So I understand that you have been in the book of Ecclesiastes. And I believe Pastor left off in chapter 10, about to start chapter 10. We're going to fast forward a little bit. So open your Bibles to Ecclesiastes chapter 12. And then when Pastor comes back, you can continue on and you already know the ending. Let's go ahead and stand again for the reading of God's word. Chapter 12. Remember also your creator in the days of your youth, before the evil days come and the years draw near of which you will say, I have no pleasure in them. Before the sun and the light and the moon and the stars are darkened. and the clouds return after the rain, and the day when the keepers of the house tremble, and the strong men are bent, and the grinders cease because they are few, and those who look through the windows are dimmed, and the doors on the street are shut when the sound of the grinding is low, and the one rises up at the sound of a bird, and all the daughters of song are brought low. They are afraid also of what is high, and terrors are in the way. The almond tree blossoms, the grasshopper drags itself along, and desire fails, because man is going to his eternal home, and the mourners go about the streets before the silver cord is snapped, or the golden bowl is broken, or the pitcher is shattered at the fountain. or the wheel broken at the cistern, and the dust returns to the earth as it was, and the spirit returns to the God who gave it. Vanity of vanity, says the preacher, all is vanity. Besides being wise, the preacher also taught the people knowledge, weighing and studying and arranging many proverbs with great care. The preacher sought to find words of delight and uprightly he wrote words of truth. The words of the wise are like goads, and like nails firmly fixed are the collected sayings. They are given by one shepherd. My son, beware of anything beyond these, of making many books there is no end, and much study is a weariness of the flesh. The end of the matter has all been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every deed into judgment with every secret thing, whether good or evil. You may be seated. Let's pray. Lord God, we thank you so much for your word. We thank you, Lord, that we are here to hear from it today. And we just pray, Lord, that you would speak to us today. In Jesus' name, amen. Well, in a recent study, researchers surveyed more than 1,300 participants over the age of 21. They were asked how, if they agreed with statements to measure their meaning in life. The phrases included things like, I understand my life's meaning. My life has a clear sense. and I'm looking for something that makes life meaningful. They also measured participants' subjective physical and mental well-being. They found that those who had meaning in life were happier and healthier than those who were still looking for it. Searching for meaning in life was associated with worse physical and mental health and cognitive functioning. To be clear, and I'm quoting someone here, That doesn't mean that searching for meaning in life is bad for you, says CNBC's Make It. After all, how else would you find meaning? However, it becomes stressful when the search becomes desperate or frustrating. So in our text today, Solomon, some say the Koheleth, some say the teacher, has been searching for meaning down life's various roads. And chapters one and two, if you would remember, he tries the paths of wisdom, pleasure, laughter, and worldly accomplishment. With each of these, he comes to a dead end and concludes, it is all vanity, a striving after the wind. Chapter five, he tries wealth. and riches, and yet the same thing. Nothing is satisfying, and on and on. Until we get to chapter 12. It's here that Solomon finally gets to something that is not meaningless. He tells us using three main points. So if you like acronyms, And if you follow well with things that are very ordered, he follows them with an appeal, A, C, A, I'm sorry, S. A, an appeal. He pleads with us to remember our creator in the days of our youth. Second, a snapshot. He gives us a snapshot of our life and how quickly it ends and what it quickly also becomes. One moment, you're riding your bike down the street, and the next, you're gripping the handles of your walker down the sidewalk. Finally, the culmination of all he has said, fear God and obey his commandments. So, what is better than wealth, worldly accomplishment? We're gonna find out today. So let's look at verse one. He makes his appeal. Remember also your creator in the days of your youth. So what if you're not a youth? Well, then you don't have to listen, just check out. No, okay? That's fine, because the same principle still applies. To really live life to the fullest, which you can do at any age, by the way. If you really wanna live the good life, remember your creator. Now, I won't get into what this means shortly, but the world will tell you, in an old quote, youth for pleasure, middle age for business, and old age for religion. The Bible never tells us that. It never tells us to wait for a certain age to walk with God. Rather, now is the appointed time. Youth, middle age, old age are all to be lived for our creator. So then, why all this focus then on the youth? Well, in the days of your youth, you have all the energy and vigor that comes from being a beginning human. Don't agree with me. Try to follow around a two-year-old for an entire day. do everything he does or she does, and see how you feel at the end of the day. It's no wonder they need naps. According to another study, a little bit older, out of the UK, the daily movements of a toddler, complete with all their running, uses the same adult energy of completing 83 rounds in a boxing ring, or running 30 miles or cycling 82 miles at 12 miles an