“Don’t let the excitement of youth cause you to forget your Creator. Honor him in your youth before you grow old and say, “Life is not pleasant anymore.” Ecclesiastes 12:1
The days of your youth are such an important time in life. It is the time when you lay a foundation for life. You are setting your course. You are developing attitudes and habits, whether good or bad. And you are making decisions that will affect you for the rest of your life. You are sowing seeds that you will reap in the years ahead. Solomon wrote, “Do not let the excitement of youth cause you to forget your Creator. Honor him in your youth before you grow old and say, ‘Life is not pleasant anymore’” (Ecclesiastes 12:1 NLT).
When you are young, you like action. You like change. A common phrase young people use is “I’m bored.” But when you get older, you kind of start to like boredom. The older you get, the more you enjoy routine. On the other hand, when you are young, you are thinking about life and looking at the future. You are open to things. And you might say, “I do want to get right with God. I do want to be a spiritual person. But right now, I am too young. I have so much that I want to do, so much fun I want to have. I am going to commit myself to Christ at a later date. I will get around to it eventually.” However months turn into years. And years turn into decades. That is not to say that someone cannot come to Christ when they are older. But the fact is that 80 percent of people who come to Jesus Christ do so before their eighteenth birthday. It gets more difficult with each year that passes, because you become more set in your ways. And by the time you are older, you just might say, “Do not bother with me. I really do not care anymore.”
I gave my life to Christ at age seventeen. Occasionally I run into old friends from back then, and we reminisce a bit. Some of them followed the Lord, and some of them did not. And when I look at my friends who did not follow the Lord and the courses their lives took, I can see the toll sin has taken on them and how it has ravaged them physically. Then I look at my life. I followed Christ. When they were out doing all their stuff, I was going to Bible studies, praying, and growing in the Lord. And what I gave up is so small in comparison to what I received in return. Life goes by so quickly. It does not seem that way when you are young. But the older you get; the faster life will seem to clip by. Then one day you will wake up, look in the mirror, and see an old person staring back at you. And you will say, “When did that happen?” Here is the good news: If you have lived for Jesus Christ all those years, you have lost nothing (except maybe a few hairs). You are getting closer to the day when you will see Him face-to-face. And you can look back with no regrets.
