Selfish people dont think about the future they

Selfish people don’t think about the future. They expend everything in the present. When the future
finally arrives, as it always does, they often find themselves in bitterness and despair. Living for today
doesn’t prepare us well for tomorrow.
When we get to the end of the line, we need to be on the right track. We ought to be able to look back
over our lives with a sense of integrity. We need to feel that we did the best we could; that we made
right choices, corrected wrong choices, and left a positive legacy behind for our family and friends.
Developmental stages in life are generally charted like this:
Stage
Quality

Infancy
Trust
Childhood
Purpose
Adolescence
Identity
Early Adulthood
Intimacy
Middle Age
Productivity
Old Age
Integrity
The idea of legacy building is often discussed in books about older adults. The Southern Baptist churches
have even formed a men’s ministry called Legacy Builders. Most of us want to be remembered beyond
our own time. We want to make a difference in our lifetime and leave something behind that we can be
proud of: a solid marriage, a family estate, and an inheritance for our children. But most of all, we need
to leave behind a testimony of God’s grace in our lives.
If we make the wrong decisions when we are young, we tend to set our lives on the wrong course. Once
you’re moving in the wrong direction, it is difficult to reverse yourself and turn around. God can
intervene to help us, but we are often left with the regrets of wasted years.
A Simple Invitation
The sooner you get focused on where you are going, the better off you will be in the long run. Twenty-
five years ago, I met a dynamic young businessman in Clearwater, Florida, named Herman Bailey. He had
blond hair and blue eyes and dressed like a Gentleman’s Quarterly model. You couldn’t miss him if you
tried! He made an immediate impression on everyone he met.
Herman was wrestling with making a commitment to full-time Christian service. I didn’t realize it at the
time, but he was also going through some very serious personal struggles. As these intensified, he began
to think seriously about taking his own life.
In the meantime, we moved to Lynchburg, Virginia, where I began teaching at Liberty University. One
morning, I stopped off at a local restaurant for breakfast and ran into Herman. He was sitting alone and
seemed surprised to see me.
“Hey, what are you doing here in Lynchburg?” I asked.
“Oh, I just needed to get away,” he said, “so I came up to check out a few things and get some things
sorted out.”

It wasn’t unusual for people to just show up in Lynchburg in those days. In fact, it still isn’t! It has long
been a center of evangelical pilgrimage. People seemed to think if they just came and glimpsed Jerry
Falwell, things would go better for them. It was one of those unique places where God worked in
people’s lives.