hour. Also, during your early years, you are very inclined to forget your creator. All of life's temptations are right there before you. Flash before your eyes for the first time and they all look really enticing. Alcohol, drugs, parties, it's all there. They're all vying for your attention. But Solomon tells us right here at the beginning of your life. That's the best time to start. It is a pathway best started early in the dawn of life. So what does it mean to remember our creator? Now we know that our creator is God. So remembering him is to obey him, acknowledge his lordship in our lives. We see this throughout scripture. I want you to turn with me. Put your finger in Ecclesiastes and go to the left, okay, to Numbers chapter 15. And we're gonna be reading verses 37 through 41. And I'll give you a moment to turn the pages. I still hear them turning. Okay, verse 37 of Numbers 15. The Lord said to Moses, speak to the people of Israel and tell them to make tassels on the corners of their garments throughout their generations and to put a cord of blue on the tassel of each corner. And it shall be a tassel for you to look at and remember all the commandments of the Lord, to do them not to follow after your own heart and your own eyes, which you are inclined to whore after. So you shall remember and do all my commandments and be holy to your God. I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt to be your God. I am the Lord your God. So, in this passage, God is speaking to Moses and he tells the people of Israel to make tassels. on their garments so they will remember all of his commandments. Now, this is not like remember like they told you to do in school when you are to remember all the US capitals. That's not the type of remember we're talking about. This is far different. Look at verses 39 and 40. It was, so as to do them and not follow after your own heart and eyes, after which you played the harlot, and here's our verse, so that you may remember to do all my commandments and be holy to your God. So the idea of remembering your creator was not just, in Israel's case, recalling something or acknowledging that God exists. It was calling them to remember all that he had commanded them, all he had done. And that he was Lord and to obey him. So again, what it means to remember your creator is to acknowledge him as Lord and to obey him. Now later on, Solomon will elaborate on this, but we're gonna go right to the snapshot that he'll give us in the next section. So Solomon tells us why it is essential to remember your creator in your youth. Because in the days of your un-youth, life gets harder. It talks about before the evil days come. This is synonymous with the days of darkness, if you read chapter 11, verse eight, where Solomon is using darkness to speak of the incoming invasion of death to the body. With that, the body begins to slowly break down. Think about it in your own life. When you were young, you might be able to play a full contact sport, not stretch, or maybe run a couple miles, not stretch, go to bed, wake up, feel fine. Now you try to do that, and your whole body hurts in the morning, or you maybe make a rolling motion out of bed. Your body's reminding you that your youth is passing, if it hasn't already passed. things have begun to break down. Tasks that were once easy for you are now harder for you to do. And if that's not enough, there's more. The end of verse one, the years will draw near when you will say, I have no pleasure in them. So as you age, the things that you once took pleasure in don't have the same zing that they once had. When you were young, you might have rushed out to see a new movie that came up. Now you find yourself saying, eh, I'll wait till that comes out on video. Or is it on Netflix yet? Maybe then I'll watch it. Let's continue. Next, Solomon describes the breakdown in another way. Verse two, before the sun and the light of the moon and the stars grow dark, and the clouds disappear after the rain. Now typically, if you think about it, the sun and the moon and the stars don't dim. But here, he's describing this as the creation being undone. And Solomon uses this imagery to show that just as creation here is being unmade, so in time is every person. And this time comes quickly. Thinking back to when I was about 10, 16 couldn't come quick enough. I couldn't wait to turn that age so that way I could get my license, move along in life. Everybody was telling me, Well, just enjoy your time as a kid, because soon you will have lots of responsibility. Then I came to understand what that meant. But it seemed to take forever to get to 16. And then, now, you turn 40 or 50, it seems like last year, your last birthday was just here. So, It's this type of language, this quickness of life, that is forcing us to take seriously this exhortation that he has just given us to remember our creator now. Because life moves quickly. Verses three and four. In the day when the keepers of the house tremble and the strong men are bent. When I, I purchased my car a few years ago. I bought it out of state, so I came with the title to the Wisconsin DMV. And I remembered that the man who sold me the car told me at the dealership that the title, that the car had been driven by an older couple who kept it in their garage. So I figured that's just something that people at dealerships tell you because they want you to buy the car. I didn't think much of it. And then I looked down at the title as I was in the line. And I noticed a small, shaky-looking signature written there in pen. And in the sunset of life, that nice, smooth signature that she might have had started to look jagged, not because I'm sure she wasn't trying a new form of calligraphy, but because in time, your hands and your body shake. So something so