Grace Road Church

Continuing our walk through Holy Week in Matthew's gospel, this week we look at the two highest commandments: "love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind," and "love your neighbor as yourself."

While these commands are good, they don't give us the power to follow them. Further, they inspire our sinful hearts to will their opposite. It's God's grace, His one-way love toward us, that fuels our Christian life and inspires us to follow God's law out of love for Him in return. This deep awareness and satisfaction in God's grace shapes into people who show radical grace and forgiveness toward each other.

This week, we take a look at an exchange Jesus has with the Sadducees in Matthew 22:23-33. In this passage, the Sadducees pose a figurative supernatural predicament to Jesus regarding the nature of marriage in Heaven. Jesus responds with another "astonishing" answer. Why does it matter that our bodies will also be resurrected? What is the ultimate meaning and purpose of marriage? And how can our understanding of these things topple the idols of our hearts?

Our Matthew series resumes with Pastor Kevin Maloney's return from sabbatical! Kevin picks up where we left off in Matthew 22, focusing on verses 15-22. In this passage, the Pharisees seek to manipulate Jesus through flattery and political incitement. Jesus responds in an unexpected way and the Pharisees are "amazed." How should we approach spiritual and political authority? What does it mean to render what is Caeser's to Caeser and to God what is God's? How might our understanding of God's authority impact the way we engage in political discourse?

This week, Reid Ferguson, former pastor of Evangelical Church of Fairport, shared with us from the book of Haggai. Haggai is structured on the prophet's four oracles given by God to the Israelites who were returned to the Promised Land from Babylon. Reid exposits the text and exhorts us to consider how the postures of our hearts might resemble those the Israelites are convicted of in this book. How do we neglect to consider God's priorities of our lives instead of our own? Are we simply about God's business for the sake of duty or are we motivated by deeper affection for God Himself? How might we better cherish the promises of God day to day?