Desire Street’s Financial Assistant Sue Bishop recently had occasion to reflect on things that matter. You might enjoy joining her in her thoughts.
Danny
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If you heard the name Joe Clanton, most folks would say, “Who is that?” He is not someone who was well known or had a great following. He wasn’t on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or anything else.
He passed away suddenly a couple of weeks ago of a massive heart attack, causing great pain and sadness to his family and friends.
So who was he?
He was, in his son’s words, “the most intelligent uneducated man ever.”
How can one be intelligent and uneducated? That is an oxymoron, isn’t it?
Not in this case. Joe didn’t have a lot of “book learning” but he had a lot of knowledge, wisdom and instinct about building, fixing, altering, repairing, refabricating, etc. You could ask him how something ought to be done and get a full-fledged course on the ins and outs, ups and downs, of the task with suggestions aplenty on how to complete the project. He found alternate uses for just about everything. If he didn’t have the “right tool” he could usually fabricate something and say “this ought to work” and it usually did.
The most telling thing about Joe Clanton was visible by the number of people who attended his funeral in the middle of a workday – nearly 200; and the number who took the 35-mile drive in the funeral cortege to the gravesite – more than 50.
In Joe’s case, no one expected his sudden passing. He had been doing the ordinary things of life, walking his dog when he felt ill, went inside and had a heart attack. For him, his life is past and the memories are all that remain.
When your time comes to bid farewell to this world, what will the comments be regarding your life? How many lives will you have touched in a way that will make them want to go out of their way to attend your funeral or follow the bier to the graveside.
Joe’s legacy is in place. What kind of legacy are you leaving behind?
“Only one life, ‘twill soon be past, Only what’s done for Christ will last.” (excerpted from a poem by C. T. Studd)
Photo courtesy of Ryan Jacques on Unsplash.com
