*Title:* Selfish Sacrifices — Pastor Kyle Baldwin, March 14, 2026

“Why do we come to Jesus?” Pastor Kyle Baldwin opens with that question, and it is harder than it sounds. Sorrow over sin, fear of death, a longing to be with loved ones — many motives can bring us to the Savior, but not all of them are the right one. His case study is Judas. Drawing on Ellen White’s account in *The Desire of Ages*, Pastor Baldwin traces the eager scribe of Matthew 8 — “Master, I will follow thee whithersoever thou goest” — to the disciple who carried the ministry’s money bag and quietly helped himself to it, the same man who objected to Mary’s costly perfume not from care for the poor, John tells us, but because he was a thief. Jesus saw the motive from the first day and answered coolly: “The foxes have holes… but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head.” He would not let anyone follow Him for worldly gain.

Then the sermon turns the mirror on us. We assure ourselves we would never use Jesus the way Judas did — yet how much of our own service is shaped by what we want to do rather than what God asks? Jesus’ warning in Matthew 7 cuts deeper still: many will stand before Him listing their ministries — prophesying, casting out devils, wonderful works — and hear, “I never knew you.” Ministry is no substitute for knowing Him. The way through is the paradox of Matthew 16: “Whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.” Early Adventist pioneer A. T. Jones put it bluntly: self-preservation, the first law of nature, means only death; self-sacrifice, the first law of grace, means only life. Ellen White says the same with a farmer’s image — the husbandman preserves his grain by casting it away — and Christ is the proof: He left His throne, laid aside divine power, became one of us forever, and still bears the nail prints. Pastor Baldwin illustrates it with the three Chernobyl workers who walked into a radioactive basement in 1986 to drain a pool beneath the reactor, saving countless lives by setting aside their own safety. Our call is quieter but no less real: to drain the pool of sin around us by sacrificing our wants, our preferences, our insistence on being right — and to serve where He calls, not only where we find it interesting.

The sermon closes with the practical test. Paul’s catalogue in 2 Corinthians 11 — stripes, beatings, stoning, shipwreck, hunger, cold — is not a demand that we face the same dangers, but a challenge to the same exchange: spend less on ourselves and more on others, with money, time, or abilities, whatever we have. And it ends with the hardest discipline of all: stop auditing everyone else’s motives in ministry and examine our own. Judas was certain the church needed his management and that his brethren were inferior — Peter impetuous, John a poor financier, Matthew too particular. Do we recognize our own spiritual poverty, our pride, our desire for recognition? Salvation is first personal. The sermon, Pastor Baldwin says, is for you. Today, offer up your own selfishness on the altar of sacrifice — give it up, let God fill you with love for others, and give yourself so that you may live for Jesus.

*Key texts:* Matthew 8:18–20; John 12:1–8; Matthew 7:22–23; Matthew 16:25; Philippians 2:3–5; Ephesians 5:1–2; 2 Corinthians 11:23–27 · *Also referenced:* Ellen G. White, *The Desire of Ages*, pp. 293–294; A. T. Jones, *Signs of the Times*

*Watch:* https://youtu.be/Mjuxe1jUaog · *Listen:* https://cloud-1de12d.becdn.net/media/original/fa41ba05cf9d34e101bf4557f084b38a.mp3