His Life, Now!: Fifty Days of Grace - A Devotional

By David Hughes

His Life, Now! is a fifty day devotional journey designed to examine the Finished Work of Jesus Christ, and His empowering grace at work in our lives. Take the time to rest in the presence of the Lord, and be enriched by His words of love and redemption.

• Language: English
• Publisher: David Hughes
• Release date: Feb 8, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370879922

David Hughes

David Hughes trained as a letterpress typesetter in the 1970s, gaining a (now obsolete) City and Guilds qualification at Kitson College of Technology in Leeds, UK. He worked on the Evening Press in York and the South London Press as a Linotype operator. After retraining on the computerised "new technology" he hung up his apron in the early 90s, mainly due to boredom! He keeps in touch with the letterpress scene through his printers' nostalgia website "Metal Type" and keeps up with the practical side of things producing letterpress business cards at Metal Type Printing.

Book preview

His Life, Now!

Fifty Days of Grace

( a devotional )

by David Hughes

with contributions from James A. Eldred,

and a special message from C.F. (Scotty) Todd

Copyright

Chapters 19 and 32 of this book are taken from A Depth of Insight: One Man’s Discipleship with Christ, copyright © 2013, by James A. Eldred. Used by permission. All Rights Reserved.

Unless otherwise noted, all scripture quotations are taken from the New American Standard Bible® (NASB),

Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973,

1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation

Used by permission. www.Lockman.org

Scripture quotations marked (NIV) are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The NIV and New International Version are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™

Scripture quotations marked (ESV) are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved."

Scripture quotations marked (MSG or The Message) are taken from THE MESSAGE, copyright © 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002 by Eugene H. Peterson. Used by permission of NavPress. All rights reserved. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.

Scripture quotations marked (CNT) are taken from Cassirer: God’s New Covenant, The New

Testament Translation, William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company. Copyright © Olive Cassirer, 1989.

Scripture quotations marked (Sanday and Headlam) are taken from from A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans. Published 1897, by T&T Clark International.

Scripture quotations marked (BBE or The Bible in Basic English) are taken from the Holy Bible, Bible in Basic English, translated by S.H. Hooke.

Scripture quotations marked (The Heart of Paul - BCJ) are taken from Dr. Ben Campbell Johnson’s book The Heart of Paul: Biblical Truth in Today’s Language. © 1985 Used with permission from A Great Love, Inc., PO Box 1248, Tocoa, GA 30577 USA.

Scripture quotations marked (Matthew and Mark - BCJ) are taken from Dr. Ben Campbell Johnson’s book Matthew and Mark: A Relational Paraphrase. © 1978 Used with permission from A Great Love, Inc., PO Box 1248, Tocoa, GA 30577 USA.

Scripture quotations marked (Luke and John - BCJ) are taken from Dr. Ben Campbell Johnson’s book Luke and John: An Interpretive Paraphrase. Used with permission from A Great Love, Inc., PO Box 1248, Tocoa, GA 30577 USA.

Dedication

To Scotty Todd, who is now a part of that great cloud of witnesses:

Thank you for showing us how to enjoy the journey of grace through this life in Christ!

INTRODUCTION

Passion … desire … hunger … fervor … intimacy – these are words that are defined more so in the heart than in a dictionary. They are meant to be experienced … they need to be experienced. For those that yearn for the authentic and genuine, whose hearts may have grown tired of the lifeless and sterile production of religion – there is hope! Jesus did not come so that we could become actors who simply play the role of a Christian on the stage of life.

He came, compelled by love, that He might redeem a bride who would live a life of true love with Him in Spirit and in truth. For those whose hearts cry out to experience more, He invites you to step off the stage, out from under the lights of man-made accolades and jeers and encounter the lover of your soul afresh and anew.

So why a grace devotional? Some may see a devotional as an attempt to install a drive-thru window into the heart of God. Simply rush up to the window, grab a quick blessing for the day and then rush off into what we have planned. I am not attempting to simply pass out a happy meal for Jesus (that was a joke there …), but to share a few thoughts and perspectives that will hopefully spark a deeper and greater conversation and experience between you and your Savior. To show us that there is more to this life than just being born and then trying to tip-toe through life and safely arrive at the grave without too many issues along the way. Let’s dare to live in Christ and take a leap of faith into the arms of true love!

