It’s quite surprising what pleases God.

Steve Brown:
It’s quite surprising what pleases God. Let’s talk about it, on Key Life.

Matthew Porter:
Welcome to Key Life. I’m Matthew, executive producer for the program, and our host is author and seminary professor, Steve Brown. The church has suffered under do more, try harder religion for too long. And Key Life is here to proclaim that Jesus sets the captives free.

Steve Brown:
Thank you Matthew. Hi Jerry.

Jerry Parries: Hey.

Steve Brown:
Man, this has have been so good this week. And I know how busy you are and to take your time to come in and teach us really means more to me than you know. Before we get into what places God, we need to say just from a theological and Biblical standpoint, he’s already pleased.

Jerry Parries: Absolutely.

Steve Brown:
I mean, you know, we work so hard to please God and we forget that he starts by being pleased and he made up his mind about us a long time ago and he’s not going to change. And so, you don’t have to please somebody, who is already pleased.

Jerry Parries: Right.

Steve Brown:
That’s what the blood of Christ has done.

Jerry Parries: Exactly.

Steve Brown:
So, we start with that, just to make that point. But there’s some things, when Eric Liddell was running in that Chariots of Fire movie, he said when he ran, he sensed the pleasure of God or something like that. So, that’s kind of what we’re going to talk about. What what do you causes God’s pleasure.

Jerry Parries: Man, that’s a good question. I have my congregation repeat this to me every Sunday. I have them confess that God is a hundred percent pleased with me because of Jesus Christ. And that is the absolute truth, but there are some things that you can do to make God smile.

Steve Brown:
Okay.

Jerry Parries: There are some things that you can do as you love your children, and you’re completely proud of them, but they can do some things to say, Oh man, that’s my son, that’s my child, that’s my boy, you know. And, as we’ve been talking about this week, the gift of forgiveness and forgiving yourself, God is really pleased when he sees you act like him. It makes him say, that’s my boy, that’s my, that’s my DNA, you know. Yeah. That’s my kid, he looks like me, he acts like me, he talks like me. I like that guy, that’s my kid, you know. And so, that’s what I’m talking about today is God will really be pleased with you, in the sense of, you make him proud, when you forgive others, and when you do as he has taught his disciples to do. I remember Peter came to Jesus, this is in Matthew the 18th chapter. And Peter said to Jesus, Lord, how often shall I forgive my brother who sins against me and forgive him, up to seven times? And then Jesus said to him, No, you don’t do that just seven times, you do it seven times seventy in a day. And Peter said, Oh my goodness, you know, seven times seventy, that’s 490 times in one day, that God is expecting me to forgive my brother. Now, here’s the good news about that, Steve, Dr. Steve. Here’s the good news about that, when you look at it from your perspective, it is very difficult and pertinere impossible for you to do that. You just don’t have the human capacity to forgive somebody 490 times a day. But if God asks you to forgive somebody 490 times a day, then think that he would at least do double for you. That means that you have over 490 times in a day that God will say, I’ll forgive you. I’ll let it go. I love you. The grace of God is unexhaustible. It’s just, there’s nothing that you don’t, or can’t just trust God in, that is just amazing. So forgiveness, God is pleased when we act like him, when we talk like him, when we give people chances over and over again because it’s not our human nature, it’s the Holy Spirit that’s working in us that causes us to do that. And that’s what’s wonderful about forgiveness, it allows you to have a piece of the Father’s DNA working through you, because it’s not a human natural affection to do, it is the part of the Holy Spirit.

Steve Brown:
You know, my late friend, Rusty Anderson was with his granddaughter one time and she did something that was not good. And he said, Honey, don’t do that. And she said, I’m sorry granddaddy. And, he went on reading the paper and she did it again. And he said to her, Honey, I told you not to do that. She said, I’m so sorry granddaddy. And he went back to reading and she did it the third time and he said, I thought I told you not to do that. And she said, I’m sorry granddaddy. And Rusty said, I said sorry is not enough. And then Rusty said, I heard Jesus say to me, funny, it was enough for me.

