The Seeds We Sow

When the mass of men leads lives of quiet desperation, the next generation will lead lives of violent desperation. We have entered that phase. The legacy of apathy is breeding a culture of death. A culture of death looks for counterfeit life in subhuman or transhuman configurations. This is where we are heading. The legacy of a culture of death are not memorial stones but gravestones. Forget Christian Society-- it’s the end of civilized society. Subhuman instincts with transhuman aspirations. It’s biotechnological dystopia. It’s gender identity scrabble. It’s Sodom and Gomorrah climbing the Tower of Babel.

No, the kids are not alright. But how did we get here?

Everyone leaves a Legacy. We walk through life scattering seeds along the path for those that will walk behind us. When those seeds grow, they may become a beautiful fruit-bearing plant for the next generation. Or they may become an invasive and tenacious weed. The generations to come will be blessed or cursed by what we leave behind.

Before Jesus died he said he had fulfilled the mission for which He was sent. His earthly legacy was complete and He was satisfied. He said to His Father in John 14:7: “I glorified you on earth, having accomplished the work that you gave me to do.”

Before he said this, he told his disciples in John 12:23-24: “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Truly, truly, I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a seed; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.”

This is the natural order of things, the succession of life. We have our seasons in the sun, when our flowers and fruit are on full display, like lighthouses signaling to the next generation that they will be okay when we're gone. During this season we work and we sow. Consciously or not, we are building our legacies. Eventually, the beauty of our flower fades and our fruit falls. Our seeds mature and sink into the ground to become the hope of the next generation.

Those seeds contain the story of you and the story of me and the story of us. Our legacies are contained in the seeds we leave behind.

What are we leaving behind?

I recently trudged through Isaiah 5. “Trudged” because, friends, it’s not a pleasant read. But we can’t breathe with our head in the sand. It’s a passage about a legacy gone wrong. It is laced with “woes” and warnings and tales of trauma. It talks of sins as old as Adam and as fresh as today’s Twitter feed.

Isaiah 5 feels like it was written for a 2024 audience. I suppose it was. After all, it’s only taken a couple of rudderless generations for our nation to become lost at sea. We like to make fun of millennials and Gen Z. I mean, it’s fun. But if we think they are flawed it’s because we failed to leave them a foundation upon which to build. They are the product of two to three generations of legacy decline. Without an anchor they have become a cork in the ocean. They will float on every new wave and current that they find themselves in.

No clear direction. No clear purpose. No absolute truth. No respect for elders… because we’ve taught them to worship the young and strong and beautiful and wealthy and charismatic.

It’s our fault. It’s my fault.

Short of a widespread revival, which we pray for, only an intentional shift in legacy-building will change this course.

The time is now.