Malcolm Muggeridge, just before his death, said: ‘Contrary to what might be expected, I look back on experiences that at the time seemed especially desolating and painful with particular satisfaction. Indeed, I can say with complete truthfulness that everything I have learned in my seventy five years in this world, everything that has truly enhanced and enlightened my experience, has been through affliction and not through happiness.’ And Kim Hubbard said: ‘I’ll say this for adversity: people seem to be able to stand it, and that’s more than I can say for prosperity.’
The Bible refers to life’s afflictions as the testing that refines our characters into something nobler, like gold purified by fire. ‘When he has tested me,’ it says, ‘I shall come forth as gold.’ No-one welcomes it at the time. But it’s what makes us.