Don’t Make Your Eulogy a Lie

Here is a sobering exercise for the end of a year. Write the eulogy you hope someone could honestly read at your funeral. What would you want them to say about how you loved God, your family and your neighbours?

Then, on the morning you want to hit snooze, or skip the prayer, or ignore your kids for the phone, ask yourself: will I make that person a liar?

Ecclesiastes says something that sounds strange: “A good name is better than precious ointment; and the day of death than the day of one’s birth.” Then: “It is better to go to the house of mourning, than to go to the house of feasting.” Thinking about the end helps us live the middle well.

Moses prayed, “So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.” Tomorrow the year ends. Number your days. Decide what you want said, and start living it.