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| “Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.-” |
| —James 1:2-3 |
During the course of my fifty years in fire protection, I have read many testing reports from the two major nationally recognize testing laboratories: Underwriters Laboratories Inc. and Factory Mutual Approvals. I had the honor of serving on both the UL Fire Council and the UL Burglary Protection Council during the latter years of my active fire protection career.
In reading these test reports, I am always amazed at certain subtle aspects that constrain the use of a product. In testing, we are always looking for how a product or service responds to the test. But sometimes, other factors intervene.
For example, heat detectors used in fire alarm systems have a maximum spacing in the United States of 50 feet on center. In contrast, in Canada the maximum spacing for the very same detector might be 70 feet on center. Why?
In the United States, the actual fire test room where these detectors are subjected to a test fire can only physically accommodate a maximum spacing of 50 feet on center. While in Canada, the fire test room at UL of Canada can physically accommodate a maximum spacing of 70 feet on center. So, the listing by UL in the United States for those heat detectors is constrained to 50 feet on center.
In our lives, we are subjected to testing all the time. We may not consciously realize it, but the circumstances of our lives continually subject us to testing and trials. The measure of our success is how we respond.
For example, I am tested daily with small, rather insignificant events that provoke me to respond in either a calm, godly fashion, or to respond with anger and frustration. My natural human nature is wired to respond with anger and frustration. It takes an abundant outpouring of God’s grace and a conscious submission of my will to God in order to respond to the smallest annoyances in a calm, godly manner. As you might well imagine, I fail far more times than I pass this daily testing.
Even in my almost constant state of shame over my inability to do what I know I must do to respond in the right way, I still rarely catch my response quickly enough to turn it toward the way God would want me to respond. Thus, I become very weary with the testing—even though my constant failure shows me how very much I need to be continually put to the test.
The Apostle James offered these words of instruction in James 1:2-3:
Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.
Since we are all still “works in progress” we should greet this new day fully aware that many times during the unfolding of this day we will be tested. We should also consider it a joy to receive that testing as yet another opportunity to learn how to live godly lives.
So, let’s strike out into today determined to allow the Holy Spirit to guide our responses to the testing that we might learn how to bend our wills to His perfect will. That’s our assignment for this day. I wonder, are we ready to accept it with joy? I surely hope so.
