In 1884 a young man died and after the funeral his grieving parents decided to establish a memorial to him. With that in mind they met with Dr. Charles Eliot, president of Harvard University. Dr. Eliot received the modestly dressed couple into his office and asked how he could help them.
After they expressed their desire to fund a memorial to honor their son, Dr. Eliot impatiently said, “You know, I don’t have much time today, what would you like to give? Perhaps a partial scholarship?’ The woman replied, “We are thinking of something more substantial than that. Is it possible to maybe build a building for our son?”
In a patronizing tone, Dr. Eliot indicated the idea was probably a bit too expensive and he asked them to consider giving a scholarship in their son’s name and come back to see him next week when he had more time. Dr. Eliot never saw them again.
One year later Dr. Eliot learned that this quiet, unassuming couple who were wanting to honor the memory of their son had gone out to California and established a $26 million dollar memorial named after their son. Then it was called Leland Stanford Junior University. Today it is simply called Stanford.
We all know the saying, “You can’t judge a book by its cover.” Perhaps truer words were never spoken. As you can see from the story above, that can be a huge mistake!
Yet perhaps we do it more than we think we do. My sister used to work for a home builder. People would come in and tour beautiful model homes. She told me that some of the wealthiest people looked the most ordinary. You couldn’t tell by appearances who could afford these extravagant homes.
Jesus says in John 7:24: “Do not judge according to appearance, but judge with righteous judgment.”
Only God knows the heart of a person. Only God knows their motivations.
Assumptions can be dangerous. Jesus is warning us to beware of making assumptions about other people.
(This post was inspired by a post by Bruce Cooper in Reasoned Cases for Christ which you can read here.)
In His Love, Cindy
Do you want to know more about Jesus? See my page Who Is Jesus?
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