Have you ever thought about what someone would say in your eulogy? Would they remember your killer meatloaf recipe? Your business savvy? Your awesome sense of humor? Would they talk about your faith? How your life inspired them?

Perhaps having cancer has made me think more about things like eulogies and epitaphs, but as I read the very beginning of Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians, I was struck by the things he remembers about this group of believers. He says,

“We continually remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labor prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.”

~ 1 Thes. 1:3 ~

Wow. What high praise for their faithfulness! And what a legacy to leave for believers who come behind them! How Paul remembers the Thessalonians, that’s how I want to be remembered someday. In fact, these three qualities are something we should all strive toward. Let’s take a closer look at each piece of the Thessalonians’ legacy…

Work Produced by Faith

We all have our daily work. Whether it be directing a household, taking care of our children, working in a job outside the home, or running a business from home, our work — especially as Americans — is one of our most defining characteristics. As Christians, we do the WORK we do because we believe it is what God has called us to do. We have FAITH that this job is what He asks of us, so we do it with everything in us.

Want to talk about work produced by faith? How about starting this blog and running a resume writing business from home while dealing with chemo and trying to figure out how to stay healthy? I’ve written about feeling this call before, so I won’t go into it much here. Just let me tell you, it took a HEFTY dose of faith to decide to finally get all this going. It didn’t make sense. The timing was ALL wrong. But, gosh dang it, if He just wouldn’t let it go! Our God is like a dog with a bone sometimes, and this was one of those times. So here I am — building a blog, writing resumes for my own clients, and He’s blessing it. It’s crazy, but He is. Just like He said He would. (Why am I always so slow to BELIEVE what God has promised??)

From here on out, I want my work in this space to always reflect the faith upon which it is founded. I want my legacy in the blogosphere and for those I love to be that I was a woman whose WORK was produced by FAITH.

Labor Prompted by Love

We LABOR and toil and do the hard things out of LOVE for God and His love within us. The term LABOR — specifically in terms of birth — can literally mean to SPEND YOURSELF in order that your baby can be born. We do whatever it takes to see them safely brought into the world, even though we know it means exhaustion and an intensity we can only know in this context. We do it because we love them.

Likewise, Jesus calls us to love our neighbors as ourselves (Matthew 22:38). That kind of love can only happen when we determine to love God so fully that His love in us spills over and onto everyone around us. Loving our neighbors — much less LABORING for them — is nearly impossible if we’re trying to do so just from our human supply. It’s so limited. Too often, we’re more worried about taking care of me, myself, and I to be worried about caring well for others, too, especially if it’s going to be hard! Being willing to SPEND OURSELVES for the sake of others is only possible with a full tank of God’s love to draw from.

A while back, our neighbor’s car was in and out of the shop repeatedly. It just couldn’t be trusted to make it from one side of town to the other, so Erik offered to take her two high schoolers to school every morning. What he thought would be a couple of weeks of goodwill, turned into two MONTHS of early morning rides, and it got wearing. He had been getting up early for so long, he was running on fumes. He needed a break. But every time I thought he would quit, he dug down deep, pulled out more of God’s love for our neighbors, and kept on. He loved on those kids and blessed their mama every morning, regardless of how tired or frustrated he was. He has been an awesome example of what LABOR prompted by LOVE can look like in our world.

Endurance Inspired by Hope

Endurance. Persistence. Tenaciousness. Doggedness.

For the NCIS fans out there, there was an episode recently where Jimmy ends up on a ledge with a young man determined to jump to his death. (All this happens early on, so no spoilers here!) Without thinking for his own safety, Jimmy grabs on to this guy’s belt and WILL. NOT. LET. GO. No matter how many times the guy asked, BEGGED Jimmy to let him go, he would NOT let him jump. His hands were cramping from holding on so fiercely to the belt with one hand and the drain pipe wth the other, but he wouldn’t give up.

Jimmy was in the middle of a life or death situation and moved all of us with his tenacity. In the midst of our day to day trials, do we demonstrate even HALF that much endurance? Or do we quit when things get just a little too hard?

Enduring gets a whole lot easier when we have the singleness of purpose that comes from HOPE in Christ. Knowing to what He has called us — to what WORK and LABOR — breathes life into us, even when the living is hard. But knowing the hope we have in Jesus? That hope fills everything we do with PURPOSE. We keep giving 100% because we know everything we do is ultimately for His glory. We DON’T. GIVE. UP. No matter what.

As Christians, we know that “all things work together for the good of those who love God: those who are called according to His purpose” (Romans 8:28). Each of us has a calling to further God’s purposes. Exactly HOW we do that will be unique for each of us, but we can ALL be remembered as someone who ENDURED the hard times and continued to live on purpose because of the hope we have in Jesus.

How Will YOU Be Remembered?

One day — hopefully many, many years from now, I want whoever gives my eulogy to be able to say they remember my work produced by faith, my labor prompted by love, and my endurance inspired by hope in my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. My job now is to make sure I’m living in such a way those things will be true!

What about you? What are you known for right now? Is that how you want to be remembered? If not, what will you change today that will change the legacy you leave behind?