Beyond planning for wealth and health, a looming retirement crisis centers on maintaining a sense of "mattering" – feeling valued and useful in later life.



At some point in the arc of a life, you begin to realize you have fewer years ahead of you than you have behind you. It’s called getting old. When this happens, you begin to give increased attention to things you may have put off to the side during younger years, such as your health or retirement.

In a recent piece in the Wall Street Journal, Jennifer Breheny Wallace pointed out the retirement crisis that no one warns you about: mattering. We plan for future wealth and health, but give little thought to what it will take to continue to feel seen and heard. She writes of the angst that ambushes many:

It was an erosion in... their sense of mattering, the deep human need to feel valued and to have a chance to add value to the world. We plan for our wealthspan and healthspan, mapping out financial security and physical well-being. Yet very few of us prepare for an equally essential dimension of retirement: our mattering span, or how we will continue to feel seen, useful, and capable of making a difference in this next chapter of life.

She notes that the consequences are profound. Citing a 2020 meta-analysis published in the journal Healthcare, nearly a third experienced depressive symptoms. The psychological losses embedded in retirement – feeling less valued, needed, or connected – were strong predictors of postretirement depression.

This is not an issue for a small minority of marginalized people. More than 11,000 Americans turn 65 every day. By 2030, one in five will be of retirement age. Wallace rightly notes that as advances in medicine afforded longer lifespans, sustaining a sense of mattering has become a defining challenge of aging.

This changes the question from How long will I live? to How will I continue to matter while I do?

I once did a message series on the seasons of life. If interested, you can get a hold of it here. I outlined how the twenties is the age of new beginnings; the thirties is the age of second thoughts; and the forties is often the age of unhappiness.

And the fifties and beyond?

The age of investing.

The latter chapters of your life are when you have the most to invest in terms of money, time, and wisdom. Biblically, there are three areas we are directly called to invest in: mentees, grandchildren, and the cause of Christ through the local church of which we are a part.

Just think of the role Jethro played in the life of his son-in-law Moses in terms of wisdom (Genesis 18), or that Timothy’s grandmother Lois played in his embrace of the Christian faith (II Timothy 1). But the clarion call is to throw ourselves into the life of the Church and its mission to the least and the lost. As Paul counseled Timothy:

“Tell those rich in this world’s wealth to quit being so full of themselves and so obsessed with money, which is here today and gone tomorrow. Tell them to go after God, who piles on all the riches we could ever manage — to do good, to be rich in helping others, to be extravagantly generous.

“If they do that, they’ll build a treasury that will last, gaining life that is truly life.” (I Timothy 6:17-19, Msg)

The research of Wallace concurred: “In my interviews, the people who regained that sense of being needed tended to follow a simple, repeatable pattern: They identified a genuine need and met it with 3Ts—time, talent, or treasure.”

Sounds like the Bible to me.

The answer to mattering is simple: die to yourself, live for others, and leave a legacy. That means investing in people, investing in family, and investing in the cause of Christ.

Then you won’t have to worry about mattering.

Because you will.

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