6 Youth (Ecclesiastes 11:9–12:8)
6
Youth
Ecclesiastes 11:9–12:8
Matt Chandler
Rejoice, O young man, in your youth, and let your heart cheer you in the days of your youth. Walk in the ways of your heart and the sight of your eyes. But know that for all these things God will bring you into judgment.
Remove vexation from your heart, and put away pain from your body, for youth and the dawn of life are vanity.
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, in 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 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 God who gave it. Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher; all is vanity. (Eccles. 11:9–12:8)1
WHY I FEEL THE WEIGHT OF THIS TEXT
I preached through the book of Ecclesiastes in 2004, and I feel this particular text—Ecclesiastes 11:9–12:8—for a couple of reasons.
DEATHS AT VILLAGE CHURCH
I pastor a very large church that is young. In the almost nine years I have pastored the Village Church, I have performed one funeral for someone over the age of thirty. I have had dozens and dozens of funerals for twenty-year-olds and under-ten-year-olds. So when you’re in that type of environment, you begin to understand that life is a lot quicker than you might think. I am under no illusion that any of us is guaranteed to see thirty years—much less sixty, seventy, or eighty. This time we have, this little sliver, really is a gift from God.
We have had multiple babies at our church die of SIDS. The babies go down for a nap and don’t wake up. I remember having to walk into those rooms and feeling like Habakkuk did as the Chaldeans approached:
I hear, and my body trembles;
my lips quiver at the sound;
rottenness enters into my bones;
my legs tremble beneath me. (Hab. 3:16)
My legs became heavy walking into those environments where there was sorrow upon sorrow upon sorrow. And at the time I didn’t see a theological framework that would support the weight of that type of sorrow.
I chose to preach on Ecclesiastes because I wanted to be faithful to the Lord and to the people he had asked me to shepherd by preparing them for the reality of life in a fallen world. And in one of the great mercies of Christ, as I was preparing my people, he was preparing me.
CANCER
So I wake up on Thanksgiving morning, November 26, 2009. I pour myself a cup of coffee and head to the chair that I sit in to read the Word almost every morning. On the way to that chair, my wife, who is preparing some dishes to take to my mother-in-law’s home for Thanksgiving, asks me to feed our six-month-old. So I get the bottle and feed little Nora and then put her in her Johnny Jump Up. And I have no memory of what happened after that until I woke up in the hospital.
Apparently, I had a grand mal seizure in front of my children. To this day my daughter will not acknowledge that it was a seizure but asks me if I remember when I was snoring because I was making a weird noise. So God’s providence shielded her from what was a terrifying ordeal for our family.
I found out that I had a mass in my right frontal lobe, and that right mass needed to be removed. So there was a lot of drama between that Thursday when I had the seizure and when I had a craniotomy on December 4. A well-meaning member of our church came and looked at the scan and said, “Matt, it looks encapsulated. It looks like you’re going to be fine. They’ll simply watch this thing. They’ll probably put you on some seizure meds, and you’ll be fine.” So I went into the meeting with the neurosurgeon thinking, “This is nothing. We’ll just have to monitor it.” I was not prepared to hear, “We’re going to have to cut out a large chunk of your brain, and this might end badly for you.”
I had walked other people through that kind of bad news hundreds of times, but this was the first time I was on the receiving end of it. I felt like I got punched in the soul. I don’t know how else to explain it. I wasn’t expecting this.
After the craniotomy, I’m thinking, “OK, they’ve got it, and I’m going to be fine.” But then I start to pick up stuff. If you’re a pastor who shepherds your people well and walks them through these types of circumstances, you begin to learn the rules at the hospital. So when I get out of surgery, I’m asking questions about the biopsy, and nobody is answering them. I’ve played this game enough to know that’s not good. If they say, “Why don’t you get stronger and then we’ll talk?” that’s bad.
They sat me down on December 15 and said, “The brain tumor is malignant. You have Stage 3 anaplastic oligodendroglioma. It’s not encapsulated, and we weren’t able to remove all of it. You’ve got about two to three years to live. That’s the average.” That sent me and the family reeling. It wasn’t long, though, until we landed on what is tried and true: the firm foundation that God doesn’t drive an ambulance—this didn’t surprise or shock God.
