Leaving a Legacy: Writing for the Sake of Posterity

A few weeks ago, I attended the viewing for the mother of a dear friend. Her mom had recently been given the "all clear" from her recent cancer scan. Though her mom beat the breast cancer, her body ultimately lost to the chemotherapy treatments. Her mother was a beautiful person inside and out. She always had a warm smile, she loved to laugh, and she was always ready with a warm hug whenever you saw her. She left behind two daughters and a husband of more than 60 years. 

Turning fifty earlier this year, I have attended more funerals than I would have liked to attend. One minute you are having coffee or talking on the phone to a friend or loved one and the next you find yourself giving a eulogy at their funeral. Life is strange like that, but it does make you think. Rather, it should make you think. And I do think a lot about death. Not in a weird unhealthy way. I realize in today's culture I need to qualify that statement. I am not longing for death by any means. Rather, I want to enjoy every minute God gives me of this life and grow to old age. Yet, according to Solomon, wise people think about death a lot. He actually says we are better off spending our time at funerals than parties.

Ecclesiastes 7:2-4

Better to spend your time at funerals than at parties. After all, everyone dies—so the living should take this to heart. Sorrow is better than laughter, for sadness has a refining influence on us. A wise person thinks a lot about death, while a fool thinks only about having a good time.

There is immense wisdom in this verse. It is true what Solomon says about funerals. You never get a clearer view of your own mortality than when standing beside a casket with someone you loved laying in it. I suppose maybe that's why the brevity of life is so often on my mind. I know from experience that death has an excruciating finality to it. No more phone calls. No texts. You won't hear that laugh again. Questions go unanswered. Issues go unresolved. Stories go untold. Grief just continues to prick your emotions when the memories and questions come. I lost both my parents to a car crash in 2011. I stood before two caskets that day. So, I understand how fleeting life can be. 

You start to realize amidst the grief there is a lot about people you never knew. Now, you never will. Even when it's people very close to you whom you loved dearly. I was 36 at the time. Old enough to know I didn't know it all, and smart enough to know I needed their wisdom as I was leading my young family. Now, the best of what is left of my parents remains in me and my sister and the stories we tell of them. Yes, we have some of their dishes, tools, and other material things that elicit joy in their use, but as individuals they have sadly been reduced to pictures, a few cards and letters, and memories. I'm thankful for those. So, many people leave so little behind. This saddens me deeply. 

As a writer, I understand the power of story. I recognize the value of the written word. I consider it the ultimate way of transmitting our deepest thoughts, our wisdom, and our life experience directly into the heart of someone else. It seems to me to be one way of easing the finality of death. Part of my motivation for writing is for the sake of posterity. The thoughts and ideas you put into written form become your legacy.

I have very little from my parents in the way of written words, thoughts, or ideas. My mother was definitely better at putting things in writing than my dad. Yet, what it amounts to is notes in her Bible (which for certain are cherished), some cards and letters, and a few devotions she wrote for a women's group of which she had been a participant. I don't have much of anything in the way of writing from my dad other than a few cards and letters. What I would give some days for some words of wisdom from my dad from beyond the grave. 

My middle son has taken interest in my writing of late. We were talking about it recently and he said, "Dad, I've never heard you say some of the things you're putting into writing." I told him that was kind of the point of much of my journaling and writing. Someday, I want him and the rest of my boys to know when they are fifty that I was battling cynicism and anger occasionally (It creeps in on you in later years and you have to fight against it). I want them to know what I was grateful for. I want them to find encouragement from Scripture in the same places I did. I want them to know the things God has brought me through, and I want them to hear my heart and my convictions. I want them to be able to follow the footsteps of a committed but often imperfect follower of Jesus.

Solomon also talks in these verses about sadness having a refining influence on us. By definition, refining means to improve something from impurities, to prune something, or to remove unwanted material from something. It's in seasons of extended sorrow that refining happens. Priorities get rearranged. Some new habits may need to be taken up while others need to be discarded. My writing was born out of a season of sorrow and refining. I write to clarify my own thoughts, emotions, and convictions. And I write for posterity so future generations of my family will know the God I loved and served throughout my lifetime. 

I also believe our writing is our testimony. Each day of our lives through the highs, the tragedies, the mysteries, and the mundane, God is at work weaving the beautiful tapestry of our lives. Daily, we are so close to the details we often struggle to see the magnificent artistry of His handiwork over time. Occasionally, we catch glimpses of his hand in moments and memories, but the written word has a way of encapsulating the splendor of God's grand design in the way no other media can. So, write. Write for posterity. Write for legacy. Write as a testimony. It's what wise people do.