Psalms 119:9 Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way? by taking heed thereto according to thy word.
Owing to the fall of man into sin, man’s nature is corrupted from his youth.
Genesis 8:21 …for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth.
These words were God’s assessment of mankind after the cataclysmic judgment of a worldwide flood. Even a judgment of that magnitude did not change the bent of youth toward evil.
Youth is a time when the desires of the flesh are at their peak of intensity. Because youth are young in years, there is much of life they have not experienced and yet they intensely long to experience it. Couple this youthful passion with a sin nature and you have an explanation of why youth is often scarred with painful memories of follies and sins as these two verses show:
Job 13:26 For thou writest bitter things against me, and makest me to possess the iniquities of my youth.
Psalms 25:7 Remember not the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions: according to thy mercy remember thou me for thy goodness' sake, O LORD.
Youth should be a time to perfect one’s potential and to grow upward spiritually, intellectually, and morally. Yet sadly, the trend in youth if too often downward and much of that time must be written off as wasted. The word unclean is an altogether too apt description of much of the way of youth.
The verse we are considering in today’s meditation shows how a young man can make the best of his youth, how he can maximize upon the potential of his youthful mind and vigour. Our verse shows how a young man can “clean up his act” and redirect his youth. The way to do this is to take heed to his way. Let’s define that word heed.
Heed – Careful attention, care, observation, regard. Especially in the phrase to take heed.
If a young man would clean up the way he lives, he must begin by caring! He must stop being careless and reckless. He needs to pay attention to what he doing, why he is doing it, and what will be the consequences of his choices for himself and for others. How sad it is to see a young man throw away his life in alcohol and drug abuse, pornography, premarital sex (or whoremongering, as the Bible calls it), and crime while he seems to not give a care about the consequences of his evil choices. Again, cleansing one’s way begins with caring.
Now many a young man has reformed his behaviour by beginning to care about his grades, his place on the team, his career, or maybe even his family. While this will win him approval with men, it is not enough to please God. There are a lot of “good” young people whose ways are clean in the eyes of men. We often hear them spoken of as “nice kids.” Yet their way is unclean in the eyes of God. Our verse is talking about cleansing one’s way before the Lord! In order to do that, the young man must take heed unto his way “according to thy (God’s) word.” He must see to it that the way he chooses to go in life is in agreement with what God’s requires of him in His written word.
A young man’s way is the whole course or direction of his life that he chooses to pursue. It includes his thoughts, motives, and attitude; the choices he makes for friends, for a spouse, for a profession, for a location, for recreation, for a faith, for a church; and whatever else goes to make up the way he lives. If a young man (or woman) would live a clean life in the eyes of God – and that’s where it counts most! - he (she) must pay careful attention to what God says in His word and follow it. A young man needs two things to cleanse his way: (1) God’s word to guide his way and (2) careful attentiveness to that word. Matthew Henry said it well:
“God’s word will not do without our watchfulness, and a constant regard both to it and to our way, that we may compare them together.”
Of course, it stands that the only way any young man can cleanse his way is through the satisfaction that the Lord Jesus Christ made for God’s chosen people on the cross of Calvary. Without the blood of Christ, all our ways are unclean and can never be anything but unclean.
Isaiah 64:6 But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags.
But thanks be to God, Christ has redeemed us by His blood from all of our sins so that we can now truly do good works, that is, we can cleanse our way according to God’s word.
Titus 2:13 Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;
14 Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.
I close this mediation by issuing this call to young men:
Ecclesiastes 12:1 Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh, when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them;
2 Timothy 2:22 Flee also youthful lusts: but follow righteousness, faith, charity, peace, with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart.
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