Uh, in less than a week. So, but, uh, we, we thank the Lord that he's in control of those things. I want to read our, uh, reading from the valley of vision and pray. And then Barry's going to come and get us started this morning in his teaching series in the book of Ruth. So you might want to go ahead and have your Bibles open there. It's Joshua, Judges, Ruth. You go to first Samuel, you've gone too far, hang a left and, uh, be ready then for him to get us started in that. Today's prayer is entitled simply choice. Let's think about choices as we are still in the very, very early days of a new year. Oh, my God, though I am allowed to approach the I am not unmindful of my sins. I do not deny my guilt. I confess my wickedness and earnestly plead for forgiveness. May I, with Moses, choose affliction rather than enjoy the pleasures of sin. Help me to place myself always under thy guiding and guardian care, to take firmer hold of the sure covenant that binds me to thee, to feel more of the purifying, dignifying, softening influence of the religion I profess, to have more compassion, love, pity, courtesy, to deem it an honor to be employed by thee as an instrument in thy hands. ready to seize every opportunity of usefulness and willing to offer all my talents to thy service. Thou has done for me all things well, has remembered, distinguished and blessed me. All my desires have not been gratified, but thy love denied them to me when fulfillment of my wishes would have proved to be my ruin or injury. My trials have been much fewer than my sins. And when I have kissed the rod, it has fallen from my hands. Thou hast often wiped away my tears, restored peace to my mourning heart, chastened me for my profit. All thy work for me is perfect, and I praise thee. Amen. Let's bow for prayer. Lord, we do praise you. We're thankful that the hand that bears the rod is also the hand that nurtures and guides us as your children. And Lord, we pray that as we continue into the early days of this new year, not knowing what lies ahead, except those things that are sure and firm in your word. Lord, we pray that you would grant us wisdom and grant us a heart like this author of this prayer of old, that we would desire that in every instance, whatever we pray, that your will would be done. And Lord, we pray that you would give us a greater reception and welcoming of whatever you send our way, knowing that you are good and you do good. Lord, now, as we begin this study in Ruth, we pray for our brother Barry as he reads and and begins to give us teaching from this wonderful little book. Pray that we will be led to see Christ as always. And he is clearly there as in type our kinsman redeemer. And so, Lord, we pray that you'd bless this time, help us throughout this day, Lord, to honor and glorify you. We do remember those that are sick among us, those in sorrow. We pray, Father, that your comforting, healing hand would be applied. And again, we thank you for your love and mercy. We wait now for you to speak to us and we ask it in Jesus name. Amen. Good morning. Glad to see our students and young ones back. We feel much more complete when they're here. I do. It's always a joy to to see them. Brother Sammy and I talked a while back that he needed a rest and and I had some things to say on the book of Ruth that I had been studying for a little while and reading several times. And seeing some new insights and new light from that book that that pushes me further and further. If I wasn't far enough already into the complete, absolute sovereignty of God and everything that happens in all circumstances and that men will have their way, of course, but God will have his as well. And in spite of. All the time. So this book, the book of Ruth, we're going to study for the next three weeks and we're going to read the whole book today. So I have to have my opening remarks to be quite quickly gone through. It's four short chapters, just a few. It can be read in 15 minutes, 18, maybe 20 minutes. It's found at the end of the book of Judges. That's not where it is in the Hebrew Bible, but that's where it is in ours. And providentially, we would believe that God would have it there because it stands out as only one of two books that have as its name the name of a woman. And the only one of those books that has as its name of the two women's books as a woman who was also a Gentile, actually a Moabitess, who were the descendants of Lot, who were those descendants being born of the incestuous relationship between Lot and one of his daughters. So that's a brief history. And we're going to that much deeper next week of the Moabites. But we have this woman, Ruth, and the other, of course, is Esther. And both of these books have very happy endings for the people of God. But it's hard for me as a believer of Jesus Christ and to talk to other believers to not find the imprint of the grace of God all over the book. Not only just as you plainly read the narrative of the story and go through it, you see God working his end, but also pointing to its chief end, which was to reconnect after the earlier days before judges, that tumultuous and violent and really ugly time of