“1 Remember your Creator in the days of your youth, before the days of trouble come and the years approach when you will say, ‘I find no pleasure in them’— 2 before the sun and the light and the moon and the stars grow dark, and the clouds return after the rain; 3 when the keepers of the house tremble, and the strong men stoop, when the grinders cease because they are few, and those looking through the windows grow dim; 4 when the doors to the street are closed and the sound of grinding fades; when men rise up at the sound of birds, 5 but all their songs grow faint; when men are afraid of heights and of dangers in the streets; when the almond tree blossoms and the grasshopper drags himself along and desire no longer is stirred. Then man goes to his eternal home and mourners go about the streets. 6 Remember Him—before the silver cord is severed, or the golden bowl is broken; before the pitcher is shattered at the spring, or the wheel broken at the well, 7 and the dust returns to the ground it came from, and the spirit returns to God who gave it.”
“At age 20, we worry about what others think of us. At age 40, we don’t care what they think of us. At age 60, we discover they haven’t been thinking of us at all,” said Ann Landers. Some have added, ‘at age 80, we just wish somebody would think of us.’
“The longer I live the more beautiful life becomes,” said Frank Lloyd Wright. “What’s the worst thing about getting old? Getting old,” said James Lee Burke. “Grow old along with me! The best is yet to be,” said Robert Browning.
Who is right? How should you think about what is happening to you right now? How should you think about aging?
God doesn’t want you confused about what is happening to you. He inspired Solomon with a word for the young and a word for the aged. It is a very realistic word. If you are getting older by the minute, listen.
If you are young, take note. If you are aged, take comfort. That’s the claim of this sermon: If you are young, take note. If you are aged, take comfort.
We will study this in two points. First: the days of trouble. Second: the day of death. First, in verses 1-5, we will see the days of trouble. Second, in verses 6-7, we will see the day of death.
First: the days of trouble. The teacher put the young on notice. There is such a thing as the old age train and it is coming. Verse 1, “Remember your Creator in the days of your youth before the days of trouble come…”
Remember your creator today, root yourself in God today, because age brings sorrows. JD Eppinga puts it this way “[Solomon] tells young people that if their faith is going to hold them up tomorrow when the days of trouble come, they will have to root it firmly today.”
If you are young, God tells you to be realistic about the aging process. You will get older. You too will get wrinkles. You too will get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom. Be realistic. Recognize now that life isn’t about you. It is about God. Live for Him today.
What happens if you don’t? Well, I’ve got a book in my office entitled How to Ruin your Life by 40. You can read that to see what happens if you don’t remember your Creator in the days of your youth and that book just takes you to 40. You would probably have time to rebuild your life and watch it fall apart at least twice by the time you are 90. Don’t ruin your life. Remember your Creator while you are young. Duane Garrett is right, “To forget the Creator of youth is to invite bitter regrets and an empty existence in old age.”
If you are older and you are worried that you’ve already ruined your life, please know that you still have time to live for God. Spiritual life is more about direction than location. A recently converted seventy-year-old who is eager to be trained in righteousness is better off than a twenty-year-old who grew up in the church but is wandering aimlessly. It’s not too late.
Whether you are young or old, God has a purpose for this season of life. God created youth. God created old age. Each has its own purpose in God’s plan. “There is a time for everything,” said the teacher in chapter 3, “and a season for every activity under the heavens: a time to be born and a time to die.” “God has made everything beautiful in its time.”
If you are young, know that God has a purpose for youth. “The glory of young men is their strength.” Use the strength you have to help others. If you are older, know that God has a purpose for age. “The glory of young men is their strength; gray hair the splendor of the old.” Solomon is talking about wisdom. Use your wisdom to help others.
God has a purpose for both young and old age and each comes with its own trials. Here Solomon talks about the trials of getting older. “Remember your Creator in the days of your youth, before the days of trouble come and the years approach when you will say, ‘I find no pleasure in them.’”
One of the sadder parts of my calling is seeing aged saints lose interest in life. In time, these saints are perfectly fine living in a tiny room because they no longer want much more. That might be you one day. Fishing, Twins baseball, swimming; “I find no pleasure in them.”
David’s friend Barzillai lost pleasure in life in old age. Barzillai was a mover and shaker in Israel and he stuck with David when few others did. One day David invited Barzillai to the capitol city. Barzillai sent this response, “How many more years will I live, that I should go up to Jerusalem with the king? I am now eighty years old. Can I tell the difference between what is enjoyable and what is not? Can your servant taste what he eats and drinks?” ‘David, there is no pleasure left for me, my friend. One day, you too will see.’
Remember your Creator today because that day is coming. Don’t be so foolish as to think you are going to be young forever. If your life is about you today, it might only be about you when you are older and then you will realize it wasn’t enough. Make your life about God. If you don’t, old age will tear you down.
