Believing the Best
Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
I Corinthians 13:7
In February of 2013, the Christian world lost a spiritual giant. Howard G. Hendricks died at the age of 90 after decades of teaching this generation’s greatest communicators.
“Prof,” as he was called, taught Christian Education at Dallas Theological Seminary. Among his students were Tony Evans, John Trent, Bruce Wilkinson, Chuck Swindoll, David Jeremiah, and countless others.
Also among his students was one who never sat in his classroom but eagerly read his books and listened to his sermon tapes.
That student was me.
As a young Christian and then as a fledgling pastor, Howard Hendricks was my “Prof” as well. As no other, he planted the idea of what I could become.
Howard Hendricks, though, would not have become “Prof” without Miss Noe. Hendricks’ parents had split up right after his birth and he was raised by his grandmother while he prowled the mean streets of Philadelphia.
By his own admission, he was a “trouble-maker” and “hell-raiser.” Teachers dreaded having him in their classroom. In fact, his fifth-grade teacher once tied him to a chair, taping his mouth shut.
She predicted that Howard, who she called “the worst behaved child in the school” would end up in prison, along with four of his classmates. Three of them proved her right.
When the next year began, his sixth-grade teacher, Miss Noe, went down the roll and called his name. She studied him for a moment and said, “Howard Hendricks. I’ve heard a lot about you.”
Howard said he immediately thought, “Here we go again!”
Then Miss Noe smiled and said, “But I don’t believe a word of it.”
The words stunned him. Hendricks later said that Miss Noe made him realize, for the first time, that someone cared for him. Better yet, that someone believed in him.
Hendricks called that moment the fundamental turning point in his life. Suddenly, someone saw him not for what he was but for what he could be.
He not only graduated from sixth grade, but then high school, and then college, and then seminary with an earned doctorate.
Miss Noe changed the trajectory of a young man’s life because she called out what Howard could become. In future years, Prof did that with thousands of his own students.
Love doesn’t label
Early on a child gets labeled. Sometimes it’s due to their behavior. Other times it’s due to their capacity. In either case, the child is pigeon-holed as to what they are rather than affirmed for what they could be. And the end result is a dead-end street.
Perhaps that’s why in the Apostle Paul’s beautiful poem on love, sandwiched between the truths that love bears all things and endures all things, he adds that love also believes all things and hopes all things.
In short, love doesn’t prematurely label. In fact, it doesn’t label at all. Rather it looks for ways to see the beauty and potential that is always present and yet often covered up.
Love doesn’t prematurely label. In fact, it doesn’t label at all. Rather it looks for ways to see the beauty and potential that is always present and yet often covered up.
Here’s a question for you. Who do you know that has been labeled as a loser…a misfit…a…well, you fill in the blank?
Here’s another question. Could it be that that person is in fact a diamond in the rough? And just like Howard Hendricks, all it takes is someone like Miss Noe to dare to believe in them.
Maybe someone like you.
PRAYER
Lord, may the story of Howard Hendricks help me to see that it’s all too easy to label a person and write them off. Help me to buck the trend and believe all things and hope all things. I might not always see a beautiful transformation, but it will still have been a beautiful thing to do.
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