the time of judges, to reconnect the lineage of Judah with that of David, whose ultimate end was to point to Jesus Christ. And of course, it talks about that son of David, that final Goel, as some would say it, that kinsman redeemer, the redeemer, the purchaser. And understand that to redeem something means to have been something that had been sold and must be bought back. So Jesus Christ being that one true relative of ours, that singular person alone who could redeem what our first parents had sold. They sold us into sin. in the fall, and then our own sin that we inherited through them. So numerous themes that just radiate out of this book, and it's too many to cover in three short weeks, but I'll name a few of them. Immigration and survival, want and need, wealth, poverty, proper responses to the poor, family responsibility, industriousness of labor and work, loyalty and devotion, patience in difficulty, obedience and deference, modesty and stealth, at some level, chance and providence, law and grace. And this book will probably, if you read it deeply and read, especially in Judges and then in 1 Samuel, that period of time, it will may likely challenge many of your preconceived notions. I know it does mine, of how God works through human circumstances. When you think and look, as we will look in depth next week, at those marriages, not only of that one, but the one of Judah, the one to Tamar, not the marriage, but a birth through Tamar of how this fills into the line of our Lord Jesus Christ, you think, God does what He will. It's not the way we think it is. It's the way He has appointed it to be, so that no man can take credit for anything. It's his way and his way alone. So he has a purpose in history. And we, of all people, Gentile Christians, non-Jewish Christians, we should cling tenaciously to this book because in it we find the true faith to our true Redeemer. that God had all along determined in His counsel and in His foreknowledge and in His purpose to save Jews and Gentiles. This wasn't something God thought of at the latter end of the New Testament. Oh, why don't we... not enough Jews, you know, they keep getting stamped out. Let's bring a few Gentiles in and save them too so we'll have enough people to populate the kingdom. No, He was His intent all along. to save his people, Jew and Gentile. And all of human history can be reduced to that. We've recently gone through Isaiah. The pastor is still going through Isaiah. If you look at Isaiah 42, as he's gone through, where it talks about, Behold my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen and whom my soul delight. On verse 4 of that says, He shall not fail or be discouraged, and he shall bring forth judgment for the Gentiles. And then Matthew repeats that in 12, that on him, on Jesus, on the true kinsman redeemer shall the Gentiles hope. That is Matthew 12, 17 and following in Isaiah 42, 1 and following. And there are even some other things to hopefully whet the appetite for salted barley that we'll go through. In 1 Samuel 22, when David is fleeing his predecessor Saul to the cave of Adullam, that's in 1 Samuel 22, we see that his parents are still living and they're going with him. But he doesn't want to drag them all over the wilderness and drag them into all types of potentials where they could be killed by Saul, who was probably intent on killing everyone that he was pursuing. We see that David leverages that relationship, that his predecessor, Ruth, would be his great-grandmother, Ruth. was of Moab. So he goes to the king of Moab and asks him to take care of his parents during this tumultuous time in his kingship. So we see that we tend to look at the non-Jewish races as these separate groups of people, as wicked as they were. But in many ways, the Jews were just as bad many times in their history. They have often and always been intermingled. There's lots of intermarrying among those tribes that God had told Joshua to completely stamp out, which that didn't happen. We see God told him to stamp out, but yet God in his purpose would have his own lineage of his own son to come through those people that God had told Joshua to stamp out. We have to agree with Paul that this God is unsearchable. He is unfindable. He is incomprehensible, but he's revealed it to us by faith. We believe that his purpose is and always to save a people, his people. Ruth was Moabite, the grandmother of Jesse, David's father. And in this brief journey, we're going to take it in three. First this week, we're going to read the book. I'm going to read the book to you, maybe with a few interjections for emphasis, maybe utilize some important themes to edify us. Second, we'll take the historical placement of the book and the people and all the many multifaceted characters that are in this book and the many historical principles that we find in the book. And then finally, we will look at the messianic imagery. In the last week, we'll look at the Messiah and the prophetic significance of this book. And it is the only book that has the name of a Gentile as its title. So a large part of the things I've studied, I must say, I owe to John Gill Commentary, and also on