Jerry Parries: That’s so good. That’s so good. And when you realize that it really sets you free, from the bondage that you have, is that, you know, man, God has forgiven me, so I am going to forgive my brothers and take you out of being in the bondage that you are in. There’s a story that Jesus continues to tell Steve in this, is about the servant that he have forgiven. The servant came to his master that owed his master, let me say a thousand dollars, or million dollars, should I say. And the servant, fell on his knees and he begged his master, master please. This is in the same verse here in Matthews, the 18th chapter. He says, Father, he fell on his knees. Master, please forgive me. Please forgive me. But the Bible said the master had pity on him and forgave him his debt, but he walked out and found somebody that only owed him a hundred dollars, grabbed him by the throat and said, pay me what you owe me. Now, that story is really about us and how we treat God. We go to the Lord with a million dollars worth of sins and God forgive us of every single debt and set us free, but we walk out and we see our friends and our family who only did one thing to us. And we grab them by the throat and say, pay me what you owe me. And the Bible says, when the servant heard, the people saw what the servant did, they went back and told the master. Master, this guy did not forgive for the one thing, after you forgiven him for millions of things. Servant said, they called him back and this is what God said to him. Or the Scripture says that the servant said, you wicked servant. because God says that if you don’t forgive, it’s a spirit of, he’s not calling you wicked cause grace covers us, but it’s a spirit of wickedness not to forgive after all that God has forgiven you for. So, I want to ask somebody, can you take your hand off of somebody’s throat today? Can you let them go? Can you release them? Can you say to them what God has said to you. I’m going to let it go because God has forgiven me of so much. And if you can do that, it will set you free. You will be able to walk with your head up. You’ll be able to sleep at night. You’ll be able to rest during the day because you have no ill willing or no ill feelings for anyone. God can set you free. And as he has set you free, it allows you to set others free.

Steve Brown:
And when God asks us to do this, and he does plainly, not just in the Scripture you read, but in a lot of places, he never asks us to do something that he doesn’t give us the grace and the power and his Spirit to enable us to do what’s almost impossible.

Jerry Parries: Absolutely. And the reason he does that, and that’s what we talked about at the beginning of the week, is that the grace of God when you fully understand the grace that God has poured over your life, when you fully understand that if he asks Peter to forgive 490 times a day, then God will forgive you double that amount. When you fully understand how much grace God has poured out over your life, you say, I can let this go, I can forgive, I’m only able to do it because I understand what he’s done for me. And that’s the beauty of grace, is when you get it, it changes your life.

Steve Brown:
And this works. I’ve kidded and it’s not really a joke cause I really do, I have a hit list on my prayer list of people that have done bad things to me and I’ve learned to make a contract with God. I say to him, look, you know how I feel about what was done to me and about this particular person. And I don’t have whatever it takes to forgive even as much as you have forgiven me, but I want you to bless them with joy and happiness and peace and long life and health and every other blessing. But Father, would you make this a contract before you, regardless of my feelings, and then begin to conform my heart to that contract. And you know something, Jerry? Not a single person is at this moment on my hit list.

Jerry Parries: Wow. Wow. That’s good. I’m the same way pastor. I tell you. I say, Father, bless ’em. Bless ’em because they’re your children and I believe it.

Steve Brown:
Oh, and that’s hard to do. You say, Well, listen, you don’t understand what he or she did to me. No, I don’t, but I’ve been there. And God understands every bit of it, and he’s given you his Spirit to do what he’s asked you to do, and then you can laugh and sing before the throne. You think about that. Amen.

Matthew Porter:
Thank you Steve and Jerry. I don’t know about you, but I need to be reminded of the power and, and necessity really of forgiveness. We get one more day of this beautiful conversation between Steve and Jerry tomorrow. Do not miss that. And just as a reminder, if you did miss any of this week’s broadcast with Steve and Jerry, you can stream those for free anytime at keylife.org or on our Key Life app. A lot of exciting stuff happening on our website. If you go to keylife.org/biblereading you can hear Steve reading entire books of the Bible. Yeah, that’s pretty cool, right? It’s an ongoing project, so check it out and be sure to come back often for updates. We also have transcripts for Key Life, so everything you hear Steve or Pete or Matt or Justin or Jerry teaching, you could get that word for word. Also at Keylife.org you’ll find our digital magazines, sermons, video versions of Steve Brown Etc, a sign up for our weekly e-mail, even a link to our Key Life app. And all of it is still free thanks to the generous support of listeners just like you. If you’d like to donate, just call 1-800-KEY-LIFE. That’s 1-800-539-5433 or you can mail your donation to

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