Finishing Strong

Imagine sitting in a hospital room on a quiet Tuesday afternoon. The hum of the monitors is the only sound in the room. You’re sitting next to someone you love—a parent, a mentor, a grandparent—and you realize you are watching the final chapter of a long life come to a close.

In those moments, nobody asks to see a bank statement. Nobody pulls out a resume to review their career promotions. Nobody cares about the model of car parked out in the lot. When everything else gets stripped away, the only thing that actually fills that room is legacy. It’s the conversations you had, the promises you kept, the faith you passed down, and the quiet, everyday impact you made on the people sitting around that bed.

We live in a culture that is absolutely obsessed with short-term results. We want the instant meal, the quick fix, and the immediate payout. But if we’re honest with ourselves, beneath all our daily busyness, most of us carry a quiet, persistent fear: When I’m gone, is any of this going to make a dent? If our church closed its doors tomorrow, would our city even notice, or would we just leave behind an empty building?

You see, in all of us there is a search for something more, a search for significance. We look at the world around us. We see the condition it is in. We ask ourselves, “Does what I do matter?” Everybody has varying levels of this. Some people desire a national or global platform. Some people want to immortalize themselves through achievements and accolades. Some of us don’t care as much about those things. But everyone wants to live a life of significance. Everyone wants to know that their life mattered, that it made an impact.

I want you to remember something today. There is a buzzword floating around our culture. It is the word influencer. It is used in the context of social media and YouTube most often. To be a social media influencer means you have a sizeable audience that listens to you. Celebrities are probably some of the first influencers. We now care what an actor thinks about life and politics. Why? Because they have influence. Their position and access to people can influence their beliefs and behaviors.

But did you know you are already an influencer? You were (and still are) an influencer to your children. You are an influencer to your grandchildren. You are an influencer to other people in this church. You are an influencer to somebody in the community without even knowing it. The two questions are do you recognize this, and are you stepping into it with intentionality?

Jacob was an influencer. He was an influencer to his family, to a nation, and to the Ancient Near East. Wouldn’t you like to know that your life and your church are making an impact for the kingdom of God? After all, that’s why you are here. The Great Commission is marching orders for all Christians, not just a select few. Don’t you want to know your impact will outlive you?

As we jump back into the story of Genesis, I want you show you, no matter what stage of life you are in, three keys to finishing strong.

Build the Foundation

We live in a fast-paced world, which lends to moving on quickly. The news cycle moves so fast that what is a headline today is forgotten about tomorrow. What is a fad today is ancient tomorrow. We get excited about something quickly, and lose interest even faster. We are always looking for ways for things to be easier and to take less time. This often lends to treating the legacy of those before us as a footnote rather than a foundation.

Some things need to take time. Some things need to be done slowly. They are that important.

The first half of this chapter covers the death of Jacob. Let’s read the first few verses together.

Genesis 50:1–3 NASB95

Then Joseph fell on his father’s face, and wept over him and kissed him. Joseph commanded his servants the physicians to embalm his father. So the physicians embalmed Israel. Now forty days were required for it, for such is the period required for embalming. And the Egyptians wept for him seventy days.

Notice that everything stops, which is appropriate for the loss of a loved one. We should pause and grieve the loss. But Joseph didn’t take a weekend. The Egyptians didn’t either. They took 70 days. It’s unclear as to whether the 40 days of embalming is part of the 70 days, but there was a mourning period of nearly two and a half months. This was just shy of the normal time of mourning for a Pharaoh. This demonstrated the great respect the Egyptians had for Joseph and his father. Jacob lived in Egypt for seventeen years. He had that much of an impact on the people in that time.

If you want to finish strong, no matter when that day comes, don’t ignore the spiritual groundwork laid by those before you. This church has stood for 113 years, and as long as there are people willing to carry on the work, the church will remain. We honor the work of those who have gone before us by pausing to remember.

So I want you to take time this week to write down three core values passed down to you (or three you want to start passing down) and communicate them to your family. Make the time. Don’t assume your family knows what your core values are. They don’t. Write them down. What does it mean to be a member of your family?

We went through this exercise a few years ago. There are a number of values we have that are unstated, like the inerrancy of scripture, baptism by immersion, and things like that. But when we were trying to describe who we are, we identified three core values that we try to embody as a church. We are a generous, loving, and hospitable people. What are the non-negotiable values your family needs to live by? Pause your life and work through that by looking at what was passed down to you from your family or from the legacy of faith.

Choose sacrifice over comfort.

We want the impact of a great legacy without the inconvenient cost doing hard things. Our human nature is to want the prize without the process. Those who win in life are the ones who made the greatest sacrifices. The more we try to keep ourselves from something difficult, the more we will miss building something that will outlast us.

Jacob made Joseph promise to take his body up from Egypt and bury him in the burial place of his people. Let’s read the next few verses.

