April 20, 2025
What happened on the most important day of your life? This Easter Sunday message from Big Valley Grace Community Church in Modesto, California, walks through Luke 24 — the resurrection chapter — and asks one question: what happened on the most important day of your life, and does it include the events of the very first Easter morning?
Beginning with the women at the tomb — carrying spices that “weighed extra heavy” because they were prepared in grief — the message follows the resurrection story through three encounters. The women find the stone rolled away, hear the angels’ question “Why do you seek the living among the dead?”, and run back with hearts fueled by hope (“when you’re full of hope, I can’t get you to shut up”). Two men on the road to Emmaus are joined by the resurrected Jesus himself — a picture of how we don’t find God; God finds us — until their eyes are opened in the breaking of bread and their hearts burn within them. And the eleven disciples in the room touch his real hands and feet, watch him eat broiled fish, and hear him open their minds to understand the Scriptures.
Three times in the chapter, the same gospel message is repeated — to the women, to the two on the road, and to the eleven — with four parts: the life of Jesus, the death of Jesus, the resurrection of Jesus, and salvation — believing in Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins. The message closes with a bold invitation: today could be the most important day of your entire life. Watch, celebrate, and say it with us: He is risen — He is risen indeed!
#Easter #Resurrection #HeIsRisen #Luke24 #BigValleyGrace
April 13, 2025
What two words would you use to describe your life? And what does Jesus see when he looks at you? In this Holy Week message from Big Valley Grace Community Church in Modesto, California, the speaker walks through Matthew 9:35–38 — “Jesus went throughout all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and affliction” — to answer one question: what did Jesus see in the people he came to save?
ministered across some 200 cities and villages in Galilee, reaching a region of about three million people — teaching in synagogues, proclaiming that the kingdom of God is at hand, and healing every disease and affliction, with miracles that proved his teaching accurate and his message true. And what did he see when he looked at the crowds? Three things. He saw individuals who needed God’s GRACE — a gift they did not deserve — because he is “full of grace and truth” (John 1:14–17). He saw individuals who needed God’s MERCY — not receiving the condemnation they did deserve — because they were “harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd,” a condition they had brought on themselves. And he saw individuals who needed God’s SHEPHERDING — and he himself is the Good Shepherd who lays down his life for the sheep (John 10).
The message closes with Jesus’s instruction in Matthew 9:37–38: “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.” Two great words: pray and invite. Watch, and celebrate with us this Easter week that the Good Shepherd laid down his life for the sheep.
#HolyWeek #GoodShepherd #Matthew9 #Easter #BigValleyGrace
April 6, 2025
What was the life of Jesus actually all about? Many people only know the “poster” — Christmas and Easter, his birth and his death. But what about everything in between? In this pre-Easter sermon from Big Valley Grace Community Church in Modesto, California, the speaker walks through John 6 — the feeding of the five thousand and Jesus’s “I am the bread of life” teaching — to answer one big question: what was the life and ministry of Jesus about?
The answer comes in three words. Jesus came to REVEAL — revealing the kingdom of God through his teaching, revealing his identity as the great “I AM” through his signs and miracles, and revealing the Father’s heart in everything he did (“Whoever has seen me has seen the Father”). Jesus came to REVIVE — reviving hearts that had reduced a relationship with God to a religion of dos and don’ts, redirecting people from perishable things to the food that endures to eternal life. And Jesus came to RESTORE — not the land, temple, and kingdom of Israel the way first-century Jews expected, but in a far greater way: an open invitation for anyone to be grafted in, believers who become the temple of the Holy Spirit, and a King of Kings who reigns forever.
And why? So that we might respond — to believe in him, become a new creation, and belong to the family of God. The message closes with Peter’s great confession, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life,” and an original song based on that verse. Watch, subscribe, and bring a friend this Easter.
#Jesus #BreadOfLife #John6 #Easter #BigValleyGrace