When it comes to food all of us know that "fresh is best". We like our vegetables fresh, our fruit fresh, our meat fresh. But keeping food fresh can be a challenge. It certainly was for the fisherman who catch codfish off the coast of the northeastern United States. How to keep the cod fresh as they delivered them all over their country? They tried freezing the fish, but they lost too much flavour. They tried shipping them alive in tanks of seawater. But this left the fish soft and mushy. Finally they came up with a solution. The natural enemy of the codfish is the catfish. So they placed some catfish in every tank. As the codfish were transported around the country, the catfish chased them around the tank. And when the fish reached their destination their texture and flavour were superb.
Life presents is with many "catfish". There they are in our world, making life difficult. Yet these catfish have the capacity to help us grow, to maintain our spiritual health, becoming the people God created us to be.
Source: Chuck Swindoll, excerpted in Illustrations Unlimited
Applications: circumstances, problems, adversity, difficulties, growth, difficult people, character