When you leave this world, will you be known as one who accumulated treasures on earth that you couldn’t keep? Or will you be recognized as one who invested treasures in heaven that you couldn’t lose?
The Treasure Principle, 2002, p. 49, Used by Permission from Eternal Perspective Ministries, www.epm.org. Get this book!
Your children should love the Lord, work hard, and experience the joy of trusting God. More important than leaving your children an inheritance is leaving them a spiritual heritage. If you left your children money they didn’t need, and if they were thinking correctly, wouldn’t they give it to God anyway? Then why not give it to God yourself, since He entrusted it to you?
The Treasure Principle, 2002, p. 70-71, Used by Permission from Eternal Perspective Ministries, www.epm.org. Get this book!
[Sarah Edwards in writing to her daughter Esther at the death of her husband, Jonathan, said], “My Very Dear Child, What shall I say? A holy and good God has covered us with a dark cloud. O that we may kiss the rod, and lay our hands on our mouths! The Lord has done it. He has made me adore his goodness, that we had him so long. But my God lives; and he has my heart. O what a legacy my husband, and your father, has left us! We are all given to God; and there I am, and love to be. Your ever affectionate mother, Sarah Edwards.”
Jonathan and Sarah: An Uncommon Union, Soli Deo Gloria, p. 223.
Death is never the last word in the life of a…man. When a man leaves this world, be he righteous or unrighteous, he leaves something in the world. He may leave something that will grow and spread like a cancer or a poison, or he may leave something like the fragrance of perfume or a blossom of beauty that permeates the atmosphere with blessing.
Do not die, O ye greyheads – ye who have passed your threescore years and ten – do not pass away from this earth with all those pleasant memories of God’s lovingkindness to be buried with you in your coffin; but let your children, and your children’s children, know what the everlasting God did for you.
Remembering God’s Works, Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, vol. 49, 448.
Consider the impact of one godly father, Jonathan Edwards. This famous early American pastor, writer, and one-time president of Princeton University had 11 children. Of his known male descendants:
More than 300 became pastors, missionaries or theological professors
120 were professors at various universities;
110 became attorneys;
60 were prominent authors;
30 were judges;
14 became presidents of universities or colleges;
3 served in the U.S. Congress;
1 became vice president of the United States.
Immortality lies not in the things you leave behind, but in the people your life has touched.