Your Spiritual Legacy: 4 Ways to Shape the Next Chapter

Revised October 18, 2026

What will your grandchildren remember about you? Will it be something you gave them, something you said, or perhaps the way you lived your life?

You can leave behind jewelry that gets lost, heirlooms that break, and coins that sit forgotten in a drawer. But the values you live by and the way you follow Jesus can influence your family for generations. That’s your spiritual legacy.

Like little private detectives, our grandchildren are watching us. They listen to our words, notice our choices, and often model our actions. Whether we realize it or not, we’re building a spiritual legacy through the everyday moments we share with them.

And here’s the wonderful thing: Your spiritual legacy isn’t just something you leave behind when you die. It’s something you’re building while you’re alive.

We can’t control the stories our grandchildren will tell about us someday, but we can be intentional about the legacy we’re creating. And no matter where we are in our spiritual journey, there’s always room to grow.

Your Spiritual Legacy Is a Story in Progress.

4 Ways You Can Thicken the Plot

1. Sharing: Talk About the Legacy You’ve Already Built.

Many of us have spent our lives teaching, fighting fires, serving in the military, raising families, or helping others in countless ways. Chances are the choices we made along the way were shaped by what we believe is important.

And behind those choices are stories worth telling.

Think about the times you helped someone in need, stood up for what was right, or faced a difficult decision. What guided you? What did you learn? Those experiences can become wonderful conversations with your grandchildren.

What character values matter most to you? Honesty? Kindness? Courage? Hard work?

When you notice your grandchildren demonstrating one of these qualities, tell them why it matters to you. Maybe they’ve worked especially hard to accomplish something or shown kindness to someone who needed a friend. Those are wonderful opportunities to share the values that have guided your own life.

And what about your faith? Do you believe in God? Have you ever experienced something that made you feel especially close to Him? Have you lived through a frightening situation that changed the way you think about life?

These are all pieces of your spiritual legacy.

Our grandchildren are growing up surrounded by ideas and opinions from friends, school, social media, and the wider world. As they begin deciding what they believe and what kind of people they want to become, wouldn’t it be wonderful for them to have the perspective of someone who has lived a little longer and loves them dearly?

I know firsthand what it’s like to wish a grandparent had shared more.

Growing up, I lived several states away from all my grandparents, and both of my grandfathers died when I was in elementary school. As a result, I’ve pieced together much of what I know about their spiritual lives from small clues.

I know they both married their wives in Methodist churches. And somehow, I ended up with a cross that belonged to one of my grandfathers.

But was Jesus important to them? Did they pray? What did they believe about God?

I really don’t know.

I wish I did.

The legacy was there. The stories were missing.

That’s one reason I believe it’s important to share our stories, our values, and our faith with our grandchildren. We don’t need to have all the answers or deliver a sermon. Sometimes a simple story about a choice we made, a prayer God answered, or a lesson we learned can open the door to a meaningful conversation.

And for those of us who live far away from our grandchildren, sharing these things intentionally can be especially important.

As our grandchildren grow, they’ll encounter plenty of people eager to tell them what matters in life. What a gift it is when a grandparent can offer something different: the wisdom of experience, the reassurance of unconditional love, and an honest glimpse into a life shaped by faith.

You don’t have to have lived a perfect life to share a meaningful spiritual legacy. You simply have to be willing to share your story.

2. Discovering: Where Are You, and Where Do You Want to Be?

Let’s take an honest but gentle look at our spiritual lives today. What’s meaningful to you? What’s missing? Is there something you’d like to explore or rediscover?

These are big questions, and you don’t have to answer them all at once. Sometimes the best place to begin is by looking at the ordinary things we do and asking ourselves why.

Here are four places to start.

1. Your Relationship With Church.

The COVID pandemic may be behind us, but some of the changes it brought to our spiritual lives have lingered.

Between 2020 and 2023, many of us traded attending church in person for watching services online. And when churches reopened, not everyone returned.

Some people began questioning what meaningful church involvement looked like for them. Did they really want to organize another craft fair fundraiser? Was Sunday evening service necessary? Were they finding the spiritual connection they needed?

Others simply discovered they enjoyed the freedom of an unstructured Sunday morning. We can admit that!

But perhaps you’ve been missing the friendships, worship, or sense of belonging that came with attending church. Maybe you’d like to return, find a different congregation, or explore a new way of connecting with other Christians.

The question isn’t whether you’re attending church as often as you once did. It’s whether your spiritual life is giving you the connection and opportunities for growth you’re looking for.

2. The Things You Say About God

Sometimes the words we use out of habit can reveal interesting things about our beliefs.

For example, when someone dies, we might comfort a child by saying, “Grandma is in Heaven now.”

But have you ever stopped to think about what you’re saying?

You’re expressing a belief that our lives continue beyond death. Is that what you believe? Do you think everyone who lives a good life goes to Heaven? Or do you believe eternal life comes through faith in Jesus?

These are important questions, and perhaps ones you haven’t thought about in a while.

The same goes for the familiar expression “thoughts and prayers.” We hear it after everything from natural disasters to someone’s broken leg.

But what do we actually believe about prayer?

Do we believe God cares about the everyday details of our lives? That He hears us when we pray? And are we making room for prayer in our own lives?

You don’t have to have every answer figured out. But exploring what you believe, and why you believe it, can be a meaningful part of growing spiritually.

3. The Causes That Touch Your Heart.

Think about the charities you support or the people whose generosity you admire.

My neighbor organizes a charity dog walk every year, and I admire her commitment to helping animals in local shelters.

Perhaps you’re drawn to feeding hungry families, supporting veterans, helping children, or caring for people who are lonely.

Why do certain causes touch our hearts more than others?

