The human life is a long racecourse. You are young—perhaps twelve, thirteen, or fourteen—and are at the beginning of your course. I am eighty-six. I have been running the course for many years and am at the finish. To be sure, I know what we human beings need to run our course well. Have you found out what people need? According to what I have experienced, we need three things.
To say that these three things are eating, drinking, and money is terrible. What we need is not eating, not drinking, and not money. In the universe, the most important One and the first One is God. Our need is not eating and drinking, but God. If you do not have God, you miss a lot; if you do not have God, you have not yet started your race. Because the worldly people do not know God, they have not started their course. They do not know what the racecourse is. They are simply in darkness. They are walking, even running, in the vanity of their mind. From the time of their forefathers until now, they do not have God. It is pitiful not to have God. The Bible says that the most pitiful person is the one who does not have God. You may lose everything but you should not lose God. As long as you have God, everything is all right.
What is the second thing you need? You may say it is the Word, the church life, the Body life, or to be burning in spirit, but if you have God, you have all these things. God is the totality of these items. As long as you have God, that is enough; that implies a lot. You may also say that we need a spirit to contact God. Yes, you do have a spirit, but that is not the second thing you need. The number one thing young people need is God. This may surprise you, but the second thing you need is education.
I know you may not like to hear this; this may bother you a lot. You may say, “Oh, education! That is terrible. From preschool to kindergarten, elementary, junior high, high school, and university—we study books from the time we are four years old! I hate all the books!” You do nothing but handle book after book for exactly twenty years. If you would not spend twenty years for education, you might be a wretched person, never knowing that you need God.
You need education. At this time you may be in junior high. You must reach the goal of getting a grade point average of 4.0. Let me encourage you to get higher than a 4.0. Does this bother you? The fact is, if you do not take my word, you will regret it when you pass the age of twenty-four, but that will be too late. The best time to get your education is from the age of four to twenty-four. That is the unique time; there is no other time for this. Many of you are close to fourteen. That means that half of your age for education has passed. You have only ten years left. I must tell you that what your life will be all depends upon the upcoming ten years. Please believe my word. If you get a 3.9, that is wonderful, but when you are twenty-four, you will regret it. You will say, “Why did I not spend a little more energy to get a 4.0 or higher?”
Some of you may say that this is too much. No, this is not too much. According to my experience of human life, education is next only to God. I thank God that when I was young, He afforded me the opportunity, the time, to receive Him. I had God when I was young. Moreover, at the same time I received a certain amount of education.
I encourage you all to consider your education, especially the last ten years of it. Next year you may go on to high school. There is a total of four years of high school. Then you will go on to college for another four years. I encourage you, do not stop your education after graduation from high school. It is a problem for the country of the United States that many of the young people today do not like to go on past high school. That is pitiful. You have to keep going on for another four years. I would like to encourage you all. If you do not get a Ph.D., you have to get at least a master’s degree. This will take you ten more years from today. This seems like a long time, but in actuality, it is very short; it will go by very quickly. Whether or not you are successful in the future depends upon how you spend these next ten years.
The Bible is very important, but I must tell you, education is also important for young people. I do not agree that any one of you would graduate from high school and then stop your schooling. That is absolutely wrong. In Anaheim in 1977, I gave a message saying that all the young ones have to finish college at least, although it would be better to get a master’s degree, and it would be best to get a Ph.D. That word encouraged many young people. Today many have come back to thank me. Some said, “At that time we thought that as long as we loved the Lord, that is all right. It is good enough simply to wash dishes in a restaurant, mow lawns, or wash windows.” I told them, “This is not okay. You must go on to finish your college education. But even this is not the best. This is barely up to the standard. You have to go on to get a master’s degree, or even the more, you have to go on to get a Ph.D.” A number of young people took my word. One brother, who is now my useful helper in the translation of the Bible, heard that word. He went on to study and received a Ph.D. degree. Now he is very good in Greek and is the most useful helper to me in Greek. Therefore, please take my word. You must have the goal to receive God, but in fact, you have already received Him. Now you have to receive an education.
What is the third thing you need? It is not something spiritual such as consecration or full-time service. It is also not health, and if you say it is a family, that simply means you are anxious to get married. Rather, the third thing you need is character. You must have God, you must have education, and you must have a proper character.
If a young brother stands to speak in a conference, he may think that he is in a good condition. He may dress very well with a light blue shirt and a necktie. This is not bad, but if he turns around, we may see that he has not tucked in his shirt. If so, he is wrong in that matter. When you put on your shirt, you must tuck it neatly into your pants.
When I go into someone’s room, I first look at the books on his desk. How do you arrange your books? You must put them in a good order. Every time you leave your desk, all the books on it must be arranged in a very nice order. This is to build yourself up. In my eyes, many things about the young people are too free. You need to be adjusted; you need to be instructed; you need to be corrected in many ways, not in only one way. The way you cut your hair may be wrong, and the way you comb it also may be wrong.
You need to build yourself up. Our proper person is our character. Our character is what we are; it is our being. You have to realize, however, that character is composed of two things: your birth and your habit. What is character? Character is birth plus habit. With all of us, though, birth does not occupy as much importance as habit. Character is mostly what we ourselves build up from our youth. Day after day, you have to build yourself up. All your parents probably taught you to have good manners at the dining table. That is the building up of a good habit, but it is not only that; it is the building up of a good character.
In brief, you need God, you need education, and you need character. Seventy or eighty years ago I was still young, so I know all the problems, situations, and gimmicks of the young people. A young brother may say that he was on fire for the Lord while visiting another church. However, that is too easy. When there is a fire, everyone is burning, but when the brother sat in his room by himself, was he still on fire? If he was not, then the burning was not his own; he simply took advantage of everyone else’s burning. This is due to the lack of a built up character.
Even in seeking the Lord, in pray-reading, and in keeping a morning watch, you need a proper character. The basic need is not your doing or your acting. The basic need is what you are. You have been in the human life for at least twelve years already, or perhaps fourteen. You have only half of your time left to build up yourself. Every young person should be built up by the time he is twenty-four years old. After twenty-four, even just at twenty-five, it is too late. Please believe me. You must get yourself prepared and educated within the limit of twenty-four years. By the age of twenty-four, you must have God, you must have an education, and you must have a proper character. Then you will be all right. God bless you. Amen.