23/04/2016
4 Reasons to Remember Your Creator in Your Youth
Our enemy says, “Youth for pleasure, middle age for business, old age for religion.”
The Bible says, “Youth, middle age, and old age for your Creator.”
But as it’s especially in our youth that we are most inclined (determined?) to forget our Creator, it’s
especially in these years that we must work to remember our Creator (Ecc.12:1).
Remember that He made you, that He provides for you, that
He cares for you, that He watches you, that He controls you; and remember that He can save you too. That’s a lot to remember, but it’s much easier to start memorizing when we are young!
1. Energetic years However, that’s not the only reason why God commands us to remember our Creator in our young years. It’s also because these are our most energetic years.
Why wait until we are pe***ng out, until we are running down, until our gas is almost
empty, before serving our Creator? The God who made us deserves our most active and healthy years: our bodies are strong and muscular (well kind of), our minds are sharp and clear, our senses are
receptive and keen and sensitive, our enthusiasm is bright and bushy, our wills are steely and determined.
Remember Him in your energetic years.
2. Sensitive years Why do far more of us become Christians in our youth than in our middle or old age? It’s
because youthful years are sensitive years. Without giving up our belief in “Total Depravity” we can say that it’s “easier” to believe and repent
when we are younger. It’s never easy, but it’s easier. And it’s easier because as we get
older our heart is hardened thicker, our conscience is seared number, our sins root
deeper, our deadness
becomes deader.
Let’s use our youthful
sensitivity and receptivity to remember our Creator before the evil days of callous indifference set in.
3. Teachable years We learn more in our youth than in any other period of life. That’s true in all subjects, but especially true in religious instruction. All the Christians I’ve met who were converted to Christ late in life have expressed huge regrets about how little they know and how little they can now learn.
I encourage them to value and use whatever time the Lord gives them, but they often feel they have to study twice as
hard to learn half as well.
4. Dangerous years
Young years are minefield years: hormones, peer
pressure, alcohol, drugs, po*******hy, immorality, testosterone, etc. Few navigate these years without blowing
up here and there. Dangers abound on every side – and
on the inside. How many “first” temptations become
“last” temptations! How much we need our Creator to keep
us and carry us through this battlefield.
Remember to remember Let me then give you some
helps to remember your Creator during these best of
years (and “worst” of years):
Be persuaded that you
have a Creator: Get well grounded in a literal understanding of Genesis 1-2 and shun all evolutionary influences.
Get to know your
Creator: Study His Word using sermons,
commentaries, and good books. But also study His World using microscopes and telescopes and any
other instruments
He gives. Join with your Creator’s
friends: Build friendships
with other creatures that love to remember and respect their Creator.
Follow your Creator’s
order: He set and gave
the pattern of six days
work followed by one
day of rest for
contemplation of
His Works.
Ask for your Creator’s
salvation: Even if your
rejection of your Creator has broken you in pieces,
He’s willing to re-create you in His image.
And while we’re on the subject of salvation, I don’t want elderly readers to be
discouraged. Compared to the aeons of eternity, you are still in your “youth.” It’s not too late to remember Him, before these evil days come even nearer.
-Godwin Gbegbene
Firebrand Network of Africa-YOUTH Alive