I want to be honest: I’m not wearing a cape. I didn’t hear that news from the doctor and immediately respond, “Well, I’m on a firm foundation.” That’s not how it worked. If that is how it went down in your life, then you have been shown greater grace than I was shown, because the first couple of days were tough.
So when I read Ecclesiastes 11:9–12:8, I feel it. And don’t go super-holy on me and say, “Well, you should feel all the texts.” Well, yes and amen. But I feel this one. It creates heat, fire, and angst in me.
Some of you will not be back for the next TGC conference. You think you will. Everybody knows that anyone can get that call that changes everything, but nobody thinks that she is getting the call. Yes, your children can die in accidents. Yes, your spouse can become terminally ill. Yes, this can happen to you. But nobody thinks it’s coming to him. Pastoral experience almost trains us that it comes to others.
So when I read this text today, its weight, thickness, and pain are a beautiful thing. When I first read through Ecclesiastes and felt the Spirit leading me to preach through the book, I felt that the writer needed a hug. I was thinking, “Man, somebody hug him. Life is not this dark.”
THE POINT OF ECCLESIASTES 11:9–12:8
The passage starts out in a way that makes everyone say, “Yes, hallelujah! Amen!” Even the most pagan people would love that first part: follow your heart and whatever your eyes see. Who doesn’t want that? Do you know anyone who would have a problem with that? No. Some might say, “Wow, that’s in the Bible? Let’s go!” But just about the time the writer has got you, he adds, “But don’t forget you’re going to be judged for all that. You’ve got to die and stand in front of God. So just don’t forget that in your partying.”
Rejoice, O young man, in your youth, and let your heart cheer you in the days of your youth. Walk in the ways of your heart and the sight of your eyes. But know that for all these things God will bring you into judgment. (11:9)
It started so beautifully, and now he’s gone dark on us: “Remove vexation from your heart, and put away pain from your body, for youth and the dawn of life are vanity” (11:10).
There are a lot of problems in Ecclesiastes 11:9–12:8. If we just sum them up, the author is saying, “Hey, enjoy your youth. Enjoy your passion. But here’s the deal: you’re going to be judged for that. And oh, by the way, life’s going to go by quickly, and there’s going to come a day when you hate that you woke up. And you’re going to die. But guess what? Remember that judgment I told you about? It’ll be time. So you get to die young and be judged, or you get to hate life and eventually die and then be judged. Good luck. It’s all vanity.” See what I’m saying? You just want to hug him. You just want to go, “Come here, man.”
IMPERATIVES
So you’ve got a problem in this text, and I think it can be solved by looking at the imperatives in this text. The imperatives lead us to Christ.
REJOICE
Human beings have a rejoicing problem, but it’s not that they don’t rejoice. It’s that they rejoice on the surface. Everyone we know rejoices. You do not know a man or woman who is not an expert at rejoicing. It’s just that they are broken in how they rejoice and what they rejoice in.
When Paul in Romans 1 begins to unpack what’s wrong with humanity and how the wrath of God is being revealed against mankind, the problem is not that we rejoice but rather what we rejoice in. We rejoice in what? Creation. Not the Creator. In essence we say, “Isn’t creation lovely? Look at how spectacular creation is. Look at how amazing creation is.” Our rejoicing is shallow because it doesn’t roll up into who created what we’re rejoicing in. We don’t get deep enough in our rejoicing.
And what does Paul say next? People believe a lie over the truth of God (Rom. 1:25). What’s the lie? This fallen nature in us believes that we’re smarter than God. I’ve never met anyone who will say that, but I’ve met hundreds of people who live like that: “I’m smarter than God.” God reacts to people who believe the lie over the truth of God. Paul paints the picture of homosexuality, with a man saying, “Forget the woman. I’ll take myself.” And the woman says, “Forget the man. I’ll take myself.” And once again people are rejoicing in the wrong thing. “I am smart enough to pull this off. I can do this.”
And what’s the last problem in Romans 1:28? They did not “acknowledge God.” You see this constantly. It’s basketball season, and a guy that’s seven feet tall does a dance after he dunks. It’s just shameful. Any time Shaq jammed the ball and did that thing he did, I was like, “Hit a free throw, brother. Then celebrate.” But if you’re 7'1" and you dunk the ball, that’s like me putting on my shoes. I shouldn’t be able to dance or celebrate that. If we think about it, the preborn Shaq didn’t rap on the uterus wall and request, “I’d like to be 7'1" and athletic.” He was born. “But he worked hard.” Okay, but I can work hard, and I can’t do that. He was uniquely wired and gifted by God to bring glory to God, and when he tampers with that, he makes himself a blasphemer. When he takes what God gave him for the purpose of glorifying God and uses it to glorify himself, he blasphemes.