the whole Bible, and a lot of Jewish writings and things that I've found in books that I have of myself, and of course on the internet. So I owe a lot to that. It's not my wonderful scholarship. But the applications are mine, and any errors are mine as well, and I will bear those. So first we'll read the book. Read the book and I'm going to read it. I have it printed in the ESB in a much larger print. Many are using the ESB now, and there are some nice, clear things in that reading that perhaps some of you that don't read the King James a lot, that kind of smooths those out a little bit. In the days when the judges ruled, there was a famine in the land, and a man of Bethlehem in Judah went to sojourn in the country of Moab. We have to ask ourselves why he did that. He and his wife and his two sons, the name of the man was Elimelech, and the name of his wife, Naomi. And the names of his two sons were Mylon and Chalion. They were Ephrathites from Bethlehem in Judah. They went into the country of Moab and remained there. But Elimelech died, the husband of Naomi. Emelech, the husband of Naomi, died and she was left with her two sons. These took Moabite wives. Significant turning point. The name of one was Orpah and the name of the other Ruth. And they lived there about 10 years. And both Mylon and Chalion died. So the woman was left without her two sons and her husband. Then she arose with her daughters-in-law to return from the country of Moab. For she had heard that in the fields of Moab that the Lord had visited his people and given them food. So she set out from the place where she was with her two daughters-in-law, and they went on the way to return to the land of Judah. But Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, Go return each of you to your mother's house. May the Lord deal kindly with you as you have dealt with the dead and with me. An interjection here. She didn't tell her to go to her father's house, to her mother's house. We're going to find out who that father was. But Naomi. Let's see, I'm sorry. The Lord grant you. But Naomi said, yeah, go return to your mother's house, make the Lord deal kindly with you as you have dealt with the dead and with me. The Lord grant that you may find rest each of you in the house of her husband. Then she kissed them and they lifted up their voices and wept. This is something ladies do. And they said to her, Now we will return with you to your people. But Naomi said, Turn back, my daughters. Why will you go with me? Have I yet sons in my womb that they may become your husbands? Does this not remind us of the situation with Tamar? Turn back, my daughters. Go your way, for I am too old to have a husband. If I should say I have hope, even if I should have a husband this night and should bear sons, would you therefore wait till they were grown? Would you therefore refrain from marrying? No, my daughters, it is exceedingly bitter for your sake that the hand of the Lord has gone out against me. And they lifted up their voices and wept again. And Orpah kissed her mother-in-law, but Ruth clung to her. And she said, See, your sister-in-law has gone back to her people and to her gods. Return after your sister-in-law. A significant statement. She returned to her gods. But Ruth said, Do not urge me to leave you or to return from following you. For where you go, I will go. Where you lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my people and your God, my God. Where you die, I will die, and there will I be buried. May the Lord do so to me, and more also, if anything but death parts me from you." And when Naomi saw that she was determined to go with her, she said no more. So the two of them went until they came to Bethlehem. And when they came to Bethlehem, the whole town was stirred because of them. And the women said, is this Naomi? She said to them, don't call me Naomi. Call me Mara for the almighty. That means bitter for the almighty has dealt very bitter. bitterly with me, and I went away full and the Lord has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi when the Lord has testified against me and the Almighty has brought calamity upon me? So Naomi returned and Ruth the Moabite, her daughter-in-law with her, who returned from the country of Moab, and they came to Bethlehem at the beginning of the barley harvest. Chapter two. Now, now Naomi had a relative of her husband's. A worthy man of the clan of Elimelech, whose name was Boaz. And Ruth the Moabite said to Naomi, let me go to the field and glean among the ears of grain after him in whose sight I shall find favor. And she said to her, go, my daughter. So she set out and went and gleaned in the field after the Reapers. And she happened. Here's this chance. And she happened to come to the part of the field belonging to Boaz, who was the clan of Alimelech. And behold, Boaz came from Bethlehem. And he said to the Reapers, the Lord be with you. And they answered, the Lord bless you. Then Boaz said to his young man who was in charge of the rapers. This was a pretty high-level guy here this young man He was he was the manager Whose young woman is this? And the servant who was in charge of the Reapers