Leave a legacy...

Today at work we had a non-work related meeting about service. My boss is retiring in a year or two and before he retires, he wanted to share with us some things that he has learned, and hear from some special people in his life. SEFL is such a great company, that they give him the permission to hold these meetings during work hours. They value their people, not just in their professional lives, but in their personal lives as well.
Today we had Rick, a SR. VP come in and speak about Service, and what we would want our legacy's to be like. He started off by first asking us if we wanted to leave a legacy, and if so, how would we go about creating it. There are 3 ways

Serve Others
Be Humble
Encourage Others

He gave us 2 examples of people who serve on a daily basis - Mr. Cassels and Tobin Cassels. They are the CEO and President of SEFL. As you guys know, there is a recession going on. Not a good thing for trucking companies! We were the ONLY LTL (less than truck load) carrier in the USA to not layoff....to not cut salaries....and to continue to match our 401K. I was blown away by this. Mr. Cassels and Tobin decided that they were going to cut costs another way in order to keep their employees working. That is amazing!!! They went against the grain, and I believe that they are going to be rewarded for it!

I have been thinking about what Rick said all day. It has made me think about our society, and how far we are from these 3 things! Right now everything is all for personal gain. We are a culture that puts "self" before anything else. We want to do what is right, fair and just for ourselves, then we will worry about everyone else. We don't serve unless it fits our schedule and doesn't take us out of our comfort zone. We aren't humble - we are conceited and arrogant. We don't encourage enough because nothing is ever good enough. We get into the daily grind of our day and we don't stop to think about the people around us. I am guilty of this too at times. I get so caught up in what I need to do, want to do and I forget that there is a whole other world out there! Life isn't about me! Christ was the ultimate example.

"He made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant..." (Philippians 2:7)

I don't want to be an arrogant person. I want to think of myself last. I want to be sensitive to the Spirit to hear when He tells me to divert from my plan and serve or encourage. I want to be humble. I want to leave a legacy...