I’m from Dallas, home of the largest cult in America. It’s the largest church with the most expensive church building you’ve ever seen. Some men in our church swear to me that they can’t read or study well, but they can tell me the name of the third-string running back for the Dallas Cowboys and how many yards he rushed for his junior year of high school. That’s rejoicing in football. That’s celebrating football.
We don’t have a problem in rejoicing. You don’t know anyone who doesn’t excel at rejoicing. The problem is not in the rejoicing. It’s how we rejoice and that we don’t get underneath what we’re rejoicing in to give credit to where credit is due. This leads us to the second imperative:
REMEMBER YOUR CREATOR
The second imperative beats like a drum in this text: Remember also your Creator in the days of your youth. Remember also your Creator before the evil days come. Remember, remember, remember, remember, remember your Creator.
The question we must answer is this: Is there a way of remembering that redeems how we rejoice and fixes the brokenness in how we rejoice?
Throughout the Old Testament this gospel rhythm is established: the Old Testament calls God’s people to remember several things about the nature and character of God.
Remember Who God Is
“Remember your Creator” means “Remember that I am God.” Through the Prophets and the Law, God constantly says, “I am God. I am the Creator. I started this, and I’ll finish this. This was my idea. I did this.” And it shows up beautifully in the wisdom literature.
I love Job 38:1–13. It’s a terrifyingly beautiful passage. I’ve asked a lot of questions, and I’m grateful that God hasn’t answered me like this:
Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind and said:
“Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge?
Dress for action like a man;
I will question you, and you make it known to me.
“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?
Tell me, if you have understanding.
Who determined its measurements—surely you know!
Or who stretched the line upon it?
On what were its bases sunk,
or who laid its cornerstone,
when the morning stars sang together
and all the sons of God shouted for joy?
“Or who shut in the sea with doors
when it burst out from the womb,
when I made clouds its garment
and thick darkness its swaddling band,
and prescribed limits for it
and set bars and doors,
and said, ‘Thus far shall you come, and no farther,
and here shall your proud waves be stayed’?
“Have you commanded the morning since your days began,
and caused the dawn to know its place,
that it might take hold of the skirts of the earth,
and the wicked be shaken out of it?” (Job 38:1–13)
And later there’s a pause like Job’s got an answer: “. . . no.”
You also see reminders in moments of worship, like Psalm 147:4:
He determines the number of the stars;
he gives to all of them their names.
“Remember that I am God. I’m not you. I’m God. I do what you can’t. I started this. I’m driving this. I’m beyond you.”
Habakkuk is very similar to Job. Habakkuk asks God, “Why are you putting up with injustice?” And God replies, “I’m not putting up with injustice. I’m sending the Chaldeans to punish my people.” Habakkuk responds, “No, you can’t come to us in judgment like that because the Chaldeans are more wicked than we are, and you surely won’t use really wicked people to judge less wicked people.” But God replies, in effect, “Oh, I’m coming. And if you think I’ll delay, just wait for it. Remember that I am God.”
Remember What God Has Done
God constantly calls people back to remember: “Look, I have accomplished much around you, for you, in you.” Here are just two examples.
First, the establishment of the Passover feast: “This day shall be for you a memorial day, and you shall keep it as a feast to the LORD; throughout your generations, as a statute forever, you shall keep it as a feast” (Ex. 12:14). This is a call to remember: “You’re going to get together, and you’re going to remember that you were slaves and that I freed you. You didn’t free yourselves. I freed you. You didn’t get yourself out of Egypt. I did. I sent the plagues. I showed my power and authority over the created order. I killed Pharaoh’s men. I got you across the Red Sea. I spared your sons. Remember that I am God and that I have delivered you and called you and fulfilled my promises to your ancestors.”