Solomon describes the difficulties of age in verse 2, “before the sun and the light and the moon and the stars grow dark, and the clouds return after the rain.”
Some commentators think this refers to failing eye-sight, but I think this cloudy talk is your old-fashioned sun and clouds metaphor that little orphan Annie made famous, ‘The sun will come out tomorrow, bet your bottom dollar that tomorrow there’ll be sun. Just thinking about tomorrow clears away the cobwebs and the sorrow ‘til there’s none. When I’m stuck with a day that’s grey and lonely, I just stick up my chin and grin and say, “oh, the sun will come out tomorrow, so you gotta hang on, ‘til tomorrow, come what may! Tomorrow, tomorrow, I love ya, tomorrow, You’re always a day away!”’
Solomon says that sometimes that’s wishful thinking. Age brings the realization that the sun might not come up again on this life. That is the reality for some of our older saints. If this is where you are at, know that verse 2 isn’t here to depress you. It is here to empathize with you. God gets it. That’s why He put this in the Bible.
I want you to think of these verses the way you think about a doctor’s correct diagnosis. When he tells you what’s wrong, you know that he can help you. God tells us what is wrong in old age so that we know that He can help us.
These next verses are proof that God gets it. This is poetry about what happens to the body in old age. These are images describing the body. First, in verse 3, “when the keepers of the house tremble.” These are probably the hands. Some of us can no longer hold our hands steady enough to do much of anything. I knew a man who loved to tinker but eventually his hands gave out and he couldn’t even do that; “the keepers of the house tremble.” Maybe that is you. You would love to take your grandson hunting, but you can’t trust your hands.
Maybe your back and legs have given out. Verse 3 describes it this way, “and the strong men stoop.” Maybe you can’t lift as much weight as you used to. You used to be a hulk of a man but now even lifting a bucket of sand would be unimaginable. Your posture is stooped. You catch your reflection as you are walking and you are amazed by how hunched over you’ve become. God isn’t ignorant of that. “Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground outside your Father’s care.” He knows what you are going through.
Maybe your teeth are deteriorating, “when the grinders cease because they are few.” Dentistry has largely transformed this one. Many of us have dentures and while this is an improvement on no teeth at all, they have their own sorrows.
All of my grandparents had dentures. I remember how strange my grandmother’s face looked whenever she took them out. My grandfather had permanent dentures. I visited him once while they were being repaired. He just had pegs in his mouth.
We Christians are called to empathize with one another; “rejoice with those who rejoice and mourn with those who mourn.” If you’ve got dentures, rejoice with the kid who just lost his first tooth. If you’ve got your own teeth, have empathy for our members who put their teeth in a cup at night.
The next image is one of the most frightening, “those looking through the windows grow dim.” This is about eye-sight. I find this one particularly troubling because without my contacts I am basically blind. If my glasses fall off my nightstand, I sometimes can’t find them. Bethany has to do it for me. That is humbling. The aging process is very humbling. You can see why those who don’t have God are without hope in this life. Solomon isn’t telling you all this because he is hopeless. He is telling you this because if you remember your Creator, he will take care of you when you can’t take care of yourself.
He will take care of you when you can’t hear well. That’s what the next words, “when the doors to the street are closed and the sound of grinding fades,” are all about. The world gets very small when you can’t hear well. “The doors to the street are closed and the sound of grinding fades.”
This is about the isolation that comes with the loss of hearing. Some of you know this pain so well. You can’t hear what your loved ones are saying, and you feel alone even in the middle of your family. This verse tells you that God understands, and He hasn’t forgotten you.
Next Solomon speaks about one of the sad ironies of old age. You’ve got the time to sleep but you can’t sleep. That’s what he means when he says, “when men rise up at the sound of birds.” Anyone here getting up earlier and earlier for no good reason? Young people wish they had more time to sleep. Older people wish they could stay asleep.
Old age keeps on punching. Verse 5, “when men are afraid of heights and of dangers in the streets.” Many of our older saints don’t like to go out and about much because they don’t feel too sure on their feet. What might be a normal step to you is a genuine obstacle to them.
Age also changes the way we look. That’s what’s going on with, “when the almond tree blossoms.” If you’ve ever seen an almond tree blossom, it sprouts tufts of white. This is Solomon’s image for gray and white hair. We try to fight this one. My dad often speaks in amazement that nobody in his church has gray hair. ‘All these ladies of different ages and not a single gray hair in the bunch.’
Watching our looks change brings sorrow. JD Eppinga writes, “I read that the late Mae West would not appear in public when she was old unless the lighting was right… Greta Garbo, [went] into seclusion rather than have others see what the years had done.” We can talk about vanity but whom among us doesn’t like to look our best? At some point, our best diminishes.
But God still shepherds us. Isaiah 46:4 is still true, “Even to your old age and gray hairs I am He, I am He who will sustain you. I have made you and I will carry you; I will sustain you and I will rescue you.”