answered, She is the young Moabite woman who came back with Naomi from the country of Moab. She said, Please let me glean and gather among the sheaves after the Reapers. So she came and she has continued from early morning until now, except for a short rest. Then Boaz said to Ruth, Now, listen, my daughter, do not go to glean in another field or leave this one. It's an important statement, but keep close to my young women. Let your eyes be on the field that they are reaping and go after them. Have I not charged the young men not to touch you? And when you are thirsty, go to the vessels and drink what the young men have drawn. Then she fell on her face, bowing to the ground and said to him, Why have I found favor? In your eyes that you should take notice of me since I'm a foreigner. But Boaz answered her, all that you have done for your mother-in-law since the death of your husband has been fully told to me and how you left your father and mother and your native land and came to a people that you did not know before. The Lord repay you for what you have done and a full reward be given you by the Lord, the God of Israel. under whose wings you have come to take refuge. Then she said, I have found favor in your eyes, my Lord, for you have comforted me and spoken kindly to your servant, though I am not one of your servants. And at mealtime, Boaz said to her, come here and eat some bread, and dip your morsel in the wine. So she sat beside the reapers, and he passed it to her roasted grain. And she ate until she was satisfied, and she had some left over. When she arose to glean, Boaz instructed his young man, saying, let her glean even among the sheaves, and do not reproach her." Remember, Jesus says how easy his yoke is. How light His burden is. Also, pull out some of the burdens, bundles for her, and leave it for her to glean. Give it to her, and do not rebuke her. So she gleaned in the field until evening. Then she beat out what she had gleaned, and it was about an ephah of barley. That's about five days worth. And she took it up and went into the city. Her mother-in-law saw what she had gleaned. She also brought out and gave her what food she had left over after being satisfied. And her mother-in-law said to her, where did you glean today? And where have you worked? Blessed be the man who took notice of you. So she told her mother-in-law with whom she had worked. The man's name with whom I work today is Boaz. And Naomi said to her daughter-in-law, may he be blessed of the Lord, whose kindness has not forsaken the living or the dead. Naomi also said to her, the man is a close relative of ours. one of our Redeemers. And Ruth of Moabite said beside, he said to me, you shall keep close by my young men until they have finished all my harvest. This would include the barley, which came in in early April, all the way through the end of wheat, which may be well up into the summer. So she's going to be there for months. And Naomi said to Ruth, her daughter-in-law, it is good, my daughter, that you go out with his young women, lest in another field you be assaulted. So she kept close to the young women of Boaz, gleaning until the end of the barley and wheat harvest. And she lived with her mother-in-law in chapter three. Then Naomi, her mother-in-law, said to her, my daughter, should I not seek rest for you that it may be well with you? Is not Boaz our relative with whose young women you were? See, he is winnowing barley tonight at the threshing floor. Wash, therefore, and anoint yourself, and put on your cloak, and go down to the threshing floor, but do not make yourself known to the man until he has finished eating and drinking. But when he lies down, observe the place where he lies, then go over, uncover his feet, and lie down, and he will tell you what to do. And she replied, all that you say I will do. So she went down to the threshing floor and did just as her mother-in-law had commanded her. And when Boaz had eaten and drunk and his heart was married, he went to lie down at the end of the heap of grain. Then she came softly and covered his feet and lay down at midnight. The man was startled and turned over and behold, a woman laid his feet. He said, Who are you? And she answered, I am Ruth, your servant. Spread your wings over your servant, for you are a redeemer. And he said, May you be blessed to the Lord, my daughter. You have made this last kindness greater than the first, and that you have not gone after young men, whether poor or rich. And now, my daughter, do not fear. I will do for you all that you ask, for all my fellow townsmen know that you are a worthy woman. The King James usually is virtuous. I like that word, virtuous woman. It rings over into Proverbs 31. And now, it is true that I am a redeemer, yet there is a redeemer nearer than I. Remain tonight, and in the morning, if he will redeem you, good, let him do it. But if he is not willing to redeem you, then as the Lord lives, He takes a note here. I will redeem you. Lie down until the morning. So she laid his feet until the morning, but arose before one could recognize another. And he said, let it not be known that a woman came into the threshing