Open the book, find the answers

Open book test

In 1998 I left my 17 year long food service career and began an apprenticeship to become a journeyman electrician. The apprenticeship was supposed to take 4 years. In order to take the electrical exam you need to prove that you have worked 8000 hours under the supervision of a journeyman electrician. By the year 2002 I had acquired 6000 of my needed 8000 hours. I got hired at a chemical plant that didn’t have a journeyman on site so the hours I worked didn’t count towards my apprenticeship. Finally in 2004 they hired a journeyman and in 2005 I had all the hours and training I needed to take the electrical exam. It was a grueling. It was an open book test. We could have 3 things with us, our code book, the Washington state regulation book and a calculator. It took 3 hours. The trick was not to know everything in the books, but to know where everything you needed to know was in the books.

I passed the test.

Since that day in 2005 I have had to continue to study my craft, and to stay current on the rules and regulations and the practices of my craft. My license needed to be renewed every 3 years and in those 3 years I have been required to obtain 24 hours of continuing education credits.

In a process that started in 2013, I was shuffled around in my job into a role that was no longer performing electrical work. By 2016 I was at a desk, creating process controls logic. I didn’t need my journeyman card anymore but I was determined to maintain it. I love doing electrical work. I seem to have a gift for it. I did maintain my card through renewal up to 2022.

My card expired on my birthday in 2022. I forgot to renew it. There is 90 days grace period. I realized I had forgotten to renew 180 days after it expired.

My only recourse now is to retake the test.

I don’t want to study for the test. I don’t want to sit through the 3 hour brain draining ordeal but if I want to continue in the electrical trade I need to have my license.

This morning at 3:20 am I was wrestling with my self loathing over forgetting to renew. I felt like God said to me. “Peter, all people on earth will soon take a test, you and and everyone else. It too is an open book test.”

We all are going to take an open book test. The book is the Bible.

As far as I know there are only 2 questions on that test.

The test has been presented to us by Jesus.

On that test question 1 is: who do you say that I am?

Question 2 is: I have told you to love your neighbor as yourself, tell me now, who is your neighbor?

It isn’t a career that is on the life here, it is eternity, and where we will spend it, with a loving heavenly father ? Or without Him? The answer to question one puts us in one of 2 groups. With God? Or without Him?

Question 2 is really an application of our answer to question 1. If we answer question 1 correctly, question 2 answers itself.

Who is Jesus to you?

Open the book to John chapter 14. The answer is in verses 1-6

Who is your neighbor?

Open the book to Luke chapter 10. The answer is in verses 25-37.

The test begins now.

Soon the timer will go off and all pencils will go down and only those who answered correctly will move on to our home with our Father.

Open the book. Find the answers.

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