Or again, when Israel passes over the Jordan River:
And Joshua said to them, “Pass on before the ark of the LORD your God into the midst of the Jordan, and take up each of you a stone upon his shoulder, according to the number of the tribes of the people of Israel, that this may be a sign among you. When your children ask in time to come, ‘What do those stones mean to you?’ then you shall tell them that the waters of the Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the LORD. When it passed over the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off. So these stones shall be to the people of Israel a memorial forever.” (Josh. 4:5–7)
In other words, “Remember what I’ve done. Don’t forget that I delivered you. Don’t forget that I didn’t abandon you. Don’t forget that I am faithful and that I have acted on your behalf.”
And there’s one more component to this theme in the Old Testament. God adds, “And I’m not doing this because you’re awesome.” That’s what we like to think. We won’t say that, but many of us think it. We think that things will go well for us because we’re “faithful.” But God’s message since day one is this: “I’m going do this because I am awesome, because I am spectacular. Let me show you how spectacular I am. I’m using you. Watch my power flow through you. I’m letting you play in what I’m doing, but it is ultimately about me. Don’t forget. I’m faithful. I don’t abandon my people.”
Remember God’s Commands
Remember God’s commands, and remember that they are about leading his people into life. The commands of God in Scripture are about lining people up with how he designed the universe to work. God’s commands don’t rob you of joy but lead you into it. At the Village Church, I try to make that clear for people who don’t have a lot of religious background or who have bought into the lie that God is in the heavens with a thunderbolt waiting to light someone up simply for smiling.
A question that people get tired of me asking is, “How’s that working for you? So you’re smarter than God when it comes to sex. How’s that working for you?” I don’t think you have to be sharp to see this. You can be a dull blade and look at our culture and conclude, “Man, we’re a mess when it comes to sex. We have not figured it out. We’re having tons of it, and it’s not working.” So we’re trying to figure out better techniques at doing it because if having it doesn’t satisfy, then maybe doing it better will. When you go to the store, look at any magazine you want, and on the cover—it doesn’t matter what it is, it could be Auto Trader—will be a little line about “how to make her engine rev” or whatever. It’s just ridiculous. So I constantly come back to the question, “Is it working?” If that’s how you view sex and freedom, does it satisfy? At the Village Church, I regularly hear testimonies about how that view of sex leads to devastation, heartbreak, pain, disease, sorrow, loss. But God’s not taking away enjoyment; he’s giving it.
DEUTERONOMY 6:6–9
And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates. (Deut. 6:6–9)
God says, “Remember my law because if you remember my law and practice my law you will see how great and beautiful and amazing I am and how much I’m for you and how much I love you and how much I am trying to lead you into how I designed things to work for the glory of my name and your ultimate joy.”
NUMBERS 15:39–40
When God speaks to his people, he is rarely seeker-sensitive.
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. (Num. 15:39–40)
I just love that: “Hey, whores, listen to me. I’m already on your frontlets, hands, doorposts, gates. Now put tassels on your clothes.” The Old Testament establishes this gospel rhythm. This idea of remembering rightly redeems our rejoicing.
LUKE 22:19
In the New Testament, Jesus, God in the flesh, shows up on the scene (cf. John 5 and Luke 24) and points back to the Old Testament and says, “See, that was me.” At his final Passover meal, Jesus says that the blood is the blood of the new covenant. “And he took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, ‘This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me’ ” (Luke 22:19). We got into that gospel rhythm in the Old Testament, and it doesn’t get broken in the New Testament. You’re still in that rhythm.
Remember! Remembering rightly will redeem rejoicing. Your rejoicing is broken, so you must remember rightly, and then you’ll rejoice rightly. You’ll get underneath the surface, and you will rejoice in what you should rejoice in rather than staying on the surface and robbing yourself of joy and God of glory.
1 CORINTHIANS 11:26
Paul takes this and runs like an Olympic sprinter: “For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes” (1 Cor. 11:26). Paul points back to the institution of the Lord’s Supper as a remembrance of the cross of Christ: “Don’t forget what Jesus told you not to forget.”
