ECCLESIASTES XII: 13.
Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter; Fear God, and keep His commandments: for this is the whole duty of man.
Now, boys, here is a piece of advice given by the wisest of men. Can any of you tell me who was the wisest man? (Solomon.) Well this Solomon was the son of a king. Can any of you tell me whose son Solomon was? (David's.) And, of course, Solomon had all that money could buy from his childhood up; and when his father died, he became king in his place. He lived to be an old man and he had a wide experience of life. In other words he tried everything that he thought he could get happiness from and his experience is given in the book of Ecclesiastes. He tried all sorts of pleasures and he tried them fully, because there was nothing to hinder or to check him. He denied himself nothing that his heart desired. He knew fully the effects of all sorts of enjoyment and when he had passed through it all he wrote it down as the lesson of his experience for all boys and young men to read. And what was it? Does he say "Young man, you have a long life before you. Now you must enjoy the pleasures of life while you are young?" Does he say you must run off from your father's house and presence like the Prodigal son did, so you can have a good time in the enjoyment of the pleasures of the world and then in your after life, when you get more settled, you can think about your Creator and death and heaven and hell and eternity? Was that the lesson which his long and extended experience taught him? Ah, no. It was a far different one. He would say this: "Young men, boys, I have been all over the road you are traveling now. I have had your feelings, your hopes, your ambitions, your passions, your temptations. And in one part of my life I concluded I would give myself up to the enjoyment of pleasure of every kind and I did so. And I know all about it and this is what I would say to you all just starting out. Remember now your Creator in the days of your youth and give your hearts and lives to Him, if you want to be happy."
1. In the first place by so doing you will avoid wretched poverty. For a man whose heart and life are given to God can not be a spendthrift. But just look at some young men how they spend their money or that of their fathers. However large a fortune they may have, they soon come to poverty.
And a man whose life is given to God is industrious and loves to work. He can not bear to be idle, for he knows and feels it to be a great sin. Besides all this God promises to see that those who live for Him shall not want what is best for them. Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount declares that if God provides for sparrows and clothes lilies, He will be sure to see to the needs of His own children. So the way to get the best assurance that you will be blessed with things needful in this life is to give yourself up to God to be His, through thick and thin.
2. If you give your heart to God now, you will be kept from the sins which bring men into disgrace. "A good name is rather to be chosen than riches." Ah! you know not into what awful sins your passions will plunge you, if you do not get the control of yourself, which only religion can give. You may be led along little by little, almost without knowing it, till you may wake up to find that you can not, can not, break off from your sins—your hated and ruinous sins. But if you give God your heart to be changed, renewed, purified now, you will avoid all these awful dangers.
3. But this verse says "the years will draw nigh in which thou shalt take no pleasure in these things that relate to God." My dear young friend, that is terribly true. The longer you live away from God the less and less will be your care for Him and for your soul. How few old men ever turn to God! Yes, very few, forty years of age and over, ever do so. I heard Dr. Munhall ask once, in a large congregation, that all who were converted after seventy years of age would stand up. Not one stood up. Then he asked that all who had been converted after they were sixty years of age would stand up. Not one stood up. Then he asked all who were converted after fifty years to stand up. Only one, I believe, did so. When he asked all who were converted after forty years to stand up, only three or four did so. When he asked all converted after thirty years to stand up, perhaps eight or ten did so. A few more had been converted after twenty years of age; but when he asked all who were converted under twenty years to stand, most of the congregation arose.
True, I was converted after I was forty years of age, but it was a bare chance. And oh, how hard it was for me. And if I had not had the most patient of friends to sympathize with me, encourage me and guide me, I should never have gotten along. I beg you do not follow my example in putting off your return to God.
Look at the men whom you know. How little interest they take in religion and their interest grows less and less all the time. The years have already come when they have no pleasure in the things of God. They have encouraged all their feelings, desires and ambitions but this, and this has almost died out. They have devoted all their thought and affections to making money and enjoying it, to seeking pleasure and enjoying it, to acquiring fame and enjoying it, and so their hearts are completely hardened and insensible to the religion which they cast aside ten, twenty or thirty years ago. And they will probably never feel the all-absorbing interest in religion which is necessary to obtain it. Hence, they will go on blinder and blinder, colder and colder, more and more hardened down to old age and to the grave and to a hopeless eternity. I beg you, my young friends, all who hear me to put off your return to God not one day longer.