According to the opening chapters of 2 Corinthians we see the progression from trials to the resultant joy. Consider how Paul’s life was filled with hardship: “Affliction” (1:4), “abundant…suffering” (1:5), “burdened excessively, beyond...strength” (1:8), “sentence of death within ourselves” (1:9), “sorrowful” (2:1), “affliction and anguish of heart” (2:4), “afflicted [and] perplexed” (4:8), “persecuted [and] struck down (4:9), “constantly being delivered over to death” (4:11), “beatings...imprisonments...tumults...labors...sleeplessness...hunger” (6:5), “dishonor [and] evil report” (6:8), “dying [and] punished (6:9) and “having nothing (6:10). And that only takes us through chapter 6! And might I add that most if not all of this was related to his faithful service to Christ. So how can you go from this agony to praise to God? Answer: It was Paul knowing that Christians need to “walk by faith [and] not by sight” (5:7). And it’s this faith that recalls that every promise of God is fulfilled to us in Christ (1:20). We know we are “established…and anointed…in Christ” (1:21). We are “sealed” and given “the [Holy] Spirit in our hearts as a pledge” (1:22). We are “reconciled to God” (5:20). As a result of these truths, we “do not lose heart” (4:1) because we are [controlled by] the love of Christ” (5:14)and through our trials we are learning in those trials to “trust [more]...in God who raises the dead” (1:9). So therefore while we are “sorrowful” as a result of trials, we are because of God's promises 'always rejoicing' (6:10).

Randy Smith

CATEGORY	CUISINE	TAG	YIELD
Meats	Mexican	Mexican, Beef	1	Servings

INGREDIENTS

6		Steaks (round; sirloin or chuck)
1		Glass of beer
1/2		Onion; sliced
1	tb	Tomato paste
1	tb	Flour
		Oil
		Salt and pepper

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Put salt and pepper on the steaks and fry until golden.
2. Mix the beer with the slices of onion, the tomato, the flour and a
little water.
3. Add the mix to the pan with the meat. Cover the frying pan and cook for
a half hour. Serve hot.
Posted to recipelu-digest Volume 01 Number 218 by James and Susan Kirkland
<kirkland@gj.net> on Nov 07, 1997

A Message from our Provider:

“A man who is eating or lying with his wife or preparing to go to sleep in humility, thankfulness and temperance, is, by Christian standards, in an infinitely higher state than one who is listening to Bach or reading Plato in a state of pride. #C.S. Lewis”