Testing to learn

I was talking with a friend one time about the many months he spent living with the NASA X-38 vehicle in a hangar at Edwards Air Force Base. He made the almost-offhand comment, “Well, we were out there testing to learn, not learning so we could test.”

X-38’s mission was to provide a means of rapid crew return from the International Space Station (ISS). Like any new development, it needed lots of preliminary and detailed design, followed by fabrication of several prototypes. Then it was out to Edwards for lots of ground tests, taxi tests, captive carry tests, parafoil design and test. And re-design, and re-test. New technologies, lots of learning by doing, lots of learning through failure

Unfortunately, the general mindset in military and NASA work, particularly among contracting types, is that a Test is pass/fail. (“Parafoil tore up again during a drop test? Hmm, looks like a fail from here.”) It was a constant business to teach people, “No, this is how we’re learning.”

In school and too-often in church, we seem to learn a bunch of stuff so we can pass a test of some sort. Innumerable sermons exhort believers with the idea that there's a God-reckoning coming, using verses like 1 Peter 1:7 and James 1:3. The idea of a “test” being only a demonstration of existing ability or capability seems to get lost. The idea of testing as part of learning, even more lost.

But the words the Bible uses about testing and proving* mostly aren’t pass/fail. They mean things like approved, tried out, examined, experienced, proven, trustworthy. (Notably, the context of both verses above is much more demonstration than pass/fail.)

God has standards, all right, and he’s always calling us toward His perfection. (After all, he made us in His image, and he's still re-making us in His image.) But life isn’t pass/fail; it’s process and progress.

Those “tests” you see in the Bible? Mostly testing to learn. Testing to demonstrate to you and me where and how we’re doing in your walk with him. Next time you feel tested, remember, it's just another step toward God. And...relax a little. He isn't going to drop you if you "fail." :)



* Greek Dokimos, dokimazo, dokimazo, dokimion are common ones.
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