Leaving A Legacy

This may come as a shock to you, but barring Jesus returning and you believing in Him...you are going to die, and when you do you will leave a legacy behind. In fact, you leave a legacy behind you all of the time. People come in and go out of our lives all of the time. Some of them are only there for a moment, others for years and years. While there may be a bunch of those people who won't remember you 5 minutes after you're gone, it is the ones who do remember you that I want to talk about today.

Remember Judas? You know him...he's one of the more famous 'bad guys' ever. This is the guy who betrayed Jesus. Do you remember reading about what happened to Judas?

With the reward he got for his wickedness, Judas bought a field; there he fell headlong, his body burst open and all his intestines spilled out. Everyone in Jerusalem heard about this, so they called that field in their language Akeldama, that is, Field of Blood. -- Acts 1:18-19

Now, you may very well be sitting there feeling like Judas got exactly what he deserved. I'm certainly not going to try to talk you out of that argument. But what really gets me is that, while Judas' legacy is to be the guy who betrayed Jesus, he was one of the 12! He walked around teaching people about Jesus and salvation! He healed people in Jesus' name! This guy did maybe more good in his life than most of us ever will and yet what we remember of him is that he was the bad guy.

With that in mind what I want to know is how do you want to be remembered? Will you be remembered for working 60 hours a week and being gone all of the time in the name of providing for your family or will you slow down and be the spiritual leader God has called you to be? Will you just go through life being a good person and trying to never ruffle any feathers or will you spend each day God gives you looking for opportunities to give, to serve, and to in at least some small way change the lives of those who cross your path?

Will the rest of us have to sit around and wonder if you really truly believed in Jesus as your Savior and Lord...wondering if we'll see you one day in Heaven or will we be left with the impact you made on us, knowing full well that we'll be with you again one day and for all eternity?

Will you be remembered for serving Jesus or for turning your back on Him? The choice is yours.