The devil may be fawning and wily to break one's commitment to God, or he may be hostile and deadly. He appeals to the innate selfishness of humans to get us to disobey God: “You desire things, you deserve them, and you will get them.” The word that we can gain anything we want in life – wealth, health, the perfect mate, business success, respect from others – is irresistible to those who are obsessed with themselves. The devil can quote Scripture and tell lies about God so that evil masquerades as something good. He can get persons to believe that their personal interests are indistinguishable from God's interests. When we do not get what we want, the devil uses a snake-headed bitterness that rears up from the caverns of the heart to destroy others and ourselves. Satan also tries to lead us to mistrust God and so to put God to the test.

David Garland

CATEGORY	CUISINE	TAG	YIELD
Dairy		Salad	6	Servings

INGREDIENTS

1	ct	(12-oz) whipped topping
1	pk	(6-oz) gelatin; any flavor
1	ct	(16-oz) small curd cottage cheese
1	cn	(16-oz) crushed pineapple

INSTRUCTIONS

In large bowl mix ingredients in order given. Pour into pyrex dish.
Refrigerate 3 hours or until set.
MRS. J. H. QUINN, SR.
From <Simply Southern>, the Desoto School Mothers' Assn, Helena-West
Helena, AR 72390.  Downloaded from Glen's MM Recipe Archive,
http://www.erols.com/hosey.

A Message from our Provider:

“Some people are kind, polite, and sweet-spirited – until you try to sit in their pews.”

The answer is simple: for myself, I do not believe that it is appropriate that I spend my time defending my name. My name is nothing – who really cares about it? And I am not called to waste precious hours and energy in fighting off every person with a laptop who wants to have a pop at me. As a Christian, I am not meant to engage in self-justification any more than self-promotion; I am called rather to defend the name of Christ; and, to be honest, I have yet to see a criticism of me, true or untrue, to which I could justifiably respond on the grounds that it was Christ’s honour, and not simply my ego, which was being damaged. I am called to spend my time in being a husband, a father, a minister in my denomination, a member of my church, a good friend to those around me, and a conscientious employee. These things, these people, these locations and contexts, are to shape my priorities and my allocation of time. Hitting back in anger at those who, justly or unjustly, do not like me and for some reason think the world needs to know what they think of me is no part of my God-given vocation. God will look after my reputation if needs be; He has given me other work to do.

Carl Trueman

Our real problem is not our sins. If our sins were the problem, we might muster the will-power to pull out of this nose dive. But the good news of the gospel begins with some really bad news. Our sins only provoke a bigger problem: the wrath of God. Our real problem is not our sins but God. He is angry, He isn’t going away, and there is nothing we can do about it. If God is against us, who can be for us? But here is the good news. God has made God our salvation. He did it at the cross. God has provided a way of escape from God: in God. We run from His wrath by running toward His grace in Christ. And if God is for us, who can be against us?

Ray Ortlund