Ecclesiastes 12

Ecclesiastes 12:1

GETTING RIGHT WITH GOD, NOWA Sermon to ChildrenEcc_12:1.“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” (Ecclesiastes 12:1).I AM glad, boys and girls, to talk to you for a few minutes this morning. I suspect that if I should ask you what I should talk about, some of you might answer as one little chap did, when a certain preacher asked the same question. His reply was, “Talk about a minute, mister.”I am going to talk to you about ten minutes. In other words, I am going to preach to you what we call a sermonette. A sermonette is a little sermon, a short sermon; and boys and girls are entitled to a little sermon or a short sermon.I am going to talk to you about getting your hearts right with God while you are yet young. That is why I picked out this text—“Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth”.I am going to give you some good reasons why it is easier to become a Christian while you are yet a child than it will be when you get to be a man or a woman.When I was a small boy in the South, and yes, after I got to be a big boy as well, I raised tobacco.

That is why I hate it so now. I had to work in it so constantly when I was a lad, and had to smell the vile stuff so often, that I haven’t wanted to see much of it since I became a man.If people want to defile their bodies with tobacco smoke or by chewing, that is their business, I suppose; but I hope none of you will ever adopt that filthy habit.Mr. Harry Maxwell who used to go with me in evangelistic work, had a little couplet that he taught the boys and girls. It went like this: “Tobacco is a filthy weed,It was the devil that sowed the seed,It dulls the senses, scents the clothes,And makes a chimney out of your nose.”Now there is something about “setting out tobacco,” as we called it, that I want you to see as an illustration of what I am teaching this morning.How many of you ever saw any tobacco? Well, how many of you have ever seen any cabbage? Oh, yes, lots of you have seen cabbage. All right, the principle is the same.If you are going to set out cabbage plants, you have to pull them up when they are young, and it is just so with tobacco. We used to go to the tobacco bed and pull up the little plants, not longer than your finger, and after a rain we would stick our finger in the ground, make a hole, put in the root of the little plant, and then press the wet dirt around the root, and the little plant would live and grow right off.Now someone might say, “What did you pull up the little plants for? Why didn’t you let them get big before you transplanted them?”Just because you can’t transplant them so easily when they get big.

They do not do so well when they get big. The reason is that their roots have gone down deeply into the ground and taken hold of sticks, roots and rocks and when you pull them up, you break these little tendrils that take hold on the ground, and at every break there is a bleeding.

We call it sap, but it is the life blood of the plant. It is not like the red blood that comes out of your finger. It is white blood, but it is the life of the plant just the same.If you walk around the field a day or two after you have planted the big plants, you will see them all wilting down, and many of them dying because of this bleeding or loss of sap. Not so, if you put out the little plants. If you go around a day or two after they are planted, you will find them sticking up just as pert as though nothing had happened to them. They stick up like rabbit ears.

That is because their roots are not broken; that is because they have not taken such deep hold upon the earth.That is the way with boys and girls. The tendrils of their hearts have not twined themselves around the things of this earth—the things that are bad, the things that are gross, the things that are low—and when they are transplanted into the Church of God, they grow spiritually as they grow in stature and in wisdom, and become strong men and women for Christ.So it is the time when it is easiest to make this change from the world and the flesh to Christ and the Church.It is also the best time!

Somebody has said that if you save a man or woman in old age, you have saved a soul; but if you win a boy or girl to Christ, you have saved a life, a man or a woman, body and spirit. All his days, then, belong to God and all his life is lived for Him.When I was a pastor at Lafayette, Indiana, my next door neighbor was William Levering, a grand old man in the seventies. One day we were visiting together. Just because he was such a useful Christian, one of the most outstanding Sunday School men on the American continent, I asked him the question, “How long have you been a Christian?” He said, “Ever since I can remember. I gave my heart to Christ when I was seven years old. I am seventy now, and I have been a Christian for sixty-three years.”You see what that meant!

He hadn’t wasted any of his life. He hadn’t given any of it to Satan.

He hadn’t squandered any of it on fleshly lusts. He had lived it all for God and for His Son and for the Church. How beautiful and how blessed! That is what it means for boys and girls to come to Christ. All of your life is thus saved and sanctified to God’s service.But it is not only the easiest and the best time to get your heart right with God, but for most of you it is the only time.You will either seek and find Him now, in your youth, or you will never find Him at all.Older people are seldom converted. Old men and old women are very rarely converted.When I was a pastor in Bloomington, Illinois, I said in my sermon one night, “If there were a thousand men in Bloomington who had seen sixty summers or more, and I had them all in my audience and preached my heart out to them, there wouldn’t be two out of the thousand saved.”At the close of the service, an old man came up to me and said, “My boy, you know how much I love you; and you know I like to hear you preach.

But you hurt me tonight.”I said, “How so?”He said, “I am sixty years old and five more. I am sixty-five.