One of my favorite aspects of Paul’s ministry and one that I think we need to hear over and over again is that he loved to preach the gospel, not only in a frontier setting—he gets a lot of credit for preaching the gospel in a frontier setting, and rightly so—but he also constantly preaches the gospel to Christians. Over and over again he proclaims to people what they already know because we are all prone to forget. We are prone to wander and drift. So Paul wants to preach the gospel to people who know it because even gospel people are prone to forget the gospel or at some level just assume it, which can create a lot of pain and heartbreak. He says:
I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that I have often intended to come to you (but thus far have been prevented), in order that I may reap some harvest among you as well as among the rest of the Gentiles. I am under obligation both to Greeks and to barbarians, both to the wise and to the foolish. So I am eager to preach the gospel to you also who are in Rome. (Rom. 1:13–15)
This is an interesting text because Paul says, “I want you to know that I want to reap some harvest among you, my brothers.” So he is not referring to justification, to salvation, but rather to playing a role in their continued maturation into their knowledge of Jesus Christ.
Some of you who have more foolish people than wise at your churches should take comfort in verse 14. I’ve picked up on some things as I have gotten to know pastors. For instance:
1 CORINTHIANS 15:1–4
This is a watershed right here:
Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain.
For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures. (1 Cor. 15:1–4)
Paul is addressing brothers here too—not pagans. They have already received this gospel. That’s in the past. And these believers are still standing in the gospel; they are being saved by this gospel, and they will be saved by this gospel. The gospel of Christ is what saves us, sustains us, and brings us safely home. We do not move on from the gospel. If you preach it in such a way that you give the impression that Christians should move beyond the gospel, then you will remove from them the very lifeline of a Spirit-empowered relationship with Jesus.
Paul warns:
I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel—not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed. (Gal. 1:6–9)
Then you’ve got that spectacular, Mount Everest–like section of texts in Galatians 2:20–3:5, where Paul (showing that he is a preacher) says, “I’d like to learn just one thing from you.” And then he asks something like six questions, saying in effect: “Did you come into the kingdom because you did something, or did you come into the kingdom because the Spirit of God made you alive in Christ? After being saved that way, are you now being perfected by the law?” He’s already told them: “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (Gal. 2:20). And there is Ephesians 1–2, where Paul gives a cosmic-level view of the gospel. It’s spectacular.
PHILIPPIANS 1:12–17
I have never met a man as free as Paul. You can’t touch him. If you say, “I’m gonna kill you, Paul,” he says, “All right! Time to go home.”
If you say, “We’re gonna let you live,” he comes back, “All right; to live is Christ.”
You say, “Okay, we are going to beat you,” and he says, “Well, you know, that’s sharing in the sufferings of Christ. I welcome that.”
If, “We’ll put you in prison,” no problem: “I’ll convert all your guards and most of the prisoners.”
Paul is untouchable. How did he get like that? He kept going back to the gospel over and over again. That’s what he says in Philippians 1:12–17. He says, “You know, I’m here in prison, but that’s fine. That has emboldened others for the gospel. So I’m here and able to share the gospel here. Everything drives the gospel forward.”
COLOSSIANS 3
Paul always wants to clearly set up the gospel before he gets into specific applications: “Now because of the gospel, do this.” So there are these great turn texts in Paul’s letters. Colossians 1 is a great christological beginning; it breaks down who he is and what he’s done and what God is accomplishing. And Colossians 3 swings it by beginning, “If then you have been raised with Christ . . .” In other words, “If you’ve been baptized into this, if you’re a believer, then let’s look at marriage, children, church, life. But if you don’t get the gospel, we can’t have these conversations. Because if I preach these conversations before I preach the gospel, you get hung up on trying to accomplish what only Christ in you can accomplish.”
So now we come back to our main text.
ECCLESIASTES 11
When we remember what we’ve been commanded to remember, then our rejoicing is redeemed because we’ll move past the surface and get underneath it. So let’s look back on some of the things we’re supposed to rejoice in according to Ecclesiastes 11. “Rejoice, O young man, in your youth, and let your heart cheer you in the days of your youth. Walk in the ways of your heart and the sight of your eyes” (v. 9).
If I can rejoice—having remembered what Christ has done, having remembered what he has purchased for me, being spiritually aware of what Christ has done for me in his perfect life on the cross and in his resurrection—in my youth, in my physical strength, I’m not rejoicing merely in my youth and my physical strength. I’m rejoicing that God in his mercy has granted it to me. And because of the grace of Christ, God has freed me up in my youth to serve him faithfully. See, I get underneath it. I don’t rejoice in being young and having a strong, healthy body. I rejoice in being redeemed. Youthful strength, zeal, and passion are redeemed so that I might rejoice that I’m here.
