It Is Good for the Young to Rejoice, Part 1

True Words for Brave Men
by Rev. Charles Kingsley

(Page 15 of 21)

Chapter 19

"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 your heart, and in the sight of your eyes: but know thou, that for all these things God will bring thee into judgment." - Ecclesiastes xi. 9.

Some people fancy that in this text God forbids young people to enjoy themselves. They think that the words are spoken ironically, and with a sneer, as if to say,

"Yes. Enjoy yourself if you will. Go your own way if you wish. Make a fool of yourself if you are determined to do so. You will repent it at last. You will be caught at last, and punished at last."

Now, I cannot think that there would be in Scripture or in any word of God a sneer so cruel and so unjust as that. For surely it would be unjust of God, if after giving young people the power to be happy, He then punished them for being happy, for using the very powers which He had given them, obeying the very feelings which He had implanted in them, enjoying the very pleasures which He had put in their way. God cannot be a tempter, my friends. He does not surely send us into a world full of traps and snares, and then punish us for being caught in the very snares which He had set. God forbid. Let us never fancy such things of God the heavenly Father, from whom comes every good and perfect gift. Let us leave such fancies for soured and hard-hearted persons, who make a god in their own likeness - a god of darkness and not of light - a grudger and not a giver. And let us take this text literally and plainly as it stands, and see whether we cannot learn from it a really wholesome lesson.

"Rejoice! oh, young man, in thy youth."

The Bible tells you to rejoice, therefore do so without fear. God has given you health, strength, spirits, hope, the power of enjoyment. And why, save but that you may enjoy them, and rejoice in your youth? He has given you more health, more strength, more spirits, than you need to earn your daily bread, or to learn your daily task. And why? To enable you to grow in body and in soul. And that you will only do if you are happy. The human soul, says a wise man, is like a plant, and requires sunshine to make it grow and ripen.

And the heavenly Father has given you sunshine in your hearts that you may grow into hearty, healthy-minded men. If young people have not sunshine enough, if they are kept down and crushed in youth by sorrow, by anxiety, by fear, by over-hard work, by too much study, by strict and cruel masters, by dark and superstitious notions about God's anger, by over-scrupulousness about this and that thing being sinful, then their souls and minds do not grow; they become more or less stunted, unhealthy, unhappy, slavish, and mean people in after-life, because they have not rejoiced in their youth as God intended them to do.

Remember this, you parents, and be sure that all harshness and cruelty to your children, all terrifying of them, all over-working of them, body or mind, all making them unhappy by requiring of them more than the plain law of God requires; or by teaching them to dread, not to love, their Father in heaven - All these will stunt and hurt their characters in after-life; and all are, therefore, sins against their heavenly Father, who willeth not that one little one should perish, and who will require a strict account of each of us how we have brought up the children whom He has committed to our charge. Let their hearts cheer them in the days of their youth. They will have trouble enough, anxiety enough hereafter. Do not you forestall the evil days for them. The more cheerful their growth is the more heart and spirit they will have to face the trials and sorrows of life when they come.

But further, the text says to the young man, Walk in the ways of thy heart. That is God's permission to free men, in a free country. You are not slaves either to man or to God; and God does not treat you as slaves, but as children whom He can trust. He says, Walk in the ways of your own heart. Do what you will, provided it be not wrong.

Choose your own path in life. Exert yourselves boldly to better yourselves in any path you choose, which is not a path of dishonesty and sin.

Again, says the text, Walk in the sight of your eyes. As your bodies are free, let your minds be free likewise. See for yourselves, judge for yourselves. God has given you eyes, brains, understanding; use them. Get knowledge for yourselves, get experience for yourselves. Educate and cultivate your own minds. Live, as far as you can, a free, reasonable, cheerful, happy life, enjoying this world, if you feel able to enjoy it. But know thou, that for all these things, God will bring thee into judgment.

Ah! say some, there is the sting. How can we enjoy ourselves if we are to be brought into judgment after all?

My friends, before I answer that question, let me ask one. Do you look on God as a taskmaster, requiring of you, as the Egyptians did of the Jews, to make bricks all day without straw, and noting down secretly every moment that you take your eyes off your work, that He may punish you for it years hence when you have forgotten it - extreme to mark what is done amiss?

Or do you look on God as a Father who rejoices in the happiness of His children? - Who sets them no work to do but what is good for them, and requires them to do nothing without giving them first the power and the means to do it? - A Father who knows our necessities before we ask for help and a Savior who is able and willing to give us help? If you think of God in that former way as a stern taskmaster, I can tell you nothing about Him. I know Him not; I find Him neither in the Bible, in the world, nor in my own conscience and reason. He is not the God of the Bible, the God of the Gospel whom I am commanded to preach to you.

But if you think of God as a Father, as your Father in heaven, who chastens you in His love that you may partake of His holiness, and of His Son Jesus Christ as your Savior, your Lord, who loves you, and desires your salvation, body and soul - of Him I can speak; for He is the True and only God, revealed by His Son Jesus Christ our Lord; and in His light I can tell you to rejoice and take comfort, ever though He brings you into judgment; for being your Father in heaven, He can mean nothing but your good, and He would not bring you into judgment if that too was not good for you.

London: Kegan Paul, Trench, & co., 1884.