Legacy series, Part 1

Today's post is lengthy, so you are forewarned! (Grin)
Here is our next focus passage in II Peter:

So I will always remind you of these things, even though you know them and are firmly established in the truth you now have. 13 I think it is right to refresh your memory as long as I live in the tent of this body,14 because I know that I will soon put it aside, as our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me. 15 And I will make every effort to see that after my departure you will always be able to remember these things. (II Peter 1:12-15)

Now that we've read that, I'm going to go offtrack here.....
What would you do if you knew that you only had one month to live?
One week?
One day?
Who would you reach out to, and say, "I love you!"
To whom would you want to speak and tell them the gospel?
To whom would you want to tell about spiritual things?
Would you think about the legacy that you will leave behind on this earth?
Morbid?
No.
Necessary?
Yes, for believers, especially.
In this verse, we could just as easily insert the word "woman" and the word "her" ...... try that as you read:

Many a man proclaims his own loyalty,But who can find a trustworthy man?  A righteous man who walks in his integrity—How blessed are his sons after him. (Proverbs 20:6-7)

A while back, we studied Joseph's life in detail, including his legacy. I got interested in the "other brothers" as well.
One of Joseph's brothers was named Asher. Let's take a look:

All these were the sons of Asher, heads of the fathers’ houses, choice and mighty men of valor, heads of the princes. And the number of them enrolled by genealogy for service in war was 26,000 men. (I Chronicles 7:40, NASB)

If I had not mentioned it, would we have known immediately that this was a brother of Joseph? Would our minds have been searching a bit, wondering, where have I heard that name before....who is Asher?
His name is only listed a few times. In this chapter of I Chronicles, the twelve brothers and their descendants are noted. So, that makes Asher the father of one of the twelve tribes of  Israel.
Let's see if we can ferret out some clues to this man who had a great legacy....

We know from our previous studies that he was raised in a dysfunctional family, as many of us have been. Whether there was a lot of love, or little love in the family is up for conjecture; but we do know that Asher and his brothers often acted out pain and bitterness in hateful behavior. The sons of Jacob were often very angry.
Perhaps Asher (and others) felt insignificant as he was growing up. He was part of a very large family; there were eleven brothers and one sister for Asher to deal with daily. To make matters even worse, his father didn't really care a lot for his mom. His mom was Zilpah, the servant girl of Leah. Many of his brothers called Leah (married to Jacob) their mom, but not Asher. We don't know (the Bible doesn't tell us) how Asher felt about himself as he grew up, but we see situations like this in our day, and sometimes the children feel pretty insignificant. They have problems with their self-esteem.
Not only could Asher have felt insignificant, he and his brothers carried within their consciences a dark secret. They had conspired to sell their brother Joseph into slavery -- and then they spent the next twenty years (and beyond) dealing with their guilt.

It would have been easy for someone in Asher's sandals to give up, but apparently he did not. Listen to what Moses said of Asher's tribe just before they entered into the Promised Land:

Moses said this about the tribe of Asher:“May Asher be blessed above other sons;    may he be esteemed by his brothers;    may he bathe his feet in olive oil. (Deuteronomy 33:24, NLT)

I chose that translation because it noted the oil would be olive oil....that was a very precious commodity during the days of the journeys in the wilderness, and even beyond. For someone to have their feet anointed with a few drops of oil was a sign of honor and of dignity. Moses said that the descendants of Asher would wash their feet with olive oil! They would be people of great prosperity and of nobility. They would be esteemed, and looked up to, by the other tribes.
So, Asher may not have had a lot of things going for him. He may have felt unloved or insignificant. He carried guilt. But he didn't let these circumstances keep him down. He rose above them and did some remarkable things - chiefly in how he impacted his family and his descendants.

Asher left a legacy for his children that every believer should try to emulate. Whether we are parents or not, we can impact the lives of those around us. We'll study more on this tomorrow.....