Who Will Pay Your Ransom?

Who Will Pay Your Ransom?

Even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve others and to give his life as a ransom for many.

Matthew 20:28

You know that God paid a ransom to save you from the empty life you inherited from your ancestors. And the ransom he paid was not mere gold or silver. It was the precious blood of Christ, the sinless, spotless Lamb of God. God chose him as your ransom long before the world began.

1 Peter 1:18-20

You are worthy to take the scroll and break its seals and open it. For you were slaughtered, and your blood has ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation.

Revelation 5:9

In May 2001, American missionaries Martin and Gracia Burnham were taken hostage by the Abu Sayyaf in the Philippines. At the beginning of their yearlong ordeal, their captors admitted they believed they could get a million-dollar ransom payment because the Burnhams were Americans. But as other hostages arranged for ransoms and were released, the Burnhams remained in captivity.

Sitting around the fire in the jungle one day, Gracia told the other hostages, “I’m glad that when Jesus paid a ransom for us, we didn’t have to wait for it to arrive or wait for him to decide if he was going to do it. Before the foundations of the world, he knew he would ransom us and that it would cost him everything.”

Jesus paid a ransom so we would no longer be held captive by sin and its consequences. This ransom wasn’t paid with mere money but with the precious blood of Christ.

Eventually someone paid a ransom for Martin and Gracia’s release, but their captors decided it wasn’t enough and asked for more.^a You never need to fear that the ransom Jesus paid for you isn’t enough. The blood of Christ is sufficient, and you are forever free.

DISCUSSION STARTERS

What do you think it would feel like to be taken hostage, waiting for someone to pay your ransom?

Who or what can hold us hostage in our daily lives?

Why do we need the blood of Jesus to buy our freedom?