Control is an illusion. You eat all the spinach you want. You can get your Pilates workout on. You can get in the gym and pump weights and run. You can be as careful as you want with that, but it’s not going to save you. Should we wisely steward our physical bodies? Absolutely. But at the end of the day, my rejoicing isn’t that I’m young and strong, because that can be taken from me in a second. That can be ripped from any one of you in a second. What can’t be ripped from me is that in this moment God has given me strength and energy to make much of him. So I don’t rejoice that I’m young. I rejoice that in my youth he has opened my eyes to how beautiful and spectacular he is. In the energy of my youth, I get to make much of him.
Ecclesiastes 11:9 also says that we should rejoice in the desires of our heart and eyes. So here is how you “get underneath” the desires of your heart and eyes. I have a beautiful wife whom I love very much, and the last year and a half has made that even more spectacular to me. I try to help her around the house and be a good daddy and love and lead my home with all the grace the Lord gives me. But when someone cuts out a big portion of your brain, there’s a period of time that you’re down. And you don’t get to do those things. Add to that the amount of steroids you’re on. Suddenly I just cried a lot. Where I had been strong and able to run things in the home, I just cried. I couldn’t hold myself together. I was so ready to be off the steroids not because I was raging but because I couldn’t stop crying. We’d go to a movie, and there’d be a commercial for St. Jude’s Hospital, and I’d start sobbing. In that season I had nothing to give, no way to lead my girl.
There’s something underneath that: Ephesians 5. It’s like that day of epiphany when a guy goes from thinking that girls are gross to thinking he has to have one. That’s not some sort of weird biological hormonal thing. God’s driving that. God’s painting a picture. So underneath, the heart I have for my wife is this beautiful picture of what God has done for me in Christ. And when there are issues (i.e., when my wife acts up)—and the only people who think that marriage isn’t difficult are people who aren’t married or who just got married; there are definitely seasons when you irritate your spouse and come to impasses; there are moments when you need help—we get this great lesson. If we’re seeing and remembering who Jesus is and remembering this great analogy of the wedding supper of the Lamb and of being the bride of Christ, we start to see underneath our marriage. I am not just rejoicing in Lauren, but I get underneath that and rejoice that God has made a covenant with me. God is not leaving me—ever. And that’s not built on my performance or how well I please him but rather on who his Son is.
I love being a daddy. If there is something greater than that outside of being a child of God—I love it. I love what kids say. I love the innocence of their hearts. And I love how often, if you’ll pay attention, God is teaching you about himself in them—whether that is from how they trust or from our oldest starting to walk. I believe that a young child walking really isn’t so much a decision of the will as much as it is some weird physiological thing that happens. So if you’ve got kids, they start to crawl. And they start to rock back and forth. And then they start to scoot along the side of something. And then what do they do? They let it go, right? They kind of awkwardly hobble. And then because God has created children with giant heads and small bodies, the head falls forward. Now science is involved: now you’ve got momentum. So the kid at this point has two choices: take a step or die. So the kid steps, and now we’re moving. Now we’re in physics. Step, step, step, and then what happens? Fall. But what do we do? We freak out like the kid just got a football scholarship: “He’s walking!” We’re calling people. We’re tweeting. We’re setting the kid back up and taking pictures. We freak out: our kid took two steps and fell on the ground.
We have a young church with a lot of young children, and we have never seen a father watch his kid take three steps and fall and say, “Idiot. Are you serious? Baby, this is your side of the family because we walk in my family. We walk!” You don’t say that. How crazy would that be? No, you celebrate the steps, don’t you?
So I’m watching my oldest do this, and I’m just blown away that she’s walking. She’s fifteen months, and I’m thinking, “She’s going to drive before she walks.” But here’s the picture I got watching Audrey fumble her way into walking: Step, step, fall. And there’s this great rejoicing in the steps. And we scoop her back up and say, “Go on again.” And “Get the camera! We’re going to film this.” And we’d just watch her and wait for her to do it again. And we’d celebrate again. But it never bothered us that she would fall. We knew that she was starting to walk and that she would get better and better at it until she was running. Since we knew that it was going to end with strong walking and running and climbing, the falls didn’t bother us. As I’m watching my kid learn that, I’m blown away at grace. That’s what I’m seeing. Celebrate your steps.
