The Heartbeat of God: Part 4 by Dr. Rod Mattoon

About this sermon

1 Timothy 2:6-7... Who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time. 7 Whereunto I am ordained a preacher, and an apostle, (I speak the truth in Christ, and lie not;) a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and verity. Jack Kelley, the foreign affairs editor for USA Today, and nominated for a Pulitzer prize, tells this story about sacrifice and love: We were in Mogadishu, the capital of Somalia, in East Africa, during a famine. It was so bad we walked into one village and everybody was dead. There is a stench of death that gets into your hair, gets onto your skin, gets onto your clothes, and you can't wash it off. We saw a little boy. You could tell he had worms and was malnourished. His stomach was protruding. When a child is extremely malnourished, the hair turns a reddish color, and the skin becomes crinkled as though he's one hundred years old. Our photographer had a grapefruit that he gave to the boy. The boy was so weak he didn't have the strength to hold the grapefruit, so we cut it in half and gave it to him. He picked it up, looked at us as if to say thanks, and began to walk back towards his village. We walked behind him in a way that he couldn't see us. When he entered the village, there on the ground was a little boy who I thought was dead. His eyes were completely glazed over. It turned out that he was his younger brother. The older brother kneeled down next to his younger brother, bit off a piece of the grapefruit, and chewed it. Then he opened up his younger brother's mouth, put the grapefruit in, and worked his brother's jaw up and down. We learned that the older brother had been doing this for the younger brother for two weeks. A couple of days later the older brother died of malnutrition and the younger brother lived. I remember driving home that night thinking, I wonder if this is what Jesus meant when he said, "There is no greater love than to lay down our life for somebody else." Beloved, the older brother demonstrated his love for his younger brother through his actions and by giving his own life to save him. Jesus did the same thing for you and me. The Lord did not limit Himself to talking about His love for mankind. He proved it. He put His desire, His heartbeat into action by giving Himself a ransom FOR ALL. In this message, we explain the meaning of ransom and the truths that are found in Jesus’ statement, “I am the WAY.” This 27-minute message was preached on Sunday night, January 29, 2023, at Lincoln Land Baptist Church.