Photos and Faithfulness

I spent a good part of last night looking at pictures of the new baby in our family with my mother – on my iPhone, using the 23Snaps application…not the box of old black and whites along with original Polaroids that I used to sit and go through with her.  How many photo collections do you have – whether in a scrapbook, on your computer, in Snapfish publications, in phone or tablet apps, or on Facebook? There are lots of choices for photo albums these days. Do you ever look through the pictures, remembering the people and events that shaped your life? 

 

Contemporary Christian singer, Steve Green released an album in 1988 dedicated to his parents called Find Us Faithful. Green and his six siblings spent much of their early lives in Argentina where their parents were missionaries.  On a mission trip to South America, he heard part of a song that Jon Mohr was working on. The refrain states:

“May all who come behind us find us faithful

May the fire of our devotion light their way

May the footprints that we leave

Lead them to believe

And the lives we live inspire them to obey

Oh may all who come behind us find us faithful.”

I have sung this song several times and am struck each time by the line: “May the footprints that we leave - lead them to believe - and the lives we live inspire them to obey.”

Whose footprints have led you to this point in your faith journey? Who are the witnesses in your life?  Who has shared their stories and lives with you, making a difference in the person you have become?  Who has shown you by word and action what it means to be a disciple of Jesus for the transformation of the world? There are so many people whose footprints are etched forever on my heart. They make up the photographs in my photo album of faith.

January 9th marks the 53rd anniversary of my birth.  It seems that with each passing year, I ask myself more and more about the footprints that I am leaving on this earth. 

• Who will say that I have been a witness to them? 
• Who will look back over their lives and say it was because of me that they know Jesus? 
• Who will say years from now that I was faithful to the Gospel message and made a difference in their lives? 
• Who will say that my life mattered – not because of the possessions I gained, the degrees I earned, or the job I held – but because I touched them in a powerful way by my actions and witness as a Christian?
• Who will have my picture in their album of faith?
• Who will have your picture in their album?

“May the footprints that we leave

Lead them to believe

And the lives we live inspire them to obey

Oh may all who come behind us find us faithful.”