Christian codfish
I delayed writing this for several days because I was trying to verify whether the story was true. Honestly, I still don’t know. But enough people have told the story that I chose to believe it!
Northern Atlantic cod are particularly flavorful fish–at least when they are fresh. As someone who moved to Colorado from Florida, I can personally vouch for the fact that all of the great fresh saltwater fish I used to enjoy loses a good amount of its great flavor from being frozen. Cod aficionados tried to solve this by having their fish shipped alive in saltwater. Great idea, right? The fish arrived still alive! But surprisingly, the fish had still lost some of its flavor, and the texture of the meat had changed into something more mushy.
This confused people for a while until somebody realized that our own meat loses its tone if we’re not active. In the wild, catfish are the enemies of codfish. So they got the bright idea of shipping the cod with catfish in the same tank! It worked. The cod arrived as tasty and flaky as it left the coast.
It is to our advantage that we have catfish in our lives. The things that seem to annoy us may in fact be the things that keep us alert and toned, mentally and spiritually. Jesus never said that his followers would be without problems–he knew that they could work to our advantage. That’s why James could give us the really irritating advice to “Count it all joy” when we’re encountering all kinds of problems and trials.
But remember… it’s not by accident that this blog entry follows quickly on the heels of one on stress management!
