If only for a moment, take your eyes off yourself and your circumstances, off the ways of this world and all rival claimants, and look at who God is. Ponder His mighty deeds. This isn’t to say your soul or circumstances aren’t important. It simply means that you are in the hands of an omnipotent God whose ability to act on your behalf is equaled only by His passionate affection for you as His child, whose strength is without end and whose sovereignty covers the expanse of the heavens. God’s desire isn’t to minimize your life and struggles and disappointments. His intent is for you to gain hope, knowing that nothing can wrench you from the loving arms of a God like this!

Sam Storms

CATEGORY	CUISINE	TAG	YIELD
Vegetables, Grains, Meats		Bar-b-q, Vegetables	4	Servings

INGREDIENTS

2	cn	Pork & Beans (16 oz cans)
1/3	c	Bottled Bar-B-Que Sauce
1/4	c	Brown Sugar
1/4	c	Golden Rasins
1/3	c	Tart (Granny Smith) Apples
1/2	c	Chopped Onion
8		Bacon Strips

INSTRUCTIONS

Drain pork and beans and place into oven-proof bowl. Chop onion and apples
and add to beans.  Also add Bar-B-Que sauce, brown sugar and rasins. Mix
together and lay bacon strips on top. Place in covered grill and bake at
350 degrees for 1 to 1 1/2 hours.
From Gemini's MASSIVE MealMaster collection at www.synapse.com/~gemini

A Message from our Provider:

“God: so personal that in comparison we are cold unfeeling machines”

The invisibility of God is a great problem. It was already a problem to God’s people in Old Testament days. Their pagan neighbors would taunt them, saying, “Where Is now your God?” Their gods were visible and tangible, but Israel’s God was neither. Today in our scientific culture young people are taught not to believe in anything which is not open to empirical investigation. How then has God solved the problem of His own invisibility? The first answer is of course “in Christ.” Jesus Christ is the visible image of the invisible God. John 1:18: “No one has ever seen God, but God the only Son has made him known.” “That’s wonderful,” people say, “but it was 2,000 years ago. Is there no way by which the invisible God makes Himself visible today?” There is. We return to 1 John 4:12: “No one has ever seen God.” It is precisely the same introductory statement. But instead of continuing with reference to the Son of God, it continues: “If we love one another, God dwells in us.” In other words, the invisible God, who once made Himself visible in Christ, now makes Himself visible in Christians, if we love one another. It is a breathtaking claim. The local church cannot evangelize, proclaiming the gospel of love, if it is not itself a community of love.

John Stott