Legs in Our Legacy

Developing people as how we want to be remembered

09/23/2024

Mk 9:30-37 Jesus and his disciples left from there and began a journey through Galilee, but he did not wish anyone to know about it. He was teaching his disciples and telling them, “The Son of Man is to be handed over to men and they will kill him, and three days after his death the Son of Man will rise.” But they did not understand the saying, and they were afraid to question him. They came to Capernaum and, once inside the house, he began to ask them, “What were you arguing about on the way?” But they remained silent. They had been discussing among themselves on the way who was the greatest. Then he sat down, called the Twelve, and said to them, “If anyone wishes to be first, he shall be the last of all and the servant of all.” Taking a child, he placed it in their midst, and putting his arms around it, he said to them, “Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me; and whoever receives me, receives not me but the One who sent me.”

A few years after I was ordained I was assigned to St. Raphael Church in Springdale, where my older brother and his family attended Mass. Now, the hardest congregations to preach to are teenagers and older brothers. Why? Well, because teenagers don’t care, and older brothers care too much. One day after Mass, my brother handed me a book on leadership by John Maxwell, and he urged me, “You really need to read this.”

I felt mildly offended and I replied: “Hey, I know how to be a priest! And I was ordained to say Mass and save souls, not to be the CEO of a Fortune 500 company.” But I was wrong and Paul was right. Think about it. Some of the biggest blunders pastors make is not how they celebrate Mass or preach the gospel, but whether or not they have mastered basic leadership skills; how to lead a congregation.

John Maxwell once share how he was mentored by legendary Coach John Wooden, who had won 10 basketball championships, the most ever. And Maxwell asked Wooden what he wanted to be remembered for, what he wanted his legacy to be. And surprisingly, Wooden replied he did not want to be remembered for his championships. Rather, he wanted to be known by his players as a coach who prepared them for life. That they did life better, not just play basketball better.

And then John Maxwell used a memorable phrase saying, ‘Legacy has legs in it.” That is, just like you can see the word “leg” in “legacy,” so too, people (symbolized by legs) are the best legacy we can be known for. A priest-friend of mine jokes, “You know it would be great being a priest if it wasn’t for all the people!” But that comment is a perfect failure to learn a critical lesson of leadership: namely, legacy has legs in it. People are an asset, not a liability.

In the gospel today, Jesus is at pains to teach his disciples lessons in priestly leadership, especially about prioritizing people. First he explains his own pending suffering, death, and resurrection for others, but they are clueless. Instead, they start a secret conversation about who’s the greatest. Perhaps they would have defined greatness as winning 10 national championships.

But like Coach Wooden and John Maxwell, Jesus emphasizes that legacy has legs in it. He insists: “He who wishes to be first shall be the last of all, and the servant of all.” That is, make other people more important than yourself. And then he uses the example of paying attention to a small child, that is, take time to teach the next generation. Why? Because legacy has legs in it, especially the legs of little children whom we form to be tomorrow’s leaders.

My friends, let me ask you the same probing question that John Maxwell asked Coach Wooden: “What do you want to be remembered for when you leave this earth? What do you want your legacy to be?” Sometimes we priests can get side tracked like the apostles and think we want to be known for building a new church, or writing books, or becoming a bishop. But all those are secondary goals to touching the lives of other people.

I’ll never forget when we bought the Trinity Junior High building a few years ago. We wanted to honor Msgr. Jack Harris by naming something for him. I called him and suggested several options but he kept objecting, “No, John, I don’t want or need anything named for me.” But I kept asking and so he finally relented and replied: “Okay, fine, name one of the bathroom stalls for me!” Tons of teenagers were deeply influenced by Msgr. Harris. His legacy already has lots of legs in it.

One way to honestly answer what we want to be known for is where we spend most of our time and money. Take out your calendar today and review where you spend most of your time last week or last month, especially your free time. And second, take out your checkbook or bank statement and look carefully at where most of your money went last month.

Whether we want to admit it or not, our time and our money are inevitably being spent on what is most important to us. And whether we like it or not, that is what people will remember us for. In other words, will our legacy have any legs in it? You know, I probably spend most of my time and money on Apollo, so I guess my legacy will have four legs in it.

Let me leave you with a provocative poem, which I also came across in one of John Maxwell’s books, called “A Little Chap.” It goes: “A careful man I ought to be, / A little fellow follows me. / I do not dare to go astray, / For fear he’ll go the self-same way. / I cannot one escape his eyes, / Whatever he sees me do, he tries. / Like me, he says he’s going to be, / The little chap who follows me.

“He thinks that I am good and fine, / Believes in every word of mine. / The base in me he must not see, / That little fellow who follows me. / I must remember as I go, / Thru summer’s sun and winter’s snow, / I am building for the years to be, / This little chape who follows me.” In other words, those little chaps are precisely the legs in our legacy.

Praised be Jesus Christ!