What Will People Say about you when your gone, should you die today? How will you be remembered? Would they set around at a table or at the funeral and be quiet or be laughing and greeting each other? And what about when they come by the casket and look down at you, even with the lid closed, and pass with a gentle smile as a tear rolls slowly down? Or would they pass by and make an empty but respectful comment to the friends and family with a fake tear and appropriately words for listening ears? What mark and impression have you made in this world with what may sound like a long time yet passes in a short season? I know we're told that we are not of this world and the things that are in it. But people are not things and love, kindness, wisdom, and the likes are not of this world. So the question to yourself remains about you, to you... and God.
Will they say you were a good business person or good financial wizard? Maybe perhaps discuss your work skills, business practices,athletic skills, achievements, yet not the person. Maybe it will be what you collected or what you owned, yet not the person. Will they say more of what you believe about things, rather than talk about your faith. Even the head of massive corporations with their picture pasted in a frame on the wall and founders of great companies are forgotten in less time than they walked this earth by new employees coming in. In schools today the trophies and names and perhaps even a picture of the team has no meaning or recognition or bonding with the ones just a generation apart, and less as time goes along. The plaques and awards at your home, will the meaning be lost within less time than you were here. In a blink of an eye even corporations named after their founders holds no meaning other than a name by which the business is called. You are technically forgotten. These are things of this world. So again the same question presents itself. Even the richest of people, the most powerful of people, the most feared people, fade in usually less time than they were here on earth.
There are things of you though that do matter, to both you and your Maker. While it is things that will still keep your memory alive forever in this world, spoken all the same, but with respect. Things fondly remembered and passed down and even if the next generation never met you, they speak with conviction and respect and a longing to know that person. Maybe even a desire to be like that person, or at least take up their legacy they left behind. To me that is what I think Jesus meant when He said to take up your cross and follow Him. Not in the burden sense as some suggest, nor the pain sense as some suggest, or the perfect sense as some would say, but His actions and His essence. What if He meant He has shown us the way, now carry on like He did. Walking on water is an impossible task yet so is living a good clean life in this world, an increasingly harder and harder to do thing. Feeding a multitude with what He had can't be done by regular people yet using what you have wisely and seeing that you help others when you can with what you have. Maybe you have extra food, money, clothes... but maybe what you have is time or even just listening. It could even be just a smile or a kind word, a careful glance. Thing is, you make the most of what you got and see that people are all cared for who come your way. So maybe you can't raise the dead or heal the sick, but you can visit the sick and comfort those who are dying. What if that was what He meant?
Clearly we rely on Grace to enter the kingdom of Heaven yet Grace is here and now. We seem to have the belief that Grace kicks in when our lives are through being lived. Like Grace is something we use only when we die. We seem to forget that Grace is getting what you don't deserve, and we use that every day, every hour, every minute, every second of every day. It is by Grace that your next breathe comes and it is by Grace the ones you love gather their next breathe... and by Grace the terminally ill do not take their next breathe. We all use Grace every day in addition to Mercy, not getting what we deserve. How is it we know we use mercy every day yet fail to know we are given grace just as much. I guess though that is in line with how we can see others follies yet fail to see our own. It matters not that other people remember you living by grace and mercy of yourself but if you extended that which was given you freely to those in who you met with, even in just passing by. What will people say when you are gone? What will your legacy be told as?
Will they say you were a good business person or good financial wizard? Maybe perhaps discuss your work skills, business practices,athletic skills, achievements, yet not the person. Maybe it will be what you collected or what you owned, yet not the person. Will they say more of what you believe about things, rather than talk about your faith. Even the head of massive corporations with their picture pasted in a frame on the wall and founders of great companies are forgotten in less time than they walked this earth by new employees coming in. In schools today the trophies and names and perhaps even a picture of the team has no meaning or recognition or bonding with the ones just a generation apart, and less as time goes along. The plaques and awards at your home, will the meaning be lost within less time than you were here. In a blink of an eye even corporations named after their founders holds no meaning other than a name by which the business is called. You are technically forgotten. These are things of this world. So again the same question presents itself. Even the richest of people, the most powerful of people, the most feared people, fade in usually less time than they were here on earth.
There are things of you though that do matter, to both you and your Maker. While it is things that will still keep your memory alive forever in this world, spoken all the same, but with respect. Things fondly remembered and passed down and even if the next generation never met you, they speak with conviction and respect and a longing to know that person. Maybe even a desire to be like that person, or at least take up their legacy they left behind. To me that is what I think Jesus meant when He said to take up your cross and follow Him. Not in the burden sense as some suggest, nor the pain sense as some suggest, or the perfect sense as some would say, but His actions and His essence. What if He meant He has shown us the way, now carry on like He did. Walking on water is an impossible task yet so is living a good clean life in this world, an increasingly harder and harder to do thing. Feeding a multitude with what He had can't be done by regular people yet using what you have wisely and seeing that you help others when you can with what you have. Maybe you have extra food, money, clothes... but maybe what you have is time or even just listening. It could even be just a smile or a kind word, a careful glance. Thing is, you make the most of what you got and see that people are all cared for who come your way. So maybe you can't raise the dead or heal the sick, but you can visit the sick and comfort those who are dying. What if that was what He meant?
Clearly we rely on Grace to enter the kingdom of Heaven yet Grace is here and now. We seem to have the belief that Grace kicks in when our lives are through being lived. Like Grace is something we use only when we die. We seem to forget that Grace is getting what you don't deserve, and we use that every day, every hour, every minute, every second of every day. It is by Grace that your next breathe comes and it is by Grace the ones you love gather their next breathe... and by Grace the terminally ill do not take their next breathe. We all use Grace every day in addition to Mercy, not getting what we deserve. How is it we know we use mercy every day yet fail to know we are given grace just as much. I guess though that is in line with how we can see others follies yet fail to see our own. It matters not that other people remember you living by grace and mercy of yourself but if you extended that which was given you freely to those in who you met with, even in just passing by. What will people say when you are gone? What will your legacy be told as?
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