My Legacy

I read my friend, April Himes, blog the other day titled "Legacy." In it, she talked about wanting to leave a legacy Jesus would be pleased with for her three girls. She told a story she had heard about a pastor's memory of waking up to find his mother praying every morning; and she wants her girls to have memories of her faithfulness and devotion to God too (you can read her blog for yourself, if you'd like, this is the link: April's Blog).

Anyway, her blog got me thinking about my kids...my legacy...what would my kids remember about me that would point them to Jesus...I have three biological children now ages 28, 26, and 24. Two girls and a boy. My oldest (who lives in California) told me recently that she was driving somewhere with her boyfriend, the sky was full of those really big round, thunderstorm-kinds of clouds that are dark on the bottom and look like a bunch of jumbo size cotton balls all stuck together. A ray of sunshine had just broken its way through them and shone itself all the way down to the earth in a blast of filtered brilliance and Tauni (my daughter) told her boyfriend that "my mom always used to say that she imagined that's what the sky would look like when Jesus came back for His people."

My 26 year old daughter, Amber, likes to tease me about when they were younger, I would go into the bathroom with my Bible and come out with a word from the Lord. She said, "It was like you'd say, 'leave me alone for 5 minutes!' You'd go into the bathroom, and when you opened the door to come out, it was like there was this light shining on you from above, we could hear the angel chorus singing, and you would say, 'come to me children, I have heard from God.'" She was teasing me, of course. But she said she knew I knew how to hear from God.

Recently when I visited Peter, my 24 year old son, and his family, there was only enough coffee left for one of us and we both wanted it. And Peter said this to me, "Mom, it's like you always used to say to me, 'You have the opportunity to be Jesus in this situation...now you could take the cup of coffee for yourself OR you could be like Jesus and give it to me." Well, what could I say to that? I guess you know HE got the cup of coffee!!

But what this showed me is that we leave a legacy of our lives from every part of our lives consciously and unconsciously. Our children, our spouses, our friends, and co-workers watch us and if we have Jesus in our lives, He will be seen.