simple as writing with a pen becomes a bit more unreadable. Old age brings the loss of control of our muscles. And also, as scripture says here, instead of walking upright, even strong men start to stoop. So this idea is carried all the way down through verse five, where it concludes that all this happens because man is going to his eternal home. Now Solomon brings the snapshot out of our lives and looks at a bigger picture, eternity. Life here, which is like a fragile silver cord or a golden bowl, is finally broken and the body returns to the earth and the spirit returns back to God for eternity. So now we come to C, the culmination. The final part of chapter 12, Solomon brings us to the culmination or the end of the matter. He says, all has been heard, fear God and keep his commandments for this is the whole duty of man. Now the whole duty of man is just another way of saying this is everyone's duty or this is the fall of, or this is for all people. So the fear of God is good for everyone. However, everyone does not do it. Proverbs 1.7 says, the fear of God is the beginning of knowledge. Fools despise wisdom and instruction. You must first understand who God is before you can fear him. We gain this insight from God's word here, which tells us God is righteous, Isaiah 45.21. God is holy, Isaiah 6, 3. God is just, Psalm 89, verse 14. But the fool rejects God's word, doesn't understand it. He doesn't understand who God is, and because of that, has no fear of God. For him, though, there is a fearful expectation of what he will receive from God. Luke 12 five says, I warn you, whom to fear. Fear him, who after he is killed, has authority to cast into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him. Hebrews 10 31 says, it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. For the unbeliever, because they do not know God, they don't worship him. and they have no real reason to be afraid of God. However, it's not enough to just know information about God. We can know that he is righteous, holy, and just, but not fear him unless we become a child of God first. First John 1. 1 John 3, verse 1 says, So how do you become a child of God? First, you have to realize that your sin has separated you from God. Second, you must realize that there's nothing you can do to pay God back for the sin debt that you have against Him. Third, you need to know that Jesus Christ came and died upon the cross to pay the penalty for your sin, and He offers you eternal life if you will receive Him as Lord and Savior. And just as the verse we just read says, as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God. So, If you've not accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as your Savior, please, after this is done, come and talk with me. I'd love to talk with you about that. Or, if you feel more comfortable with one of the elders, I'm sure they would love to share that with you as well. For those of you who already are children of God, to fear God, it means to approach him with reverence and awe. Hebrews 12, 28 and 29 says, therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire. The fear of God should be a motivating factor that drives us to worship in obedience. Look at Deuteronomy 10, 12. And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all of his ways, to love him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul? The fear of God should cause us to love God, to worship and obey him, just as Jesus says, If you love me, you will keep my commandments. So, coming to the end, Solomon has made his appeal. Remember your creator and the days of your youth because life is short. Now looking around at some of you, I don't know this, but you may be numbers people. and tomorrow you'll go back to work in the world of finance or accounting, and you know just how much you need to invest before you retire, or how much you need to buy, how much you need to pay to buy that lake house you've always wanted, or how much the stock market needs to go up every year over time, and how much you need to spend when you turn 65 to keep your nest egg intact. You could probably tell me that if I asked you. All that computing, and yet some have not taken the time to compute how you will spend your life. God here is saying, remember me while you still have the chance. Not the balance of your 401k, not your multiplication tables that you learned as a child. Give me all your heart. Love me with all of your heart, soul, mind, strength, all the days of your life. Now, my wife loves flowers. To be honest with you, I don't really care about them. My wife would probably be thrilled if I brought her home these. She probably would not care too much if I brought her home these wrinkled up dried ones. Here you go, sweetie. Don't you want these flowers? Do you really want to, my question to all of you who are not walking with the Lord, Do you really wanna give yourself to God like this? Get to God later on in life. Give your life to him then. God is telling you, don't wait. Live for me today. Remember the creator in the days of your youth because the days of evil will come. Let's pray. Lord God, so many out there don't want to talk about death. But God, your word approaches it head on. We know that this life is short. Help us, Lord, to prioritize our life so that you are first and you are everything to us, and that we would serve you with our whole lives. Lord, I thank you so much for this time in your word in the book of Ecclesiastes, and I thank you so much for C.T. Studd, who said, only one life, which will soon be passed, only what's done for Christ will last. And when I am dying, how happy I will be if the lamp of my life has been burned out for thee. Lord, please help us to live for you today and for the rest of our days. In Jesus' name, amen.