While we were in Italy, we went to see St. Mark’s Basilica. It was beautiful inside-out, and there was so much history there. We had a really wonderful tour guide who had grown up in Venice. She shared about her grandmother, a devout Catholic, who was a significant part of her life, yet when she passed, this lady no longer was a practicing Catholic.

This lady was wearing a pretty long dress. Besides the attitudes I picked up along the way, the other comment that stuck out to me was that “Grandma would have looked at her and said, “God is looking at your ankles.”

I sighed, and my heart sank.

Another tour guide we had grew up in the church, but as he put it, “wasn’t really religious.”

What I noticed a lot in Italy that we see here just as much is that there was a lot of religion and tradition, but I don’t think I once heard anything anywhere about a relationship with Jesus.

I thought about what she had said about what she remembered her grandmother saying. Those were the things that stuck to her. The other tour guide was sharing about Pope John Paul the second and what had stuck out to him was the kind of man he was. This pope had been shot at twice in an attempted assassination. He met with the man who shot him and forgave him face to face. This was what stuck out to him about that Pope.

That act of meeting that man and forgiving him is what impacted this man.

I have been pondering these things from those moments in Italy until now at home. I have been praying and asking God, what kind of spiritual legacy am I leaving?

What are the things that people hear me say that will stick with them long after I am gone?

Does my relationship with Jesus spur others on in theirs?

How am I impacting those around me in how I live my life?

I think these are good questions for us all to pray over and answer. It matters.

One of the most impactful things I saw in Italy was Michaelangelo’s Last Judgement painting in the Sistine Chapel.

It was a very emotional moment for me. We were supposed to be silent in there and take it in. As I looked up at this painting, which displays heaven and hell. Jesus is there on the throne, holding one hand up and another down. Satan is in hell, and it graphically displays what that is like there.

I stood there looking at it all, and my heart became sad and tears began running down my cheeks. There was something about having a visual of what I know is to come, and these are people. I repented for times I had not spoken up enough, even when people were dying. I prayed for boldness to share what Jesus has done for me and how He has changed my life.

People need to know we were created by God for a relationship with Him. Sin came in and fractured that relationship with God and with one another, yet God loved us so much and wanted that relationship with us so deeply that he sent Jesus to die and be raised up again.

They need to know it’s more than rules, regulations, and traditions. They need to know we won’t ever meet perfection because Jesus is the only one who could, and that is why we need Him. They need to know heaven and hell are real, and we have a real enemy who seeks to steal, kill, and destroy. He wants us to suffer and to not have that relationship with Jesus.

How are we leaving that spiritual legacy?

I pray we will ponder these things.

I am incredibly aware more and more as I get older that life is a gift. We are not guaranteed tomorrow, and Jesus is coming back.

May the way we live our lives and live out that relationship with Jesus leave a mark that draws people to Him instead of away from Him.