Epitaph

“Lord, help me to know how fleeting my time on earth is. Help me to know how limited my life is and that I’m only here for a moment more.” Psalm 39:4

A friend had a life changing experience leading him to go to his individual family members to repent, confess and ask each one to forgive him for his hurtful words and wounding actions which had impacted their lives.

He first got on his knees before his wife. She listened as he outlined point after point what the Holy Spirit had revealed to him. “I see what I have done through my actions and words,” he said. “I repent and I’m so sorry. Will you forgive me?”

“I forgive you,” she replied.

He then went to the youngest of his four children.

He began and the teenager instantly fell on the floor with him before he could finish.

“You don’t have to do this dad, I forgive you,” they said.

“I love you, but I do need to do this.”

He finished. They cried and hugged.

The next youngest child took a little longer but, soon, they too offered a quick and heart felt, “I forgive you, Dad.”

The next to the oldest listened through every point and, when asked “will you forgive me?”, emotionally replied, “I forgive you, Dad.”

Then came the oldest, the one who had absorbed the most painful words and actions.

They sat and listened to him pour out his heart, and, after being asked “will you forgive me?”, stood and walked away.

This is not the way my friend saw this going. Each of the other family members had forgiven quickly.

“What do I do now?” he asked God.

“Repeat until they get it,” God replied.

And so, he did.

After many “trust-building” sessions of my friend being on his knees and the oldest child just sitting there, finally, he heard “I forgive you dad.”

The direction of his family changed.

He changed how he would be remembered.

“He found happiness and honor in being helpful to the world.” – George Washington Carver

“Benjamin Franklin, printer, like the cover of an old book, its contents torn out and stript of its lettering and gilding, lies here, food for worms. But the work shall not be wholly lost; for it will, as he believ’d appear once more, in a new and more perfect edition, corrected and amended by The Author.”

“That’s all folks” – Mel Blanc, voice of Porky Pig & Bugs Bunny

“Free at last…” – Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Epitaphs are the words chiseled into tombstones memorializing one’s life.

What would be chiseled into your tombstone if it were created today?

What would you like for it to say?

Are there things left undone or unsaid?

Begin today living as you would like to be remembered.

We can’t change the past but we can redeem it by our words and actions today!

It’s not too late.

You have been prayed for.