Genesis 50:4–6 NASB95

When the days of mourning for him were past, Joseph spoke to the household of Pharaoh, saying, “If now I have found favor in your sight, please speak to Pharaoh, saying, ‘My father made me swear, saying, “Behold, I am about to die; in my grave which I dug for myself in the land of Canaan, there you shall bury me.” Now therefore, please let me go up and bury my father; then I will return.’ ” Pharaoh said, “Go up and bury your father, as he made you swear.”

Now, did Joseph have to do this? No. Could he have buried his father in the nicest tomb in Egypt? Probably. After all, does it really matter where one is buried? Not really. But if you are going to respect the legacy of one who has gone before you, then you will honor his or her wishes.

But it is an inconvenient thing to have to pack up and travel such a great distance to accomplish this task. If this were today, you would have to take a considerable amount of time off work. The travel would be long, and you wouldn’t be “productive.” But the greatest things in life worth doing should be done slowly. Joseph goes to Pharaoh to ask for permission to fulfill his oath to bury Jacob in Canaan. Fulfilling this promise required awkward conversations and logistical effort. It was going to be hard.

If you are going to finish strong, you will need to choose sacrifice over comfort. Here’s what I want you to do. Identify one spiritual promise or commitment you’ve been putting off—whether it’s getting your household on a budget, getting baptized, or serving—and schedule the conversation or step needed to make it happen this week. You don’t need to complete it this week. You just need to start it this week. What comfort do you need to let go of to make the impact you are being called to make?

Make them feel it.

The question I have asked in every church that I have been a part of is, “If our church closed its doors tomorrow, would the community even notice?” The follow-up question is, “What would we have to do to have such an impact that if our church did close, the community would hold a funeral for it?” We are still in search of the answer to those questions, but I feel like we are getting a little bit closer.

What happens next is quite astonishing. Let’s look at the rest of this section.

Genesis 50:7–14 NASB95

So Joseph went up to bury his father, and with him went up all the servants of Pharaoh, the elders of his household and all the elders of the land of Egypt, and all the household of Joseph and his brothers and his father’s household; they left only their little ones and their flocks and their herds in the land of Goshen. There also went up with him both chariots and horsemen; and it was a very great company. When they came to the threshing floor of Atad, which is beyond the Jordan, they lamented there with a very great and sorrowful lamentation; and he observed seven days mourning for his father. Now when the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, saw the mourning at the threshing floor of Atad, they said, “This is a grievous mourning for the Egyptians.” Therefore it was named Abel-mizraim, which is beyond the Jordan. Thus his sons did for him as he had charged them; for his sons carried him to the land of Canaan and buried him in the cave of the field of Machpelah before Mamre, which Abraham had bought along with the field for a burial site from Ephron the Hittite. After he had buried his father, Joseph returned to Egypt, he and his brothers, and all who had gone up with him to bury his father.

Jacob’s death didn't just affect his family. The entire nation of Egypt, including very prominent figures, marched with Joseph to honor Jacob. This might be in part because of Joseph’s position and what he accomplished as second in command of Egypt, but Jacob also lived in Egypt for seventeen years. That’s time for people to get to know him, for him to have his own impact on people.

Your value, though, is not derived from how many people come to your funeral. Your value is solely in the relationship you have with Jesus Christ. He loved you so much that he traded his life for yours, his righteousness for your sin. It is from that he calls us to step into the work of advancing his kingdom through influence. You have influence. We have influence. Use your influence intentionally for the gospel of Jesus Christ.

What is your life? What is the impact you are going to make? How are the people in your life going to feel it? Ask yourself: How is my personal life, and our collective church, serving our neighbors so intentionally that the gospel is unmistakable to those around us? What would you need to do individually to begin investing in people around you? For some of us, we are going to have to be very intentional about making new friends. All you need is one. If everyone in this church invested in one person who was far from God, we could change Three Rivers.

How do we do that? I’m glad you asked. I am committing in 2027 to do an event once per quarter that will put us face to face with people in our community. We are starting next month. We are going to buy gift cards to the Lowes grocery store and pass them out to members of our community to help with groceries. We know it’s getting more expensive, and we want to use some of the resources God has given us to pour back into our community. That’s going to happen on October 7th. Our Wednesday night folks have been helping me plan it and I like what we are putting together so far. We will have a prayer station set up and we will have some gospel material and information about our church to hand out. This will introduce us to people who are not a part of our church.

Another opportunity is the Faith & Finances class I will be running starting near the end of January. We want our community to know how they can master handling money God’s way and commit to walking with them as God transforms their money and relationships. Opportunities abound. We just need to pick one and do it with excellence.

How can you take the time, the skills, and the knowledge God has given you to invest in one person over the long haul?

Finishing strong is not about leaving a famous name behind. It is about making a lasting, gospel-driven mark on your family and community that outlives you.

Are you ready to step into what God has for you?