Ecclesiastes 12:1-7 Remember now your Creator in the days of your youth, while the evil days come not, nor the years draw near, when you shall say… I. WHAT IS IT THAT SOLOMON COUNSELS YOUNG PEOPLE TO REMEMBER? He says, "thy Creator": but what about God does he desire his hearers to keep in mind? 1. His existence, as He proves it. And He proves it most clearly by creating us; He is our Creator: He made us, every one of us, and He now owns us for His possession. 2. God's character, as He exhibits it. The heathen think God is cruel; so they insist He must be propitiated and pleased by bloody sacrifices. 3. God's providence, as He exercises it. Not a moment passes without our having His care. There was one very pleasant story told among the ancients about a person called Erichthonius: they said he was very comely in his body, from the waist upwards, but he had his thighs and legs like the tail of an eel, small and deformed; for a long time he did not understand that he was different from the rest of mankind, but as soon as he became conscious of his hateful weakness, he grew so melancholy that God pitied him; and then He showed him, in a dream, what gave him a fresh and splendid idea; that is to say, this poor shapeless creature was the inventor of the chariot or carriage, whereby his own want could be supplied; so God benefited him, and so he became a benefactor himself to men. Once when this story was related to a child, she suddenly said: "I suppose it is not true exactly; but if it had been, it would have been very kind, add lust like God to do it, too." 4. God's Word, as He has revealed it. The Bible is a message sent directly from our Maker; so He expects us all, young and old, to read it, and find out what it means. The Scriptures do principally teach what we are to believe concerning God, and what duty God requires of man. 5. God's Church, as He has organized it. He gave His only begotten Son that He might be made Head over all things to the Church, which is His body, "the fulness of Him that filleth all in all." II. WHEN, SPECIALLY, ARE WE TO REMEMBER OUR CREATOR? "Now, in the days of thy youth." 1. In the beginning, remember that the young can be Christians. Why not? All they have to do is to come and ask Christ to take them, and make them His children. 2. Remember, therefore, that it is easier for young people to be Christians than it is for others; The spirit of religion is precisely that of a little child, to start with; and a religious career is exquisitely in accordance with a youthful disposition (Matthew 18:8). 3. Remember, once again, that the young have often become Christians. In the Scriptures we have the account of , of Paul's sister's son, of , of John Mark. In the primitive Church the names come to us of , who must have loved Christ when he was four years old; and has often been quoted as saying that there were many boys and girls "who had been considered disciples of the Lord in their childhood, and continued uncorrupted all their lives." Later in history, we know Jonathan Edwards was converted before he was seven, and Matthew Henry before he was eleven years old, Isaac Watts before he reached nine. 4. Remember that the young ought always to be Christians. Many are the children of faithful training and of many prayers. God is true to His covenant, and "the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call." (C. S. Robinson, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh, when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them; |
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