My professional career has been an adventure of rewarding opportunities, terrific mentors, and lifelong friendships. I know few people who have enjoyed their work as much as I have. As I approach my 70th birthday I still am active, part-time, doing what I love with friends I treasure.

One really bad day in 2017 threatened to ruin the pleasant ride.

When a business friend offered me the position of senior vice president of a national company I was thrilled at the opportunity, but had to take a pause in the decision. I was 61 years old and had a secure job that would take me comfortably into retirement. I would have to forfeit significant stock value to join a competitor. But, the financial boost and prestige was overwhelming, so I accepted the offer.

Excitement and success was immediate. But, so was trouble. Before taking the new job, I had participated in an industry group that had challenged business practices of a client of my new company. This client’s executive had taken the actions very personally and vowed revenge on anyone involved. So, I was in the awkward position of leading a business line with a primary client who wanted to discredit me personally.

What happened in the next few months was so irrational that I expected it to stop just from the effort required by my antagonist to keep up the attacks. He regularly communicated charges of business interference and misbehavior, all untrue, directly to my company president. I was repeatedly called to answer these charges directly to the president. After six months the president called me into his office on a Saturday morning and fired me, effective immediately. No transition, no financial consideration, just go.

He simply lacked the desire or courage to defend me against unreasonable accusations any longer. I had done my job energetically and loyally. I was unemployed and befuddled. I had prayed frequently through rounds of accusations. I wanted to know why God would have this opportunity presented to me only to take it away.

On the way to my car, I uttered a prayer through the noise in my head, “God, I don’t know why this happened but I trust you will make something out of it.”

Waves of unsettling thoughts crashed my brain all weekend as I tried to distract myself from frustration. Would I get another job? Would my reputation be ruined? Would I regain the money I risked in taking this job? Did I just make a dumb decision and have to pay for it?

Monday morning, 48 hours after the event, I got a surprise call from a friend in the recruiting business. “Don’t hang up on me”, he said. “A company you used to work for would like for you to come back and lead a business practice in Denver.”

I asked the recruiter how he knew I needed a job. He didn’t, and he had little hope I’d be interested in his offer. Three months later, I was living in Denver, working with old friends, making new friends, and loving what I was doing. Soon my wife and I would find a neighborhood church which ministered to us and gave us an opportunity to grow and serve. Our adult daughter joined us and experienced miraculously healing from a tragic life crisis. And, on the advice of our pastor’s wife, a real estate expert, we bought a piece of property in Colorado that would appreciate 250 percent over the next three years, digging us out of the hole my risky job move had put us in.

I’m not saying this is everyone’s experience. This is what God did for me and my family. But that wasn’t even close to the whole story. I learned some valuable discipleship lessons that I might otherwise have missed.

As you might expect, everyone I knew in my business wanted to know what had happened to me. This included my prospective new employer. I had decided to just tell the factual experience to anyone who asked and let the chips fall there. To a person, everyone I told accepted the unusual sequence of events without question. For almost 40 years I held the conviction that honest communication and honorable actions are what God expected of me. I wasn’t perfect, but was able to realize the benefit of a track record of integrity and honesty that pays off when there is a crisis.

What I learned from getting fired

Credibility matters. It takes years to build but can be lost in an instant. It pays off when you really need people to believe you.

Experiencing unfair treatment is good for you. The experience was humbling, softening my professional ego like no other event in my life thus far. Humility is virtue in itself, but has a defined tangible benefit. I empathize with people in my sphere of influence who were unfairly treated and took the opportunity to advocate for them. In particular a very talented woman in my Denver group deserved a chance to lead and was being denied unfairly. In my heightened awareness I would not let it rest until she got her chance. She took over from there, succeeding in ways her critics never considered.

God is in the restoration business. There is nothing I did to deserve the good things that happened to me after being fired. They were gifts from God. The reminder that He redeems and restores in all areas of my life is a lesson I’ll never forget and never get tired of sharing.

Our true identity is in Christ. I may have enjoyed the recognition of the elevated position a little too much. The stark reminder that my work is not who I am caused me to remember that I’m a follower of Jesus first.

Faith is better than bitterness. After I was fired my mind would frequently return to the frustration of the crisis. Was it unfair?  No doubt. Am I better off personally from the experience?  In every way.

Looking back, getting fired made my life better. It made me better.