You told me I couldn’t be saved.” “No,” I answered, “I didn’t tell you you couldn’t be saved. What I told you was that you wouldn’t be saved. I said, ‘If there were a thousand men over sixty years of age hearing me preach, and I preached my heart out, there would not be more than two of them ever saved, one in five hundred,’ but that is not God’s fault. That is their fault. They could all be saved if they would, but they won’t, that is all. Old men’s hearts are hard. Old men’s habits are fixed. Old men seldom or never make a change.”The tears came into his eyes, and he said, “Well, if that is so, then I will be saved.

I will seek the Lord now. I will give my heart to Him tonight.” And he did. I baptized him and his wife and another old man and his wife all on the same evening.But now I have been in the ministry forty-seven years, and I have seldom baptized people of that age. In this time I have baptized hundreds, yes, thousands of boys and girls, and I have buried scores of old men and old women who lived without Christ, and they died without Christ; so seldom is it that an old man or an old woman seeks the Lord.So I am saying to you, Either get right with God in your youth, or you will never get right.I have tested it out in many audiences and asked, “How many people are there here who were converted after sixty years of age?” In an audience of 1,000, 1,500, or 2,000 there have been one or two rise.“How many were converted after fifty years of age?” and three or four would get up.“How many were converted forty years of age or after?” and possibly four or five would rise.“How many were converted after thirty years of age?” and there would be five to ten.“How many were converted before they were eighteen years of age?” and two-thirds of the house would rise.What is that but positive proof that we either find the Lord in our youth or we never find Him at all? There are some exceptions to be sure, but exceptions prove the rule. The rule is—a Christian in youth or never!“But,” you say, “why should I be a Christian?” There are three or four reasons, any one of which would be sufficient.First, Christ loved you and gave Himself for you.

That certainly ought to beget your love in turn.Second, Christ offers to receive you and is abundantly able to save you. That should make instant appeal, and bring quick response.Third, the saved boy or the saved girl is the safe boy or the safe girl.

You are safe in sickness and in health. You are safe whether you live or die, if you are only the Lord’s. Paul said, “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain”. So, in either, he found he was happy and content.It is so with the true Christian. Many of you will live to be men and women. Some few of you will live to be old men and old women. A great many of you will die while you are boys and girls or young men and young women. It is beautiful to live right; it is blessed to be able to die content and without fear.Little Annie Ashpurvis lived in New York city in a tenement house.

Her mother was very, very poor, and the house a wretched old place. Annie used to go with her brother down to the riverside and pick up the logs and pieces of bark and driftwood that came along and struck shore. They carried this home, put it in the basement, and dried it out so that on the cold days they could have a fire.One bitter day, Mrs. Ashpurvis said to Annie, “Go down in the basement and get some wood and put it in the stove. It is cold here. You will have to take the lamp, for you know it is dark down there.”So Annie picked up the oil lamp, and started down to the basement for wood.

It was so cold, somebody had spilled water on the steps, and it had frozen into ice. When Annie’s feet touched this ice, they slipped, and when she fell, she dropped the lamp, and broke it, and the coal oil splashed on her clothes and took fire, and in a minute or so, Annie was badly burned.

Her mother ran to her assistance and carried her upstairs. A doctor and nurse were called. Annie lived until about the middle of the night. The doctor who had been out seeing other patients, came back to see Annie, knowing how near death she was. When he came in, he went over, picked up her hand and felt of her pulse. It was very feeble and missing occasionally. He turned around, beckoned the nurse over to the window and whispered to her, “She will not live many minutes.”Annie, although covered with cotton batting in which they had wrapped her, heard what he said. She was a mission girl and had given her heart to Christ and was a true Christian.

Immediately upon hearing that, she commenced to sing, “Jesus, Lover of my soul, Let me to Thy bosom fly,While the nearer waters roll, While the tempest still is high.Hide me, O, my Saviour hide, Till the storm of life is past;Safe into the Haven guide, O receive my soul at last.”She sang the first verse in good voice, and the doctor was amazed at her strength. He walked over to the bed and looked at her, and she commenced on the second verse. “Other refuge have I none; Hangs my helpless soul on Thee;Leave, oh, leave me not alone, Still support and comfort me,All my trust on Thee is stayed, All my help from Thee I bring;Cover my defenseless head With the shadow of Thy wing.”Her voice had weakened some, but it was still clear. She then picked up the last verse, for she knew them all. “Plenteous grace with Thee is found, Grace to cover all my sin;Let the healing streams abound; Make and keep me pure within.Thou of life the Fountain art, Freely let me take of Thee;Spring Thou up within my heart, Rise to all eternity.”She ended the verse in a whisper. The doctor looked down into her face. It was still. He picked up her hand, and felt of her pulse. It had ceased. He turned around and walked to the window, and as the tears coursed his cheeks, he said to the nurse, “I have seen lots of people die, but this is the first time I have ever seen anyone just sing their way from earth to Heaven.”Isn’t it beautiful to be able to do that? Every boy and every girl who gives his or her heart to Christ will be blessed, and whether you live or die, you will be the Lord’s and you will be happy in Him.