Remember your Creator in the days of your youth (Eccl 12:1)

by | Jul 5, 2024 | Leow Zhi Xian, • Timely Word •

Remember your Creator in the
days of your youth

(Eccl 12:1)

1) Enjoy your youth and be a good steward of it.​

Young people, it’s wonderful to be young! (Ecc 11:9a, NLT) Dear youths, you are in a great phase of life. You have energy, you have ideas, you have hopes, dreams and desires. With your newfound independence, skills and abilities, there are so many things to explore and so many things you can try your hand at. The world is filled with possibilities and you have a myriad of opportunities and options. ​

But dear youths, remembering your Creator means remembering that “you must give an account to God for everything you do” (Ecc 11:9b NLT). Be a good steward of the energy, the talent and the opportunities that God has given you. They come from God – so honour Him with where you direct your energy and talents to, and how you use the opportunities you have.​

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2) Seek God’s strength to deal with temptations.​

With the energy and opportunities that come with youth, you will be faced with temptations. This is made worse by peer pressure. It’s so normal to want to belong to social groups and to want to be accepted by your friends. ​

But remembering the Creator in your youth means relying on Him to resist temptations and to keep a pure and holy life. Lean into the community that God has given you and let God help you through His people. “So flee youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart.” 2 Tim 2:22 (ESV)​

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3) Give God your anxieties. ​

I know, it’s not easy to be a youth! You face lots of worries, anxieties and frustrations. You have challenges to navigate – identity, meaning and purpose, sense of belonging, friendships and relationships. Who am I? What is my purpose in life? Where do I belong – who are my friends and am I accepted by them? What/ where should I study? What if I make the wrong choice? How will my future pan out? ​

Dear youth, God knows all these anxieties you face. Remembering your Creator means recognising that He holds you in His good hands. Your past, present and future are under His sovereignty. In hymn-writer John Newton’s words: “Everything is necessary that God sends, and nothing can be necessary that He withholds.” Because of God, you can – as Ecc 11:10 says – “refuse to worry” (NLT) and “remove vexation from your heart” (ESV).  ​

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4) Recognise that your youth is fleeting. ​

While youth is a wonderful season of life, remember that it is just that – a season of life that will come and go. Do not hold on to it too tightly. If you do, you would want to maximise everything you can do in this stage of life – you might compromise on God’s intention for you to rest, or God’s desire for you to be holy and set apart for Him. ​

Our bodies will grow old, our energy levels will drop, we will start to have ailments (I definitely do now!). But remembering your Creator means that while you are being a good steward of your youth and enjoying this phase of life, you are also able to embrace and accept the next phase of life (adulthood!) peacefully, graciously, as part of God’s planned seasons for our lives.​

Dear youth, ultimately, remember what Ecc 12:13b-14 (NLT) says: “Fear God and obey his commands, for this is everyone’s duty. God will judge us for everything we do, including every secret thing, whether good or bad.”​

By sister Zhixian​

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Discipling Our Youth to Know Jesus

by | Jul 5, 2021 | Leow Zhi Xian, Nixon Sng, • Timely Word •

The recent Singapore Census 2020 reported a rising trend of youth declaring that they have no religion. According to interviews conducted by CNA, some youths, Christians included, said that religion was not a big part of their lives, even though they participate in religious rituals with their parents. (For more details, see CNA article “No Religion: Why more in Singapore are turning away from traditional faiths”)

Why is this happening? Are parents and the church failing in the Deuteronomy 6:4-9 mandate to disciple the children? How can the church disciple the young ones to know Jesus as their Lord and Saviour?

Recent research from Fuller Youth Institute showed that for a youth’s faith to grow and continue into adulthood, s/he will need five significant spiritual relationships. The parents count as one, their youth leader could count as one, but what about the other three? This is where the church can come in. Youths need adults who know them personally, and who will approach them in the community of faith and ask them about life and school, or even their friendship problems (which is extremely common at their age). The good news is this – you do not have to be young to love a youth; every adult in the church can be involved. All you need is a heart for youths and maybe a crash course in building a relationship with them. Here are four things that we learnt in our time as Youth Overseers that can help build a relationship with the youths:

1. Be available

Our youth know that we are caught up with life’s busyness and have limited time. When one of the youth leaders made changes to her schedule to accommodate youth, the youth commented, “you’re so free ah”? Separately, another youth said that while he appreciated the youth leader for meeting him, he felt guilty for taking up the youth leader’s time. It made me wonder if the youth’s perception of our busyness would hold them back from approaching us. Let us show that we are available. When we make time for them, through text or in person, we show that we care, and they can come to us anytime they need.

2. Be interested in their lives

When we make ourselves available to the youth, we are given the opportunity to enter their world. The generation gap naturally closes when we make a genuine effort to listen and be interested in their lives. If not for our involvement in the youth ministry, we would not know about slangs like “ship” and “stan”, or KPOP groups like BTS or Ateez. Let us step out of our comfort zone to engage in new activities the youth are interested in to forge better relationships. We may embarrass ourselves in the process, what matters is that our youth can see that we tried. This has an additional perk of creating memories that will last for life.

3. Be a Safe Environment

To engage our youth effectively, we have to create a safe environment for them to be vulnerable and share openly. Our youth grew up in a different culture, so we should not assume that we know what they are going through, or worse, downplay their problems. When we are quick to jump to conclusions and solutions (which would be based on what we learnt while growing up in our time), we have missed the point – the youths want their voice heard and their feelings acknowledged. The last thing we want is for them to clam up, and we end up shut off from them. Let us be quick to listen, slow to speak. (James 1:19)

4. Be open to two-way conversations

However, providing a safe environment does not mean we do not get to speak. If we have done the above, we eventually earn the right to speak into their lives. But instead of a top-down approach, let us dialogue with them. With growing access to a wealth of information online combined with their impressionability, youth will inevitably question what we tell them. We should be glad because this means they do not blindly consume what they read online and they find it safe to share their views openly. We should take this opportunity to have two-way conversations to help them to navigate issues, thoughts, and concerns. This also places us in a better position to shape their understanding through a biblical lens.

We hope that the above tips make it easier for everyone to start building a relationship with youths. The discipling of youths is not the sole responsibility of the parents or the Youth Ministry. If we want our youths to thrive in their relationship with Jesus, let’s play our part in being one of the five adults in their lives. Will you consider reaching out to a youth today?

By sister Leow Zhi Xian & brother Nixon Sng