Begin With the End in Mind

The 2nd habit of highly effective people is to begin with the end in mind.  The author Stephen Covey gives the example of imagining you’re at your own funeral.  What would you want different people to say about you during the eulogy?  

Thankfully, I had a campus minister who took us through a similar exercise way back in college.  It’s sometimes easy to forget what’s important to us in the daily grind of life.  When we visualize things like our own funeral though, it helps put things in proper perspective.

If you want to be remembered as a gracious person, are you acting graciously on a regular basis?  If you want to be remembered as a person who loved his family, are you acting that way now?  I can remember thinking I wanted to be remembered as a man after God’s own heart.

Since college, I have tried to cultivate that in my life.  I certainly haven’t always succeeded but I have always tried to live that way.  When I come into contact with different people I try and point them toward Christ.  Not always in a blatant, turn or burn type of thing, but rather trying to spread the fragrance of Christ.

Back to the 2nd habit, he talks about what you’re centered on and how it affects how you view the world.  He suggests being centered on principles.  Principles are good to be sure, but Jesus makes a way better center than mere principles.  The basic idea is sound though, center your life on things that cannot change.

Jesus is the only Being I know that does not change.  It is a mystery to me.  It’s taken me a lifetime of wrestling with what that even means, but I stake my life on that claim of Christ; that He is an unchanging Savior and Lord.

He is my Center because nothing else matters apart from Him in my life.  Following Christ is sometimes mysterious, but at the same time it helps the rest of life make sense somehow.  Not always of course, I go through periods of doubt just like the next person, but following Christ does start to clarify what on earth I am here for.