I have been teaching emergency response classes for many years. I have taught CPR classes, community emergency response classes (C.E.R.T.), First Responder Classes, emergency medical technician courses (EMT), paramedic courses, Hazardous Materials course and many other courses involving response to and preparation for emergencies. I love emergency work and love teaching these students.
I started yet another First Responder class last night. (It seems the students keep getting younger and younger. Or could it be that I'm getting older? Stop chasing rabbits and get back to the story.)
As usual I gave my students an over-view of what the course would be like. I told them that they not only would be required to have the "book" knowledge of the topics but also be required to preform the skills. As I always do, I presented them with copies of the skills test on the first night of class. I told them that at the end of the course they would be tested from these exact skill sheet. I stressed to them the importance of knowing, understanding and being able to preform these skills. My words to them were, "Not knowing and being able to accomplish these skills will cause you to fail this course". But I know what they will do. Oh, they won't be the first class to do it and they won't be the last class to do it. They will put off their study of these skills until the final week.
Even though I stress the importance, even though I remind them continually, the final week of class will arrive and the testing day will be upon them and they will not have picked up the skill sheets or studied the material.
You might say, "What idiots"! Yeah, that's the way I feel too. But I look back at the way we Christians live our lives and I see that we are not much different from my misguided students.
We have been given the Word of God, the ultimate instructions for Holy living. It has been shown to us in words and by example how we should live in order to honor God. Yet how many of us put off the things that are most important. Procrastination has become the norm for people of our day. "Don't do today what you can put off until tomorrow" has become our theme.
Recently, one of my students told me three days before the final test, "Oh, that test. I haven't even looked at that material yet". Imagine how that made me feel as an instructor. Imagine how that makes God feel as our Father.
Lord, may we read your words morning and night, may we "study to show ourselves approved unto God", may we be prepared for the final.
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