What Will We Be Remembered For?

All Saints Day is observed in churches on the first Sunday in November. It has become a day to remember those people who were there for us when we needed them, but since then, they have passed on.  Many of the characteristics we loved about them we learned from them, and we are now carrying their baton in the relay race of life.  We will all pass our baton on in our own due time.  

A mentor of mine died in September.  Her name was Gladys McGarey, MD.  I had never met her except through YouTube and her book, “The Well-Lived Life: A 102-year-old Doctor’s Six Secrets to Health and Happiness at Every Age.” Her motto, “Be glad,” went along with her name, Gladys.  

When I heard that she had passed on, I looked for her last interview.  I found one that she did with Caroline Myss.  Caroline had done extensive work in near-death experiences (NDE).  She told Gladys that some people have an experience in which they see a review of their lives. They were surprised that all their big accomplishments were not part of the review.  The review was made up of small, loving things that they had done for someone else - things that were so insignificant that they had forgotten about them - but they changed the course of the other person’s life.  

Maybe you can think of some random act of kindness that helped you and share that with another person as an honor to them. Has there ever been someone whom you didn’t like being around while they were living, but after they died, you received a blessing of greater understanding?

That’s what happened to Jesus and his family.  The Bible makes it clear that Jesus’s brothers (and sisters in Matthew 13:55-57) did not like him, even though they lived with him for 30 years. Apparently, there was a rift in the early part of Jesus’s ministry (see Mark 3:31-35 and the parallel passages in Matthew 12:46–50 and Luke 8:19–21). His brothers are never mentioned as his disciples during his pre-crucifixion ministry. The Apostle John wrote that Jesus’s brothers didn’t believe in him (John 7:5).  And one time, Jesus’s mother and brothers tried to take him home because he was offending the Jewish leaders.  Most scholars believe that, after Jesus died and went to heaven, two of his brothers, James and Jude, believed in him and wrote books in the Bible.  

We can be on either side of this story.  We can be the one who isn’t liked, and we can also be the one judging someone else as bad.  

Jesus’s story has always been a comfort to me.  My dad didn’t like me.  When I was little, he would talk about my mom’s sister, Bettie.  He hated her, and as a small child, I felt afraid when he talked like this.  When I became a teenager, he would say the very worst thing he could say to me: “You are just like Aunt Bettie.”  No matter how much I tried to be different than Bettie, I never succeeded.  

My dad died January 29, 2009.  The Thanksgiving before his death, he wouldn’t even look at me.  That Christmas, I hugged him and said, “Dad, I love you.”  He said he loved me!  So after all, he died well.  I always knew that, as soon as he passed on, he would love me.  I was one of his lessons in life.  

I found it was good for me to anticipate that Dad would someday love me, even if it was after his death.  That truth was always a comfort.  

I made this silhouette of myself, taken off of my website, to remind me that I have all these characteristics in my life   I enjoy being with myself as I can feel each lovely vibration.  Having these qualities that surround me in my life does not in any way mean that other people will know that they are there.  They are invisible. We all have the same spirit in us that Jesus had when he was on earth.  Not everyone recognized his beauty.  Why would we think everyone can see ours?

The question - “What will we be remembered for?” - can be answered in a positive way once we get to heaven.  Every little act of kindness that we did will be celebrated and remembered.  While on earth, what we will be remembered for depends much more on the person remembering than it depends on our behavior, characteristics or mannerisms.

We know that Jesus was the epitome of love, and he had only beautiful characteristics, but that didn’t mean that the people he loved, loved him in return. While on earth, the end of the book was not written about Jesus yet. When he got to heaven there was a whole crowd to cheer him on.  They are here spiritually to cheer us on if we just tune in. And as soon as we pass that baton on in life’s relay to the person who will follow us, we will be given a wreath of victory.  

As we think of people whom we want to honor today for what they’ve done while they were on earth, let’s remember that they’ve already been honored, and they want us to get the same honors by doing the same loving and kind things they taught us to do.  

We must remember that the end of the book isn’t written about us. All our failures and heartaches have been lessons about how to become more loving and kinder.  

Let’s take some time to think about the whole race that people have run before us. How has their life put you in a position to run your life and learn lessons along the way? Have you ever heard their voice in the great cloud of witnesses cheering you on to just keep running the race?

Who is in that crowd for you? Jesus is there. He is cheering us on when we feel unloved and unappreciated and when others think we are crazy. We have all had mentors that have helped us. Let’s see the bigger picture of our lives and be grateful for all those who have gone before us.