Our generosity often reflects the values we hold dear. Compassion, kindness, justice, and caring for others are all qualities that Jesus taught and demonstrated.

You might discover that you’re already putting some of your deepest beliefs into practice without thinking of them as spiritual activities.

And perhaps there’s a cause you’ve always wanted to support but haven’t gotten around to yet.

What matters to you, and how would you like to express those values in the years ahead?

4. The Way You Celebrate Holidays.

As I write this, the Christmas season is approaching, and I can already feel myself getting annoyed by the commercialism. You too?

Sometimes I wonder how a season celebrating the birth of Jesus became so focused on shopping, decorating, and Amazon deliveries.

Maybe you’d like to make Christmas a little more meaningful this year. Not necessarily by doing more, but by being more intentional about what you do.

Last year, I took my oldest grandson to deliver a toy to the Toys for Tots collection box at our community center.

I deliberately bought a toy like one he already enjoyed playing with and asked him to carry it inside and place it in the donation box.

Of course, he was very interested in checking out all the cool toys other people had donated!

But it also gave us a chance to talk about caring for others and being thankful for what we have.

And it was certainly more enjoyable than Costco on a Saturday morning. Ha ha!

It wasn’t a grand spiritual lesson or an elaborate Christmas tradition. Just a small moment of generosity that we shared together.

Sometimes that’s all it takes to begin bringing our values into the everyday experiences we share with our grandchildren.

A Little Reflection Goes a Long Way.

As you think about these four areas, you may discover that some parts of your spiritual life are already deeply meaningful. Others might deserve a little more attention.

That’s perfectly fine.

This isn’t about measuring how spiritual you are. It’s about discovering what matters to you now and what you’d like to nurture in the years ahead.

And the wonderful thing is that you don’t have to wait until you have everything figured out to begin sharing your faith with your grandchildren.

You can keep growing right alongside them.

3. Growth: Who Am I Becoming as I Grow Older?

Faith development for those of us over 60 can be tricky.

If you inwardly groan at the thought of another sermon on the Parable of the Talents, you know what I mean.

You’ve heard the Bible stories multiple times, purchased the devotionals, attended the retreats, and participated in the Bible studies. And somewhere along the way, you may have found yourself on a spiritual plateau.

You still believe in God. You still value your faith. But you wonder, What’s next?

How do we continue growing spiritually as we grow older? One answer I’ve found is to revisit some of the old Christian classics. Authors like E. M. Bounds, Oswald Chambers, and Hannah Whitall Smith challenge me to think more deeply about my relationship with God. Their writings encourage me to move beyond what I’ve always known and consider what I still have to learn.

Another answer comes from the old saying, “If you want to learn something, teach it.”

And who better to teach than our grandchildren?

Teach a young grandchild how to say grace before a meal. Tell them the Parable of the Talents, even if you’ve heard it a hundred times yourself. Ask an older grandchild what they think a Bible story means.

You might be surprised by their questions. Children have a wonderful way of noticing things we’ve stopped paying attention to.

And when a grandchild asks something you can’t answer, what a perfect opportunity to explore the question together!

Sometimes looking at familiar truths through younger eyes is exactly what we need to blow a little dust off our own spiritual lives.

Maybe your faith hasn’t become stale. Perhaps it’s simply changed.

At 65, we may have questions about God that never occurred to us at 35. We’ve experienced loss, disappointment, answered prayers, unanswered prayers, and unexpected blessings.

Those experiences can deepen our faith, but they can also challenge what we’ve always believed.

Sometimes spiritual growth means asking new questions rather than simply learning more answers.

I do think that as we grow older, we have to take more responsibility for our own spiritual growth. We can’t always rely on someone else to challenge us, encourage us, or show us what comes next.

It’s a journey we have to choose for ourselves, even when we don’t know exactly where it will lead.

And perhaps that’s one of the gifts of growing older: discovering that God still has more to teach us.

4. Hope: The Next Chapter Is Yours to Write.

One good thing about a spiritual legacy is that it isn’t finished until our final day.

Perhaps you’ve spent decades faithfully praying for your family and sharing your love for Jesus. Or maybe you’re just beginning to think seriously about the spiritual influence you want to have.

Either way, there’s still a story unfolding.

You can’t go back and change the years behind you. But you can decide what you’d like the next chapter to look like. Imagine the possibilities.

Maybe that means reconnecting with God after a long absence. Perhaps it’s sharing stories you’ve never told your grandchildren, starting a habit of prayer, or exploring questions about faith that you’ve carried for years.

It doesn’t have to be something big, either. It can be as simple as a Bible on a table.

I remember visiting my grandma Glady after she moved into a studio apartment at a senior living center.

She had this immense Bible sitting on her coffee table. In the front was a section where she had recorded the marriages, births, and deaths of our family members.

To me, as a child, that Bible held the mysteries of the ages. God’s Word, surrounded by the names of generations of our family.

I could almost feel our family resting under God’s watchful eye, generation after generation.

I don’t remember Grandma Glady giving me a lesson about spiritual legacy. But I remember that Bible.

And all these years later, I still think about what it represented.

The End?

Not quite.

Fortunately, you don’t need to have everything figured out before you begin.

The wonderful thing about a spiritual legacy is that it grows through ordinary moments, small decisions, and the love we share with the people around us.

You may never know exactly how your life will influence future generations. But that doesn’t mean your influence isn’t there.

And while you’re helping shape the spiritual lives of your grandchildren, you may discover that God is still shaping yours.

You can’t rewrite the chapters you’ve already lived, but you still have a say in what happens next. And with God’s help, the next chapter of your spiritual legacy might be the most meaningful one yet.

More Posts About Spiritual Legacy.

Save to Your Pinterest Board: