

My sins are too heavy to carry, too deep to undo, and to real hide. So, I’m here.

And I’m here and I’m going to confess to you have mercy on me. That goes without saying. God, doesn’t tell your secrets. God is not a gossip, and you can trust him, and he’s promised to forgive you. If we confess our sins, I John.

If we confess our sins, he’s faithful and just to forgive us our sins,

the ones we confess

and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

That’s pretty cool. But the Bible also says that we need to be connected with one another in such a way, that we can be honest with one another. Now we should be honest always with one another. We should be honest with the specifics with only those that we trust, with whom we have fought the battles, somebody who also knows that they are weak and need to confess and then you trade-off your soul. And you do that very slowly. Now, I don’t think they can forgive you, but they can pronounce the word of God about forgiving you. They can remind you of the gospel, and the gospel says it doesn’t matter where you’ve gone, what you’ve done, who you’ve heard, what you’re smoking, what you’re drinking. You come to Jesus with it and he’ll forgive you. And you got to find a brother or a sister, who also will do the same thing. I’ve got maybe two people in my life who know everything. And, I can’t tell you how valuable they are to me. I can say anything to them, and they know the gospel and they speak it to me, so I won’t be discouraged. So you go out and do likewise. Key Life is a listener supported production of Key Life Network.

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