2020 has been a tough year for teachers. They find themselves working harder than ever trying to make sure students still get a quality education even while having new restrictions in the midst of a global pandemic. This is really the motivation to start a series called Influences by highlighting a teacher.

Influences is a way to share with you, the reader, the people who have served to influence my life. Some of the people that I will highlight will be dead theologians that have impacted the way I think. Others will be people from my life that had a personal impact on my day to day life. The goal is to try to show how people from the well-known pastor to the person you have never met or heard of have an impact on one life.

I had no idea the impact she would make. I was just a third grader who was in her class. Janet Nolan was the third and fourth grade teacher at our Christian school. Over the next two years as her student she would challenge me and help me to grow but what I didn’t know at the time she would continue to teach me even after I left her classroom. I would like to highlight a few of the ways that she influenced me.

Read Widely

I was in awe from the first time I walked into her classroom. I was already a bookish kid (my dad is really to blame for this as he reads 5-6 books interchangeably) but Mrs. Nolan’s room was my safe haven. When you entered the room it was surrounded on almost three sides by bookshelves. There were so many books and we were given free reign of this “library”. Books of all kinds filled the shelves and for a little guy who loved to read I felt like I was in heaven. She encouraged us to read and to love books but a moment that changed me forever was right around the corner. It was the Fall of my fourth grade year and I approached her desk to speak with her about book selections:

David: I have read all the books on the shelves. There is nothing left to read.

Mrs. Nolan: You have read all of my books? Every single one?

D: Yes, I have read all the boy books!

Mrs. N: Boy books? What do you mean boy books?

D: I have read all the books for boys on the shelves, there is nothing left.

What Mrs. Nolan did next set me up for life. She calmly and correctly encouraged me to not view books as boy books or girl books but books. She explained that stories that I couldn’t imagine waited for me. She didn’t make me feel foolish for making my comment or chastise me in front of the class. She gently pushed me back to the shelves. To this day when I approach a books that I may disagree with the author or the conclusions that they make or when I am assigned a text in school that I may not look forward to reading I hear her. I am reminded that there is a world out there that is waiting to be engaged with but I will never know it if I don’t pick up the book and read.

Think Critically

After leaving her classes our friendship continued to grow. She and her husband Tom went to our church and they lived a few blocks down the street from the house I grew up in. Several times during the year we would walk the few blocks to see them. Some of my favorite moments that I cherish dearly are the conversations that we had on their back porch. She always wanted to know what activities I was involved in but she never let me leave without telling her what I was reading, not that I would let her. I would share what I was reading and she would ask questions about what I was learning. I thought she was interested in me, and she was, but she was forcing me to think. She loved me enough to take the time to care beyond merely hearing. She engaged me not as fifth grader or seventh grader or junior in high school but as a thinker. When I am questioning how students think or engaging with a student I try to model what she did with me.

Constantly Encouraging

One of my last times to spend time with her was after Jessica and I were married. We were sitting in Tom and Janet’s back room talking. I had just finished another semester as a teaching assistant which involved me teaching multiple sections of a class at Baptist Bible College. I was telling her about the semester and how much I was loving teaching. I told her how I never thought I would love being in the classroom especially since I thought I would be on a church staff at that point in my life. Never missing a beat, she said, “Oh David I think you do a wonderful job preaching. I always thought you would make an excellent teacher as well. I’m not surprised at all that you love the classroom.” Were there times that she had to discipline me when I was a student? Absolutely! Were there times where she had to correct my thinking? No doubt! What never changed over the years was the spirit of encouragement that invaded my life every time we were together. When I thought about pursuing a Master’s degree she encouraged me to do it and when I thought I wanted to get a PhD she was a supporter.

Teachers never know what impact they are having on their students and their pursuits. I never truly got the chance to tell her how much she has impacted me. She passed away a few years ago from a battle with cancer and we lived far away, keeping me from having this final conversation with her and telling her how much she meant to me. Some may look at their life as a teacher and wonder if it really matters. I can tell you it does. I have had the privilege of teaching at Baptist Bible College in Springfield, MO for 7 years. I moved from a teaching assistant, to part time faculty, to full time faculty, and now I serve as an adjunct faculty member but every day she walks into the classroom with me. She never lectured pastors, missionaries, and Christian leaders but in a strange sense she really did.

If you think about it when you are finished reading this, reach out to a teacher that made an impact in your life and thank them.