When God says, ‘Do it,’ just, for God’s sake, do it.

Steve Brown:
When God says, ‘Do it,’ just, for God’s sake, do it. Let’s talk, on Key Life.

Matthew Porter:
That was Steve Brown. He doesn’t want to be your guru and he’s not trying to be your mother. He just opens the Bible and gives you the simple truth that will make you free. Steve’s a lifelong broadcaster, author, seminary professor and our teacher on Key Life.

Steve Brown:
Thank you Matthew. If you have your Bible open it to the book of Acts, the last part of the seventh chapter into the first three verses of the eighth chapter. And there is no good news there, period. I mean, there really isn’t, it’s a dark time. The leader of the church has been killed. They buried him and Luke goes on to say there was great lamentation when they buried Stephen. So, they were not, you know, dancing and saying, isn’t it wonderful, he’s with Jesus. They weren’t trying to cover the darkness of that situation with cliches. I mean, it really was a dark. And then on top of that, there was persecution and the Christians were spewed out of Jerusalem. They couldn’t stay there anymore. And then as if that’s not enough, you’ve got this young guy, who’s got power, religious and political power, and he’s going into the homes of Christians, rousting them out of their homes and putting them in prison. That’s dark and it’s dark right now, isn’t it? Where we live. And if you don’t listen to what I’m teaching you because Luke taught me in the book of Acts, then you’ll get discouraged. Martin Luther famously said, we have to preach the gospel to each other less we become discouraged. And agree with that, but we need to read the book of Acts to each other, so we don’t get discouraged too. And I agree with that too. And that’s what we’re doing. We’re looking at a life, a darkness, a place where God seems to have gone away on vacation to Bermuda or somewhere, and it’s just not working. And yet God is doing something that is amazing. And so, we’re talking about the repercussions of a committed life. And we saw yesterday a principle, God has a plan and you fit into that plan. Scripture is clear about that. There are no exceptions to that, I don’t care who you are. I don’t care what you do, be faithful, where God has planted you and grow there and do what he tells you to do. And you’ll be amazed at sometime, maybe not even in this life, but at some place you’ll be able to look and see good heavens. Look what I did. And then there’s another principle that’s related to the first one, is this, you don’t have to understand God’s plan, you just have to do it. Let me tell you something you already knew. The plan of God is incredibly intricate and complicated. We are very foolish when we attempt to understand that universal and ultimate plan because that’s impossible for somebody who’s finite. That’s why Calvin called the Bible God’s baby talk. That’s the only way he could talk to us was with baby talk.

For my thoughts are not your thoughts. Neither are my ways your 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.

I’ll tell you something. I’ve been doing this for a long time, and frankly, I probably know more than you do because I’m old and I’ve been doing it so long, about Scripture, about God, about religion, about stuff that normal people don’t spend a lot of time on. I’ve spent my life studying. And do you know what I’ve learned? If you stood before God, the real God, not the one they tell you about, but if you stood before God and you haven’t been confused, you haven’t felt, I don’t have the foggiest idea of what this is about. If you haven’t been confused in standing before God, you’re probably worshiping an idle because God is big and we are little. He’s really big. And we are really little. I’ve worked in broadcasting most of my life. I did it for the world for a while. Made more money, then I did it for Jesus and the retirement plan is incredible. I remember the first radio station I worked for in the mountains of North Carolina. It was, the call letters were WPNF, Wonderful Pisgah National Forest. You know, that was not a bad gig. We had music for the dinner hour and I always worked the evening shift. And you’d put on an album of Mantovani and sweet violin music. And then you’d, and there were six cuts on that side. And then you’d go out and sit on the front porch of the radio station, smoke your pipe. And when you heard it running out, like click, click, click, you went back into the studio. And in my deep voice, I would say you are listening to WPNF, music for the dinner hour. And then I’d flip that album over and play the second half of it. Now, one of the best jobs I ever had, but let me tell you about the engineer at that little station. His name was Leon, and I don’t even remember his last name, but he was incredibly gifted. You had to be when you were working a small radio station and you were the only engineer who understood the transmitters and how to fix them. And sometimes we would go off the air and we’d call Leon and he would come to help. He would hand me a wire and say, hold this. Do you think I knew what that wire was for? I had no earthly idea. And then I remember one time he handed me a wooden chair and I said, what am I supposed to do with this? And he said, if I look like I’m being electrocuted, hit me with his chair, so you knock me away from the transmitter. And I can remember standing there with a wire, I had no idea why I had the wire and the chair, so I could hit him if he got electrocuted. I was obedient to what he told me to do. And I had no earthly idea of what he was doing. And then I found out because Barnhouse said, all of life illustrates Bible doctrine, that God did exactly the same thing to me. He handed me a wire and a wooden chair. And I said, what in the world is this for? You don’t need to know, but you do what I tell you to do, and we’ll make music together. You see, we’re an incredibly complicated people. We worship a far more complicated God, and it’s a chess game that we don’t even understand where one of the players, the chess game is multilayered and we have to allow God to do his thing. One time, somebody asked a missionary in Africa. And he had been there for 24 years. Had seen one convert in 24 years. Now I don’t know about you, but you know, I would decide this is not my calling. I’m going to go do something else, like vinyl repair or something like that. But somebody asked him, one convert in 24 years? Why in the world that you stay? And the missionary said, because Jesus won’t let me leave. Moody one time, when he was in Chicago and going to a church, the pastor of the church he was attending was very depressed because the small congregations that came to hear him preach. And Moody said to this pastor, by the way, I preached your sermon five times today. And I led 12 people to Christ. Every action done in obedience to God in the place where you have been planted will bring God’s plan to the place where he wants it. I don’t care whether you’re washing dishes, changing diapers, paying bills, doing business, teaching or preaching, just do it. When God says, do it, just do it. And I got a promise. God will use it, even if you don’t understand it, Colossians 3:23.

Whatever your task

And there is no exception.

work heartily, as serving the Lord.

You know why Paul says you should work heartily as serving the Lord because that’s exactly what you’re doing. You’re serving the Lord when you’re faithful to the place where he put you. Are you a good citizen? That’s him. Are you kind to your neighbors? That’s him. Do you reach out sometimes to the poor and feed the hungry? That’s him. Are you washing dinners after the church dinner? That’s him. Are you being the best father you can be or the best mom you could be? That’s him. And it’s a part of his incredibly complicated, multilayered plan that you don’t have to understand. If he tells you to do it, just do it. You think about that. Amen.

Matthew Porter:
Thank you Steve. Wow. Lots of plot twists here in Acts 8. We’ll continue diving into this chapter tomorrow and throughout the rest of the week. Hope you’ll come along with us. Well, here it is August 16th and you still don’t have the latest issue of Key Life Magazine. So, we want to give you another shot at grabbing your own copy. This edition features articles by Robin DeMurga, Chris Wachter and of course, Steve. And it’s still available for a limited time. What’s that? Oh, well, Jeremy just told me it’s actually November 16th today. Yikes. All the more reason to call us right now at 1-800-KEY-LIFE. That’s 1-800-539-5433. You can also e-mail [email protected] and ask for the magazine. If you’d like to mail your request, send it to

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