“Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth; and let thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thine heart, and in the sight of thine eyes: but know thou, that for all these things God will bring thee into judgment”— Ecclesiastes 11:99Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth; and let thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thine heart, and in the sight of thine eyes: but know thou, that for all these things God will bring thee into judgment. (Ecclesiastes 11:9).
IT is a solemn thought that, although the grace of God avails to save the vilest sinner, yet nothing can ever make up the losses of a wasted life. The effects of sin remain even though the sinner is justified by faith in Christ. In the government of God there are temporal consequences of evil living which no repentance and reformation will ever undo. Therefore, the importance of turning to God in youth ere one’s influence for evil has affected others in a way that will leave eternal consequences. The only path of true blessing is that of subjection to the will of God.
“I took the best of my youth
For pleasures all my own—
Forgetting I must some day reap
The chaff that I had sown.
I took the best of every day.
When mind was fresh and keen—
To do the special things I loved.
The things that would be seen.
My youth soon fled, and I, alone.
Reaped sorrow for my pleasure;
The things I loved to do for show
Proved but an empty treasure.
But when I gave my best to God.
My life—the morning hour―
found His pleasure was my own.
His grace, my shining tower!”
—Mildred Allen Jeffery.