You might feel older than the hills, but you aren’t ancient. You are a child of God and He will care for you.
He will care for you even if you can barely care for yourself. Solomon puts it this way, “the grasshopper drags himself along.” We have some members who can barely move in the morning. We’ve got other members who can’t move it all. Is there any hope in that situation?
Last year marked fifty years since Joni Erickson Tada was confined to a wheelchair after a diving accident. As she reflected on her fifty years as a quadriplegic, Tada shared her hope in 1 Peter 5:10, “after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace … will himself restore, confirm, strengthen and establish you.”
Joni has hope in what is coming. “The God of all grace … will himself restore, confirm, strengthen and establish you.” “I’m making all things new.” That’s coming. ‘Joni, get up and walk.’ That’s coming.
And it is coming in a little while. “After you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace … will himself restore, confirm, strengthen and establish you.” In a recent interview, Joni marveled that, at times, the past fifty years have seemed like just a little while. God has helped Joni endure this little while. She says, “I’d rather be in this wheelchair knowing Jesus than walking without Jesus.”
Is knowing Jesus superior to whatever you’ve lost? ‘You can have all the world but give me Jesus.’
If you have Jesus, you can be assured that your best days are not behind you. You will be resurrected as Jesus was resurrected. You will have a new body. There are better days ahead, but something must come first.
That’s where this passage ends –in death. That’s our second point: the day of death. The teacher again calls us to remember. Verse 6, “Remember Him…”
We are to remember God because the sorrows of old age are coming, and we are to remember God because we will die. It isn’t just other people who die. You are one of those people. You will die. “Death is the destiny of everyone,” writes Solomon, “the living should take this to heart.”
God doesn’t want you to obsess over death, but He does want you to recognize that you will die. “Lord, teach me to number my days that I may gain a heart of wisdom.”
The teacher gives us three images of death because he wants us to understand it. God wants you to understand death because it will happen to you. He first tells us that death shows the beauty and fragility of our lives. Verse 6, “Remember Him—before the silver cord is severed, or the golden bowl is broken.”
Life is precious and when it is shattered, when the silver cord is severed, when the golden bowl is broken, something beautiful is lost. Your life is a precious thing. In her Pulitzer Prize winning book Gilead, Marilynn Robinson writes about life and death. She writes in the voice of an old man who had a son late in life. The man is dying and he wants to share his heart with his son even after he’s gone and so he writes, “I’m writing this in part to tell you that if you ever wonder what you’ve done in your life, and everyone does wonder sooner or later, you have been God’s grace to me, a miracle, something more than a miracle. You may not remember me very well at all, and it may seem to you to be no great thing to have been the good child of an old man in a shabby little town you will no doubt leave behind. If only I had the words to tell you.”
Life is precious. Your life, your days, are precious. “Remember Him—before the silver cord is severed, or the golden bowl is broken.”
Solomon’s second image is about vitality. Verse 6, “before the pitcher is shattered at the spring, or the wheel broken at the well.”
There was no running water in those days. You used a pitcher to collect your water from a spring or a well. This shattered pitcher tells us that one day we won’t be able to get that water. We won’t be able to restore our vitality. We will be like a broken pitcher trying to hold water. Death is like that. One day, you won’t be able to hold life anymore. It will leak out of you and there will be no repairing you.
Solomon’s final image comes out of Genesis 1, “the dust returns to the ground it came from, and the spirit returns to God who gave it.”
Death will return you to from whence you came. Adam was made out of the ground and so we all return to the ground. The committal at a funeral service is a powerful moment. We people of dust return to the ground. It is a properly humbling moment. We hold many illusions about ourselves but death reminds us that we are creatures. We are created.
The word in death is to remember our Creator. Remember Him before what is fragile and beautiful is broken. Remember Him before your vitality is gone. Remember him before you are laid in the ground from which you came.
I have an uncle who refuses to have anything to do with death. He doesn’t come to visitations. He doesn’t come to funerals. He can’t stand the reminder that he is mortal. He knows that life is fragile. “The silver cord is severed; the golden bowl is broken.” He knows that one day he won’t be able to hold life. “The pitcher is shattered at the spring.” He knows what happens in the cemetery. “The dust returns to the ground it came from.” He knows and it terrifies him.
He hasn’t taken verse 6 to heart, “Remember Him… Remember your Creator.” He has no hope in death.
What about you? Your golden bowl will be broken. Your pitcher will be shattered at the spring. You will be lowered into the ground.
What is your hope? Is it your Creator? “What is your only comfort in life and in death?” “That I am not my own but belong body and soul in life and in death to my faithful Savior Jesus Christ.”
Can you say that in whatever stage of life you find yourself in tonight? May the Lord enable you to say it on the day of your death. Amen.