2 Corinthians 11:3 says,

I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ.

[NASB]

Devotion is a feeling of strong love or loyalty – that is the dictionary definition. But may the Holy Spirit elaborate upon its true meaning from the heart of Jesus as we witness His devotion towards us. These devotions that follow are certainly not meant to be a substitute for true relationship with our Lord, but a spark, a jumping off point for the Holy Spirit to take you deeper into the experience of His Life, Now!

Love in Jesus,

David

1

THE SIMPLICITY OF THE GOSPEL

Part One

I can remember getting a Rubik’s Cube years ago when they first came out. It looked great in the package, all the little colored squares happily grouped together to form six different solid colors, one on each side of the cube. It looked simple enough ... that is, until I got my hands on it. A few twists and turns and I had ruined its simple color harmony. The more I tried to fix it, the worse it got.

For too many people this seems to describe life. Every twist, every turn, every choice and decision to try and fix one thing, just messes up something else ... it all seems so complicated! Even as christians we can find ourselves at a place we overly complicate things. We can find ourselves trying to live by our own efforts and religious self-help techniques, rather than in tune with the Holy Spirit and the true, life-changing gospel – I know I have. This puts our spiritual health in our own hands. We have made our relationship with Jesus more about rules, regulations and our own performance, than about His grace, His love and the reality of the cross. We try to twist, turn and shuffle things to make everything better … and life just seems to complicate even more.

In 2 Corinthians 11:3 it says:

I am terribly afraid that you will be deceived by the deceiver just as Eve was in the Garden. Through this cunning deception, the utter simplicity of your relation to Christ would lose its grip on your mind.

[ The Heart of Paul - BCJ ]

The simplicity [single focus] of the gospel is found in a person – Jesus! May our hearts be truly captured and captivated by Him alone. The church has at times made the solution more about finding better programs, or building bigger buildings or having more things to entertain the saints – these things may draw a few crowds, but they don’t change lives. These things can find a proper place in Christ if He so directs, but apart from Him they only bring clutter. We as children of God must allow the Holy Spirit to set our hearts on the simplicity of the gospel – Jesus!

Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 2:2:

I didn’t try to impress you with polished speeches and the latest philosophy. I deliberately kept it plain and simple: first Jesus and who he is: then Jesus and what he did – Jesus crucified.

[ The Message ]

A loving savior offering a glorious life-changing redemption – pure and simple! I came across this quote I believe is very fitting – The truly amazing thing about early Christian preaching is that it did not proclaim religious duties or moral standards, or even a reforming program, but a person: on Jesus who was crucified and who the christians knew to be alive. (Michael Green in The Lion Handbook to the Bible) … well said!

It’s all about a person, a savior – our savior. And His name is Jesus! Oh, that we would let our life be defined by Jesus alone, and what He accomplished through His sacrifice on the cross and His triumphant resurrection. That we would see the ever-unfolding reality of what that means. The Lord wants us to experience a life that is defined by His love for us and the passion which that ignites in our hearts. We can’t fix ourselves and the Lord has not called us to try and do that because He knows we will truly rest when we entrust all into His hands.

2

THE SIMPLICITY OF THE GOSPEL

Part Two: DEALING WITH MIXTURE

There are some things that just seem to be made to go together, like macaroni and cheese, bread and butter, and of course ... peanut butter and jelly. Yet, there are other things that if mixed together can be not only distasteful, but harmful and toxic. This is so true regarding the message of the gospel.

The last devotion dealt with the simplicity [single focus] of the gospel – which is the person of Christ and the redemptive work of the cross. Today we want to look at the issue of mixture regarding the gospel. We must be careful, because there are other things that often times get mixed in with Jesus and are still called the truth – yet they are in fact toxic to our faith.

There is a story in 2 Kings 4:38-41 in which the prophet Elisha prepared a pot of stew for the sons of the prophets. One of the sons of the prophets went into the field and found a wild vine and gathered from it wild gourds and sliced them into the pot of stew ... for they (the sons of the prophets) did not know what they were. As they began to eat they cried out to Elisha, There is death in the pot. Elisha instructed them to bring meal and throw it into the pot and then there was no harm in the pot.

This story pictures a recipe of mixture that we need to be careful not to serve to people today. The sons