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If God doesn’t do it, it won’t get done.

If God doesn’t do it, it won’t get done.

FEBRUARY 22, 2022

/ Programs / Key Life / If God doesn’t do it, it won’t get done.

Steve Brown:
If God doesn’t do it, it won’t get done. Let’s talk, on Key Life.

Matthew Porter:
This is Key Life with our host, author and seminary professor, Steve Brown. He’s nobody’s guru. He’s just one beggar telling other beggars where he found bread. If you’re hungry for God, the real God, behind all the lies, you’ve come to the right place.

Steve Brown:
Thank you Matthew. If you have your Bible open it to the 10th chapter of Acts, as we continue with our study of the book of Acts. And we’re looking at the 10th chapter of Acts because, well, it’s a part of our long study of the book of Acts, but because this 10th chapter deals with some problems with which we deal in our time, mainly racism and prejudice and division among people. You know, it’s not just racism. In fact, I believe the major problem that we deal is classism, where classes look down on other classes and find that they have been called to be their mother, rather than their friends and their brothers and sisters, but be that as it may, the 10th chapter of Acts addresses some issues that we’re dealing with. And if you were listening yesterday and you never listen to me, we took some time to look at Peter with all the dirt. You know, you can be obedient, even if you aren’t pure, people are always saying, I don’t know enough to witness. And I want to say, of course you don’t. Nobody does. I’m not good enough to stand for Christ, of course or not, that’s the point. And that’s true of Peter. Peter was not a good person. He was a hypocrite and that was years after he was converted. And Paul makes that clear in the book of Galatians. Peter was political and maybe in not so wonderful ways, but he was a obedient, when God told him to do something, he might complain, he might tell him that he didn’t want to do it, but Peter was going to do it. And God said to Peter in effect, and you can read it in the 10th chapter of Acts. God said to Peter, you are so prejudice, you drive me nuts. Now, I want you to find some people you don’t like, in effect the Gentiles, the Goyam. It might be different for you, but it’s still the same. And I want you to go to them and I want you to tell them about me and he did, and God brought revival. And that brings me to the second thing that you ought to note from the 10th chapter of Acts. Not only was Peter used as an unpure instrument, a sinner who needed a savior, an unpure instrument in his obedience to bring forth reconciliation. You also ought to note that God had to directly intervene to bring a change. There’s a vision, there’s a supernatural vision that Peter experienced, when God came to him personally and spoke to him, God then prepared in a supernatural way the people to whom Peter would speak. Cornelius and his people showed up supernaturally. God told Peter, they were gonna show up supernaturally and for him to go with them and he did it. And so, you see God all over the place in this, and I’ll tell you something in racial matters in our country and in our churches and in our personal lives, if God doesn’t intervene, we’re going to kill each other. If God does not intervene, there’s not going to be any solution. Listen to me, our problems in particular, our racial problems are beyond us. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to fix it. And you don’t either. You can try to be nice to make up for things that have been done in the past, to bring some balance, to make sure you have friends on both sides of the racial divide. You can, but that’s not going to do it. It’s too big. In fact, it’s gigantic and it’s killing us and we need God. And if God doesn’t do anything, nothing is going to be done. And so, there needs to be major repentance and prayer on the part of Christians. And I’m talking about African-American Christians, I’m talking about Asian Christians. I’m talking about white Christians. I’m talking about all of us. We need to come to the realization that we don’t know what to do, that we can’t fix. And that we don’t know how to fix it. And all the money in the world, all of the spurious teaching in our public schools, all of the education, all of the sociology, all of the psychology that we applied to it, you know what happens? It gets worse. It gets worse. And so, I got an e-mail from a pastor friend this morning, and I’ve been talking to him, he’s been kicked out of his church and you say, well, he must’ve done something really bad. Actually he didn’t, he tried to be honest about racial matters. And they said he was racially insensitive and they fired him. What they should have done was he and everybody in that congregation should have fallen on their knees and say, whoa is me with Isaiah. I’m a sinner. And I dwell in the midst of unclean people and we’ve messed this thing up and we don’t know how to fix it. And once we come to that point, then God will intervene and make a difference. I’ve often said, and I get challenged on it, but I believe that in America we’re close to another great awakening. I was here because I’m an old guy and one great awakening was called the Jesus movement. And I’ll tell you, I have never seen anything like that in my, in my entire life. It was bigger than the great awakening under George Whitfield and Jonathan Edwards. I mean, it was amazing. It swept across colleges and university campuses, they had mass baptisms on the beaches of California. The church I was serving in the Boston area became absolutely packed with young people, who were looking for meaning and they changed our church and Jesus changed our church. And you know why that happened because we got to the point where we didn’t know what to do and God came. And I think that we’re sitting in a time or we’re standing in a time where we’re going to watch another great awakening because it’s dark. And when it gets dark enough, you can see the stars. When it gets dark enough, even a little light will do. When it gets dark, the light begins to shine. And folks, if you haven’t seen how dark it is, you’re crazy. I mean, if you focus on that and I do sometimes, I’m just depressed. I don’t see a lot of answers. I don’t see our leaders coming forth with saying anything that’s worth anything to lead us out of this morass. I don’t see hope. I don’t see anything, that’s bad. No, that’s good because when we come to that point in general about our problems and in particular for what we’re talking about this week, about racial matters, then God comes cause he comes to broken hearts. He comes to those who are broken and humble. He comes to those who don’t know where to turn. He comes to the weak. He comes to the sinful. He comes to the marginalized. And so, it required God’s intervention and it’s still does. We’re an arrogant bunch. In fact, that’s our problem. It turns into self righteousness and the self-righteousness is incredible in our country because we’ve turned away from the true God. And when you turn away from the true God, sin becomes irrelevant and nothing that you claim. Repentance isn’t necessary because there’s nothing to repent of. And everybody who disagrees with you is not only wrong, they are evil. And that’s where we are right now. And Christians, we do it too. I’d like to call out the pagans, but there are not many listening to this broadcast or I would. This broadcast and this is where God has called me is to teach God’s people. And to let God’s word teach me because I am the greatest of sinners. And, once it gets to the point where you can’t fix it, then it’s at the point where God fixes to move. And when he moves things happen and things change. And so, as we look at the racial problems in America, just as there was prejudice in the 10th chapter of the book of Acts about Jews or from Jews to Goyam to Gentiles. One side was right, one side was wrong, just as there was looking down noses with peacock feathers flying in the breeze in the fruit century, it’s true now. And so, there’s one simple thing to do. Stop, take a deep breath and repent. You think about that. Amen.

