Legacy

These students--nineteen years worth and counting--are what I want my legacy to be.  I want to be remembered for the investment I made in them.

There was a time when I wanted to write the Great American Novel or direct a critically acclaimed cinematic masterpiece.  I felt a desire to do something “important.”  But lately, I’ve found it doesn’t matter so much to me to be remembered for my accomplishments.  I don’t feel a need for immortality through books or plays that I write.  I don’t need my name on a building or my statue in a park.

I want to be remembered for what I was to people.  I want my legacy to be the investment I put into people, especially young people.  I want to be remembered as someone who cared and who was an inspiration to those who knew me. I want to be remembered  as someone who reflected the character of Christ and who shared on an authentic picture of what a relationship with Jesus looks like. I want to be remembered for living life authentically, with humility and good humor, and for treating everyone with dignity and respect.

In the end it’s the lives I change that is the greatest legacy I can leave behind.

Well here's another stone in the walls of this lifetime, of this lifetime.

I built them tall but they gonna fall

When the days gone by, when my children cry.

When I'm gone and gray what will the people say about this lifetime?

I'll stand to say you that you came my way with the Son of love, the brightest day

Of this lifetime.

             --Mat Kearney