floor. And he said, bring the garment you are wearing and hold it out. So she held it and he measured out six measures of barley and put it on her. Then she went into the city. And when she came to her mother-in-law, she said, how did you fare, my daughter? Then she told her all that the man had done for her, saying, These six measures of barley he gave to me, for he said to me, You must not go back empty-handed to your mother-in-law. She replied, Wait, my daughter, until you learn how the matter turns out, for the man will not rest. Christ never rested, did he, until he fulfilled all his work, but will settle the matter today. In chapter four, we read now Boaz had gone up to the gate and sat down there and behold, the Redeemer, whom Boaz had spoken, came back. So Boaz says, I'll turn aside, friend, sit down here. And he turned aside and sat down and he took ten men of the elders of the city and said, sit down here. So they sat down. Then he said to the Redeemer, Naomi. who has come back from the country of Moab, is selling the parcel of land that belonged to our relative Elimelech. So I thought I would tell you of it and say, buy it in the presence of those sitting here and in the presence of the elders of my people. If you will redeem it, redeem it. But if you will not, tell me that I may know. For there is no one besides you to redeem it. And I come after you." And he said, I will redeem it. Then Boaz says, oh, the day you buy the field from the hand of Naomi, you also acquire Ruth, the Moabite, the widow of the dead, in order to perpetuate the name of the dead in his inheritance. Then the Redeemer said, I cannot redeem it for myself, lest I impair my own inheritance. Take my right of redemption yourself, for I cannot redeem it. Now, this was the custom in former times in Israel concerning redeeming and exchanging. To confirm a transaction, the one drew off his sandal and gave it to the other. And this was the manner of attesting in Israel. So when the redeemer said to Boaz, buy it for yourself, he drew off his sandal. Then Boaz said to the elders and all the people, you are witnesses this day that I have bought from the hand of Naomi all. that belong to Elimelech and all that belong to Chaleon and Milan. And Ruth the Moabite, the widow of Milan, I have bought to be my wife to perpetuate the name of the dead in his inheritance, that the name of the dead may not be cut off from among his brothers and from the gate of his native place. You are witnesses this day. Then all the people who were at the gate of the elders says we are witnesses. This is a this statement right here. When we move into this next week, this statement right here will will illuminate much. It has for me, perhaps you already know of how this blessing, especially in verse 12, What this blessing means. Then all the people who were at the gate and the elders said, we are witnesses. May the Lord make the woman who is coming to your house like Rachel and Leah. Now, this man was 80. This woman was around 40. Who together built up the house of Israel. May you act worthily in Ephrathah and be renowned in Bethlehem. And may your house be like the house of Perez. Pereiros was born of incest, whom Tamar bore to Judah because of the offspring that the Lord will give you by this young woman. So Boaz took Ruth, and she became his wife, and he went into her, and the Lord gave her conception, and she bore a son. Then the women said to Naomi, Blessed be the Lord, who has not left you this day without a redeemer, and may his name be renowned in Israel. He shall be to you a restorer of life and a nourisher of your old age for your daughter-in-law who loves you, who is more to you than seven sons has given birth to him." Then Naomi took the child and laid him on her lap and became his nurse. And the women in the neighborhood gave him a name saying, a son has been born to Naomi. They named him Obed. He was the father of Jesse. the father of David. Now these are the generations of Perez. Perez fathered Hezron. And Hezron fathered Ram. And Ram fathered Amenadab. Amenadab fathered Nishan. Nishan fathered Salmon. And Salmon fathered Boaz. Boaz fathered Obad. Obed fathered Jesse and Jesse fathered David. This is an amazing narrative for us when we look at the one true redeemer. May God richly bless the reading of his word. This is going to be a short one today, but I can't promise that on the next two. Let's pray. Our Father in God, we thank you for your mercies. They are indeed tender. We're thankful for the examples that the Old Testament is, and not just the books of the law, but all of its books, all of its truth, all of its what appears to our mind repulsive things sometimes. All of the things that we don't understand, we pray for understanding. Father, if we know that Hearing and understanding only come by faith, and that's a gift from you. We pray that you would gift us faith to see in your word, to see that our kinsman redeemer, our one true. Savior. Has given us comfort. has made our lives easy. We're not bound by sin. We're not bound by the fetters of ungodliness, but are kept by the power of Your Spirit. So God, help us. We plead in Jesus' name, Amen.