I met with a lady this past weekend who was a missionary kid. Her parents spent 30+ years as missionaries across Latin America. Her aunts and uncles were all missionaries in Africa. Her cousins have all chosen to remain as missionaries in places like Congo, Ghana and the interior of Africa. Her sisters were missionaries. She herself was highly involved in local church ministry plus multiple trips a year to do women's ministry abroad and help foreign missionaries. What a legacy her family has in the Kingdom! How blessed to be the great-grandparent in that family, looking at a series of generations all obediently sold out to Christ! To see God use your "children to bless the nations" is truly a mighty legacy for any leader to behold.

Yesterday we had a gathering of area pastors to welcome a new guy to town. It drew high profile guys, new guys just starting churches, pastors of struggling churches and some "patriarchs" who had been icons of regional church leadership for decades. With many generations represented at the gathering, there was a remarkable distinction in how various generations tended to establish their legacy.

George Harris and Buckner Fanning were looked up to by half the guys in the room because so many of them had been mentored, encouraged, supported, and commissioned by those guys early on in their Christian walk. They saw them as patriarchs of their own ministry journey. The legacy of George and Buckner was that their leadership was beyond themselves - they freely and whole-heartedly invested in raising up others who went on to lead with great independence from them. CBC and BRCC are not "church plants" by either of these guys, yet both pastors were mentored and supported by George.

There was a free loving investment in others by that generation of leaders that stood out as exceptional to the present norm. It's so easy for a church, an organization, a team or any group to only invest by addition - to recruit the best for their own effort and want to grow their team superior to everyone else by "drafting" top talent. Contrast that with how these elder statesmen sent out leaders to go and flourish for the Kingdom without any strings attached.

How do you measure legacy of leadership? Personal reign, personal accomplishment, or the beyond-self passing on of Godly love, counsel, discipling, instruction and wisdom that bears fruit outside the fences of your territory?

How would your leadership legacy be measured today? How will it be in 10 years?

When Jesus was asked by John the Baptist's followers if He was truly the Christ, Jesus pointed at His track record in the lives of people - "the blind now see, the lame walk, and captives are set free."