Because so many of us believe the gospel, we don’t remember the gospel well enough. The litmus test of whether you understand the gospel is what you do when you fail. Do you run from God and go clean yourself up a little bit before you come back into the throne room? Or do you approach the throne of grace with confidence? If you don’t approach the throne of grace with confidence, you don’t understand the gospel. You think you can get yourself clean enough to stay in the club.
It’s not you only at your worst that God has a problem with. It’s you at your best. It’s when you nail it that you’re filthy before the Lord. When you get up and have your quiet time and get into Edwards and you’re trying to learn to play the acoustic guitar so you can lead worship before you preach and you share the gospel with your neighbor and you go to the gym and talk to some guy who is bench-pressing and you use the bench press as an entry to a gospel narrative, and it’s brilliant, lights out—it’s on that day that you are offensive to God without Jesus. The idea that the Reformed community hasn’t bought into the idea of earning favor is foolish. I meet young and old men all the time who are still trying to earn what has been freely given.
REMEMBERING IN A WAY THAT LEADS TO RIGHT REJOICING
In our jobs and callings, we begin to get underneath them when we understand what Jesus Christ has done. When we remember what Jesus has done, that takes us underneath that surface level of rejoicing. It takes us out of the kiddy pool and into the deep end of the pool, where joy can be ever expanding and the glory of God can shine, and we can be sustained in that rejoicing.
This is not just a mind-set. This is not just, “Let me change how I think about things so that I can remember correctly and thereby fix my rejoicing issue.” That’s not how it works. How do we get into remembering in a way that leads to rejoicing correctly?
HAVE A REGENERATE HEART
First, you need a regenerate heart. You need to be born again. You’re a much better pastor when you’re saved than when you’re not. You’re a much better pastor when you understand the message not just in your head but having been transformed by the Holy Spirit of God—not conformed to a mere pattern of religion.
My fear for some of you is that as you grew up in church, you learned early on that by saying certain things and acting in certain ways you got power and credibility and applause. You’ve learned to play the game so well that by being Reformed and making much of Jesus, much is made of you. And in the end you have not been converted. You’ve just been conformed to a pattern of religion. You haven’t been transformed by the Holy Spirit of God. You must war with that. I feel no guilt in wanting you to question whether you know him, love him, serve him.
MEDITATE ON THE GOSPEL
Second, you need to constantly mediate on the gospel of Jesus Christ. After all of these years of trying to faithfully serve the Lord by the power of the Spirit sealed inside of me by the grace of God, I still have to preach the gospel to myself.
Just a few months ago, I was preaching near my hometown, and I had a little bit of a break. So I thought it’d be a good idea to go see some of the houses in the area that I lived in and take some pictures and show them to my kids. There was one where I got saved right before my eighteenth birthday. I drove into town and saw a field where I got into a fight with a kid named Shawn in front of a whole bunch of people. I’m not a fair-fight kind of guy. I don’t have that kind of physique. I had to take a cheap shot and keep wailing until somebody broke it up. So some bad, dark things happened in that field to the point where Shawn, to this day, if God hasn’t saved him, would flush at the mention of my name.
Then I drove by one of the houses we lived in, and I took a picture. And I was immediately filled with memories of things that occurred in that house. I felt shame. Then I drove by Jimmy Herford’s house and remembered his sixteenth birthday party, and I was immediately filled with shame.
So I got back in my car and drove back to preach. And the entire drive back, I’m being accused—and not by the Holy Spirit because when the Holy Spirit accuses, it’s sweet. When the Spirit convicts, there’s a sweetness to it. Not so when it’s the lies of the Enemy. So I’m driving, and I’m fighting with myself: “Oh, you’re going to talk to them about what a man of God you are and what a man of God they’re supposed to be? That’s what you’re going to say? You’re going to point guys toward the gospel? What do you think Shawn thinks about your gospel? What do you think Holly thinks about your gospel? What do you think most of your friends from high school think about your gospel?” I’m going to preach on believing the gospel, and I’m having to wrestle with myself to believe it myself.
It was somewhere in the middle of that wrestling that the promise of the covenant and the blood of Jesus Christ and the knowledge of Scripture really defeated what was the work of the Enemy because I got to say, “No, that Matt Chandler is dead. He should never say anything about Jesus. Good thing Jesus killed him on the cross. Good thing that the new Matt Chandler is holy and righteous, and not because he is but because it was granted to him.” Now, all of the sudden, I get to walk in gospel power.
