1) I wish I had the courage to be true to myself, and not live the life others expected of me. I wish I had the courage to be true to myself.
Most people live their life to fulfil the expectations of others, and never stop to examine the dreams, desires, and the destiny that God put in their hearts.
When you get to the end of your life, if you've never discovered what God put in your heart, and fulfilled it, one of the regrets you will have is: I wish I had lived my life, to fulfil what God put in my heart, and I hadn't lived just to please people and their expectations of me.
2) This was the one universal of all men: I wish I hadn't worked so hard - that I'd spent more time with my wife and my family.
I wish I hadn't worked so hard, or poured so much of my life into work, and trying to get money and resources and so on. I wish that I'd spent more time with my wife and my spouse.
3) This was a very common one: I wish I'd had the courage to express my feelings; instead of living my life just to keep peace with everyone.
I wish I had had authentic relationships; instead of just being shallow; and connecting, rather than building relationships, yet never sharing my life with people.
4) I wish I'd stayed in touch with friends, because now I see the value of these people in my life, and I regret that I never followed through the friendships, and made time to keep them up, and to be with them.
5) Last, and also a very common one: I wish I'd let myself be happy. I wish I'd let myself be happy; or had more fun.
People realised that happiness or joy is a matter of choice. No matter what comes in life, you can choose to rejoice; or you can let it come on top of you, and live under the feelings, and the circumstance.
They said: I just wish I'd had more fun. I wished I lived a happy life - or chosen to be happy.
At the end of their life, they've come to the stage: I've got this regret, and I wish I had done that.
You and I don't need to get to the end of our life and say “I wish”. We can get to the end of our life - because we've still got life left in us - and we can make some decisions today that we're going to live differently, and choose our life to be different than what it was.
I want you to consider three possible areas that you could leave a legacy:
Proverbs 13:22 – “A good man (or a good woman) leaves an inheritance to his children's children”.
A good person considers how to leave an inheritance to their grandchildren; so very clearly in the Bible, the Bible affirms that you should think generationally; think ahead concerning your family, your children, and your grandchildren, and consider what you would leave to them.
1) You can leave finances, or leave some kind of asset, or resources.
Some people don't leave assets - they leave debts! When the person dies, the family is burdened - they've got to pay debts before they can even celebrate.
2) Family - you can leave a legacy of family. What will your family remember you for? What have you invested in their life?
3) A legacy of faith.
A legacy of finances; a legacy of family, which can mean natural and spiritual; and a legacy of faith - how will your relationship with God be remembered?
Some of you are thinking: I'm past being able to do anything about that now... No one is ever past making a change!
That's the great hope of the gospel: you can change today! The past can be overcome.
We still have time to do some things in the future, so I want to just give some practical things on developing a legacy for your family.