Matthew Porter:
Thank you Steve. Truly our current racial challenges are serious, but as we’re seeing here in Acts 10, definitely not something new. We’ll continue our study tomorrow. Sure hope you will join us for that. Hey, when was the last time you were pleasantly surprised? For me, it would probably be when I opened my fast food order and everything was right. Huzzah! But there’s an even better surprise those fleeting moments when we realize that God is actually making good on his promise to make us more like Jesus. If you could use a reminder of how truly amazing and transformative the grace we experience really is. We have a free booklet, we would love to send you called Radical Freedom: Surprising Faithfulness. It’s a newly reprinted excerpt from Steve’s classic book, A Scandalous Freedom. Get your copy right now by calling us at 1-800-KEY-LIFE. That’s 1-800-539-5433. You can also e-mail [email protected] to ask for that booklet. If you’d like to mail your request, send it to

Key Life Network
P.O. Box 5000
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If you’re in Canada, send your request to

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

Just ask for the booklet called Radical Freedom: Surprising Faithfulness. Oh, and before you go, have you ever considered partnering with Key Life through your giving? It’s easy, just charge a gift on your credit card or include a gift in your envelope. Or just pick up your phone and text Key Life to 28950 and then follow the instructions. Key Life is a member of ECFA in the States and CCCC in Canada. And we are a listener supported production of Key Life Network.

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