Remember the agony of cramming for tests? The amount of information needed to stuff into your brain felt both massive and somehow slippery. One day while in college I sat down in the student center lobby, and in my microscopic handwriting wrote every fact I thought I needed to know for my upcoming Biology test. The creation of a study guide wasn’t revolutionary. Many times I’d created similar documents and stared at them in hopes my brain would absorb the litany of facts. But I had the focus and discipline of a puppy, and my retention of knowledge was average.

This time instead of staring at the page, I began copying the entire study guide onto another page. It was more engaging than blankly staring at the page, and the connection between my mind and hand seemed to help the memorization. Something about scribbling the aspects of the Krebs Cycle allowed my pencil to write on the page and my memory alike. The weighty yet elusive mountain of information to memorize became clear and manageable, as if tacked to a corkboard in my mind.

The strategy, although time intensive, largely worked. Upon receiving the test I’d comb through the questions, usually unsurprised and fairly able to answer them. College was the most visible and literal testing of my life. Each week provided a new challenge. One where success was easily determined by the number written on top of the test in red ink.

I only received one ‘B’ my entire life.

Earlier in life those words dripped with pride, but now I’m sheepish. The meaning of that short sentence is still uncertain, as if the motive behind it is some clever trout I know exists, but can’t coax to the surface. Maybe the easier and equally important conclusion is this: I learned how to take tests. And one step further: I was good at it.

Fifteen years later, my tests are no longer printed, they no longer measure success neatly with a percentage. I could easily make a study guide about ruminant nutrition, and eventually regurgitate the necessary facts. But now, one of the courses is fathering, and the test is how to hold my emotion in the face of my children’s anger. At least carbohydrate digestion cycles were straightforward.

Questions about competency and respect run unhindered, without any study guide to prepare with.

“What scars are you giving him?” I wonder as my son’s face can’t hide the hurt of my words. 
“Is this any good?” mumbles the blinking cursor over a blank page.  
“Can you cut it?”I swear I hear in the silence between words with colleagues.

I find it curious that as a 35 year old, I still use the language of testing to describe my life. Testing feels right and true for who I was 15 years ago. Not just because I was taking literal tests in college, but because that was the time I was trying to make my mark as a young man, recent graduate, and new husband. I was squarely in the Zealous Warrior stage at that point in my life (Chris Bruno wisely describes this in his book Sage: A Man’s Guide to His Second Passage.) But now, I wonder if  the metaphor of testing is helpful?

It feels important to highlight the need of embracing singular challenges. Summiting the peak or having the honest-painful-imperative conversation with a friend can summon and affirm something beautiful we were unaware of. But to view all of life as a test? It seems that’s a recipe for performance and a sub-surface simmering fear of failure.

I’m not sure what the new paradigm should be. Four paragraphs ago I was fully committed to the idea of testing. But isn’t it interesting how often Jesus weaves agriculture into his parables and teaching. Maybe, probably, he knows the confounding paradox that every farmer and rancher does - that they must work and wait. Raising crops or livestock requires more effort than one thought possible, and, one will have to wait and depend on weather and ground and that which is wholly unaffected by one’s work ethic. Maybe, probably, Jesus wants to invite us to a life where we are to work and wait alongside him. 

Where do you find yourself? Cramming for the never-ending final exam of life? Or pursuing the mystery of participation instead of performance?

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Jesse French, Executive Director