When I was a child, my older brother and I would often stay with my grandparents at their farm in Indiana. It seems almost cliché to talk about visiting grandparents on a farm – playing in the corn crib, riding on the tractor, going fishing, building forts in the woods, running through the corn rows, gathering eggs in the henhouse — but that was my experience, taken for granted at the time, but remembered now with warm gratitude.
I also clearly remember the twinkle in my Grandpa’s eyes as he drove like a bat-out-of-you-know-where over the rolling back roads of Parke County, Indiana. He was no senior slow-poke. In fact, Grandpa’s car seemed to sail from the crest of one hill to the next as he NASCARred his way into town. Once we got there, we’d go to an honest-to-goodness “general store” with wooden floors and we’d be given a little money to buy some candy. And then we’d NASCAR back out to the farm.
I remember that my grandparents’ house always smelled like fried chicken, strawberry Jello, and Ajax cleanser — my Grandma was a good cook and meticulous housekeeper. Of course, sometimes the fried “chicken” wasn’t chicken at all – it might be catfish or even squirrel — but it all tasted good to me.
There is one memory of those trips to the farm that is now sweeter than all the rest. I recall how I sometimes woke up very early, especially on those mornings when Grandpa was going to take us fishing, and I padded out of the bedroom and found my grandfather leaning over his desk, bathed in the purplish light of a fluorescent desk lamp, reading his Bible and praying.
It baffled me at the time. I didn’t know that anyone read the Bible simply because they wanted to. But my Grandpa did. He read the Scriptures and he prayed … probably for me. I think that’s where the magical twinkle in his blue, blue eyes came from. Now I understand.
My Grandpa passed away many years ago. His farm was sold, but no one can buy or sell the legacy he left me. He valued the Word of God, and now I share that passion. I wish I could tell him how much it means to me. I can’t, but I can do something better: I can leave the same legacy for those who come behind me.
When my sons were young and got up early in the mornings, they often found me in the living room with my Bible on my lap, gleaning its wisdom and strength, and praying … most likely for them. I want them to remember me the way I remember my Grandpa, the way songwriter Michael Card remembered his grandfather when he wrote: “In you I learned the kind of faith that looked up to the mountains. In you I saw just what I’d like to be. Oh, Grandad, I wish you could be here to tell me what to do, ‘cause I first saw the light of Christ through you.”
We have only one brief lifetime to build a legacy for those who come behind us. Let’s build well.
Proverbs 22:6 — Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it.
Proverbs 23:15-16 My son, if your heart is wise, then my heart will be glad; my inmost being will rejoice when your lips speak what is right.