Welcome to the Excel Stillmore podcast. I am your host, Chris Emerson. I'm here to encourage you in your walk with God. Thank you for joining in.

Today's podcast is sponsored by a wonderful company, Creation to Revelation. This group of Christians believe it is extremely important that we teach the Word of God to our kids.

They have original graphic illustrations from the beginning of the Bible to the end,

featuring the beautiful and consistent presence of Jesus throughout.

You can explore all of that at creation to revelation.com.

I'm so thankful you're here, so let's get started. Welcome back. Thank you again for listening in, for joining in. It means a lot.

I want to begin today by giving credit where it is due for today's

title, Leave Things Better. A couple of weeks ago, there was a post on social media by a gospel

preacher friend named Don Truax. Don preaches in Florida in the Temple Terrace Tampa area, and he was reflecting in that

post on the life of his father. It had been 28 years to the day that his father had passed

from this life. It was all very touching. He talked about how he thinks about his dad every day. He recounted the

circumstances that his father endured throughout his life, starting very young. He had things happen in his

life that most of us have never endured. And the entire post really was just a man of faith sharing with his friends how

much he adored the faithfulness of his dad. This leads us to today's title. I want to read a small

section from that post. Brother Don wrote these words. I've been thinking a lot in recent days about the fact that dad was

adamant. In every circumstance, you should leave things better than you found them. Borrow something

from a friend? It had to be returned in better shape than when you received it.

Become part of a local church, work to make it better than when you arrived.

My dad preached for 60 years.

He always sought to leave things better than he found them for the next preacher,

and the church better for his having been there. In my unashamedly biased judgment, I believe he did just that. Leave things better. Okay, so straight up from my perspective,

as someone who is always on the hunt for three word phrases that stick,

...