My life has been an adventure, a journey filled with struggles and celebrations, ups and downs, challenges and victories. Along the way I have collected a backpack filled with what is becoming my legacy. It's my book, my story.

I have been re-thinking the contents of my legacy, opening the backpack and looking for the fingerprints of God. In that process I have re-visited the following:

• Gut check: My reminder compass. Although my life has had a number of transformational moments, have I remained true to the baseline choice of living my life to make God look good? I want to be like Jesus, not like everyone else.
• In spite of all the negative stuff around me I have a magic mirror. God is blessing me with vision and imagination for the future. It's my faith choice to live toward that vision. Am I distracted, or am I yielding to God's workmanship?
• Along the way I have collected certified WOW moments! These candid shots remind me of the surprise events, the on-the-spot decisions that happened without thought or reflections... they just happened and the adventure took unexpected detours and new directions. Have I trusted God even when he seemed far away?
• On a few occasions I have been blessed to be part of something truly extraordinary. These experiences always pushed me out of myself and into the lives of others. Have I learned anything in the process?

And the backpack still holds secrets; these hidden lessons are in God's hands. Secrets He unveils when the time is right.

You, too, have a backpack. Like me, you are collecting the life-choices that change things. These choices are forever stored away as your private legacy.

So, it's time for your own re-think, your time to open that backpack and explore your legacy thus far.

Good questions make us think outside the box. What’s it like being in partnership with God?

My friend responded: "It’s like being Mel Gibson’s sidekick in Lethal Weapon. He leaps from the 7th story balcony into a swimming pool, surprised that we would have any hesitation in following after him. And, like Indiana Jones’s girlfriend we find ourselves caught up in an adventure of heroic proportion with a God who both entices us with his boldness and energizes and repels us with this willingness to place us in mortal danger, suspended over pits of snakes."

My friend thinks God is wild and dangerous and adventurous and he loves it. What do you think?

Mr. Hitchcock wanted to teach his son Alfred a lesson he would never forget. So, with the cooperation of local police the plan was set.

The scheming father sent young Alfred down the street to the local police station with a note sealed in an envelope. "Wait there for a reply," his father said.

The young boy ran as fast as he could, after all, the note must be important. When he arrived at the police station he meekly handed the envelope to the officer at the front desk.  The policeman tore open the envelope and took his time reading the note. He crumpled up the paper and said, "Come with me, Alfred."

They walked down the hall to a vacant cell. At first Alfred was amazed, he had never seen the inside of a jail before, but his amazement was about to vanish, in a single heartbeat.

When the reached the end of the hall, the policeman opened the cell door on the right and pushed the boy in, slamming the door shut. Alfred was stunned and confused. As the officer walked away, Alfred could sill hear the echoing words, "This is what we do with naughty boys."

For ten minutes young Hitchcock cried, yelled, screamed, and cried some more, but no one was there to hear him. He was alone and terrified. Finally, the officer returned, as the note had instructed, and release the boy without saying a word.

Hitchcock ran and ran and ran. He was free but afraid to go home, afraid to talk about the lesson of the cell. Never again did he trust his father and that jail cell terror stayed with him for the rest of his life.

Oh, he learned to deal with it; he turned it into an uncanny ability to create suspense. He taught us to enjoy being a afraid.

Alfred’s father wanted this to be a lesson that forced his son to grow up, to be a man, but Alfred missed that lesson. He missed the point altogether. He learned to be afraid, very afraid.