So, Karen and I are in Panama. We're taking some time off and I'm going to try not to blog for a week.

In the mean time, I'd like to start a discussion and get you readers to share your experiences and thoughts around a theme. The question I'd like to pose is, "How do we misunderstand adversity?"

For too long I've experienced adversity in life and misunderstood God's purpose in allowing it. As a younger man, when I was fired from jobs, I saw it as a great injustice. I looked at all the positive things that I'd brought to my roles and felt agrieved for having been let go. Although I tell other people to never be a victim or to think the thoughts of a victim, that was the language I used.

For years I could only understand the pain I'd experienced in terms of how it hurt me. I couldn't see the benefit of the pain - how it helped me grow. I couldn't understand the correlation between resistance, pressure, and friction and the process of moving to another stage in life. Just as muscles need resistance to grow, so does our character. Faith only grows in the presence of doubt.

I look at young people and I'm concerned that we parents have removed too much of the pain from their life. People need to feel opposition to understand the price of achievement. We do a great disservice when we remove the natural consequences of failure from those we want to help.

Adversity is not an enemy, it's a friend. The person who hurt you most is God's tool to teach you forgiveness and perseverance. The person who you never want to talk to again is a flawed human being just like you or me, convinced of the rightness of their intentions, struggling to make a difference.

So, I'm going to be gone for a week, but in the interim, I'd like to invite you to share your response to these questions: How has God used adversity in your life? Did you misunderstand it? What happened and how did your view of adversity change over time?