Why a Special Work Should Be Carried on for the Young People
By Edmund C. Jaeger
THE study of statistics shows that conversion belongs almost exclusively to the years between ten and twenty-five. It has been estimated that out of every thousand joining our various churches, over half that number join before reaching the age of twenty, and another third before their thirtieth year. It may be said, almost without exception, that what you would do for a man, you must do for him while he is a boy. The whole trend of modern psychology has been to put emphasis upon the period of youth as the decisive period of life. The religious experience, the education, and the character of after-years are determined by the education and environment of childhood. “’Tis granted, and no plainer truth appears,
Our most important are our earliest years:
The mind impressionable and soft, with ease
Imbibes and copies what it hears and sees,
And through life’s labyrinth holds fast the clue
That education gives her, both false and true.” Consider the beauty of the material with which we have to deal in our work for the young,— material fresh and plastic,— boys and girls on the threshold of life, buoyant, hopeful, and full of vigor, “none wanting to fail, none needing to fail,” thirsty plants ready to imbibe the waters of truth. Ever are they saying:— “We are willing, we are ready,
We would learn if you would teach.
Look into our childish faces:
See you not our willing hearts?
Only love us, only teach us,
And we all will do our parts.” For what more could we ask? From the standpoint of the teacher the conditions are ideal. Convert a boy, and he has a beautiful future to expend in the service of Christ, with opportunity of accumulated growth in usefulness. As John R. Mott puts it: “If you reach an old man, and interest him in right objects, you are dealing in addition. If you reach a boy, you are dealing in multiplication.” Then consider the fact that the young possess a greater amount of physical energy than those of any other age; that this very power of which they are conscious makes them able to attempt undertakings that old age would not dare to consider. This buoyant energy, this unwearing strength, this hope that sings over his head, is the life of the world. The fact that the mind of the youth has not been dulled by failures and disappointments, that he has freedom from care, allows him an advantage which is invaluable in grappling with the new problems of the church. Why do we let the machinery of lives wear themselves half out in the service of sin before we attempt to enlist them in service for Christ? Why do we wait until a boy grows into manhood, goes wrong, and becomes unimpressionable, before we attempt to help him? Some one will have to answer this question before the great white throne. We enter upon the difficult task of trying to reform character, when it would have been comparatively easy to form character. The artful adversary of all human kind has not been unawake to the significance and importance of the plastic state of the mind at the beginning of life. His fiercest temptations are directed at the youth. The forces of evil are seeking in every way to drag him down. Evil invites him on every turn. Nearly all criminals begin their downward course before their eighteenth year. John R. Mott suggests that if the breakdown in character occurs later in life, the seams were made in youth. Where are those who will stand ready to shield the growing child from the contaminations of lust and greed? Are there not fathers and mothers in Israel who will by their earnest efforts and ceaseless prayers defeat the plans of the evil one? It is in the beginning that, agencies for evil are easiest curbed or crushed. As the boy of Holland saved his country from inundation of the sea by placing his hand over the small leak in the dike, so in all social effort it is easier to crush the small outcroppings of crime and tendencies toward evil, than to wait until manhood has developed, and sin in all its myriad forms has wound its tentacles around the soul. Consider the vast influence a young person has to invest. Whether this power shall be wasted in mischief-making, dissipation, and influencing others for wrong, or whether it shall be diverted to good ends, depends largely upon us. One bad boy in the community will in a month teach filthy ideas which the teachings of purity of a lifetime can rarely efface. The youth are natural teachers. They learn more from one another than from all the teachers in the land. It has been the provision of a kind Providence to make this teaching ability of youth potent in the dissemination of truth and goodness among their fellows. Being of the same age, they have intellectual sympathies which produce a sense of unity. This is a great advantage. When Sir George Williams founded his Young Men’s Christian Association, and gave to the world the idea of Christian work as expressed in the phrase, “Young men for young men,” he gave to us the key for the solution of the problem of winning the world’s young people for Christ. Let parents realize this, and work to save the young, that they may in turn be a power to save their fellow youth.