Do not assume the gospel. It must be explicit, and it must constantly be explicit. If you assume it, then all people will hear is moralistic therapeutic deism: “Do this. Don’t do that. Go here. Don’t go there.” They will not understand that their righteousness is blood-bought. Don’t assume it.
We baptize tons of twenty-year-olds who say to us in our baptism class, “I grew up in church and never heard the gospel.” We always want to press on that because sometimes you just don’t have ears to hear. So we ask, “Did you take any notes when you were in youth group?” “Yeah.” “Go back and look at your notes, and tell me that you didn’t hear the gospel.” And a lot of them come back and say, “Yeah, I heard the gospel. I guess I just didn’t have ears to hear.” But there are an amazing number of young men and women who were told, “Don’t drink beer. Don’t have sex. Don’t listen to secular music.” Should we call young people to holiness? Absolutely. Is holiness possible outside of the working of the Holy Spirit to regenerate us? No. Even if they didn’t have sex, didn’t touch beer, and didn’t listen to anything but Sandi Patty, does that in the end redeem them? No. They’re just nerdy lost kids.
Make the gospel explicit. Preach it week in and week out. “Well, people will get tired of hearing it.” I’ve been doing it for nine years, and they don’t get tired of hearing it.
WALK BY THE SPIRIT
Third, walk by the Spirit and not by the flesh (Gal. 5:16). I want to stay deeply tuned in to my affections—like when I no longer marvel, when I’m no longer overwhelmed, when I’m no longer stirred up and enflamed that God in his mercy saved me. I didn’t save myself, he saved me. I had a plan for me, and it wasn’t his plan. He came and got me; I wasn’t looking for it. I moved from California to Texas and “happened” to have a locker next to a guy in football who came up to me and said, “Hey, I need to talk to you about Jesus. When do you want to do that?” Not, “Hey, would you like to hear about Jesus?” It wasn’t an option; he was going to tell me. But he did let me pick the place: “Where do you want to have the conversation. It’s happening, but where do you want to have it?”
So I want to stay dialed in to the fact that God came and saved me. I want remembering to lead to rejoicing, and when that’s not taking place, I want to be nervous and get around other brothers who can help me work through why I’m not marveling at what should be more spectacular than anything else in the universe.
CONCLUSION
Some of you are young and feel young. Some of you are at your cruising altitude for a while. Some of you are on the descent, and for some of you the tray tables are stowed, the chair back is up, and you don’t wonder if you’ll be here for the next conference. When I said that earlier, you were thinking, “Probably, that’s me. I probably won’t be here.” So we’re all over the map.
But here’s the reality. I need you to hear me, and I don’t know if you will. We are right now several hours closer to standing in front of our great Father and Judge than we were when we walked in. I’m wondering how you’re doing at rejoicing. That’s the question on my heart for you. Are you rejoicing well? Are you remembering in such a way that you’re getting underneath how most men rejoice? Are you rejoicing in what God has done for you in Christ? Are you rejoicing in what Colossians calls those shadows? Are you looking at your marriage and going, “Isn’t the Father spectacular?” Are you looking at your children, your job, your life, the nuances of everyday life, and are they stirring up a passion within you for God’s mercy? Or is your rejoicing hollow? Is it shallow? Are you in the kiddy pool? Or are you swimming in the ocean?
My hope for you is that you know the deep waters, that the Holy Spirit would invade in simple acts every day to draw your attention and focus to who he is and what he has done. That is the firm foundation that is unshakeable. That’s how you become a man or woman who is unmoved. That’s how you glory in crazy circumstances. When you hear “cancer” or experience loss, you mourn, yes, but you are very quick to say, “Yes, Lord, accomplish what you want to accomplish.” There is a confidence that comes when remembering redeems rejoicing that’s simply not there when you rejoice in your youth because you’re young. Or you rejoice in your money because you have money. Or you rejoice in your wife because you have one and she likes you for now. Or you rejoice in your children because they’re healthy and doing what you say. Or you rejoice in the nice car or house that you have.
All that can be taken from you. You’re not free. But when remembering leads to rejoicing, you’ll be a man or woman unshaken. And that’s my hope for you.
1 All Scripture quotations in this chapter are from the English Standard Version.