For the next four weeks, we are going to focus our attention on what is considered by many, not just the most beautiful and well-written piece of literature in the Bible, but one of the most beautiful and well-written pieces of literature known to man, and that is the book of Ruth. So if you have your Bibles with you, open to the book of Ruth, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, Today we'll look at Ruth chapter one. The next four weeks we'll do one chapter each week in the book of Ruth. Now, why the book of Ruth? There are a number of reasons. One, we didn't want to take too long of a break between the first eleven chapters of Romans, which give us our orthodoxy, or mainly our indicatives, and that those last few chapters of Romans, you know, twelve to sixteen, where we get orthopraxy and the imperatives, we didn't want to take too long of a break before getting back to that. So we wanted something that was brief. But the other thing is, you will notice as we look at the book of Ruth that there are some parallels of which you need to be aware. For example, there are some familiar themes in Ruth that we will recognize from the book of Genesis. Let me give you just a few. First, the idea of God's people leaving the land of promise due to a famine. We find that in the book of Genesis. that ultimately the way Israel gets into Egypt is because of a famine that has caused God's people to move. Well, here in the book of Ruth, we begin with the idea of a famine that has caused Elimelech to take his family out of the promised land. Secondly, the idea of foreign Gentile wives being grafted in to the covenant community. foreign Gentile wives being grafted into the covenant community now here in the book of Ruth we see Ruth the Moabites being grafted into the covenant community and in the book of Genesis we see that Joseph's wife is grafted into the covenant community not only are they grafted into the covenant community but but they also bear children who play significant roles in the covenant community. Joseph marries an Egyptian gentile woman and her children Ephraim and Manasseh, though their mother is an Egyptian gentile, receive Joseph's double portion blessing and actually become the half-tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh. And here we see that Ruth, though she is a Gentile, will marry Boaz and they will become grandparents of King David. In Genesis we see that a traditional enemy of Israel becomes an ally the traditional enemy is Egypt and throughout the Old Testament we see Egypt as the enemy of the Jews however in the book of Genesis Joseph rises to prominence in Egypt and because of his prominence the Pharaoh himself welcomes Joseph's father and family into Egypt here in the book of Ruth the Moabites Traditional enemies of Israel become allies through this process. Also, we see a widow bearing the promised seed. A widow bearing the promised seed. Here, we see Ruth, a widow who is going to give birth to one who is the promised seed. And Ruth, because of that, is going to be listed in the genealogy of Jesus. In the book of Genesis, we see Tamar. a widow who bears children and is thereby listed in the genealogy of Jesus, though she was a widow. So Ruth is not completely disconnected from what we have seen in the book of Genesis. Ruth is also not completely disconnected to what we've seen in the book of Romans. If you'll remember, what we just dealt with in Romans 9 through 11 is this whole idea of the relationship of the salvation of the Gentiles to that of the salvation of the Jews. now what we said in the book of Romans chapters 9 through 11 is that we have seen all the way through redemptive history all the way through salvation history that it was God's intention both through statements that we see the promise that he makes to Abraham for example of being the father of many nations it was always God's intention that salvation would include the Gentiles in Ruth that gets skin put on it In Ruth, we see this Gentile woman who becomes one of the most significant figures in salvation history through her being grafted in. So there is a connection here both to our time in Genesis and to our time in Romans as we look at the book of Ruth. Let me give some background. The time period here is the period of the judges. That's important and very significant. If you remember in the judges, we have the idea of everyone who is doing what is right in his own eyes. That's the time frame of the book of Ruth. We see that in the first line. The author lets us know that this is occurring during the period of the judges. Secondly, the circumstances, which is the famine. Famines we see in scripture for a number of different reasons, oftentimes God punishing his people, but we see it very frequently with God using a famine in order to move his people from one place to another. Also there are cultural nuances. The idea of women in the ancient Near East and the plight of widows in the ancient Near East. Listen to this. From the Bible background commentary. Widows in the ancient Near East had lost all social status and generally were also without political or economic status. They couldn't really own property. They would equate to the homeless in our American society. Typically, they had no male protector and were therefore economically dependent on society at large. That was the plight of a single woman. When we open up the book of Ruth, we find three of them together. There's also this idea of lever at marriage. God has given His people A law concerning widows. Now there are a couple of laws concerning widows that we see here in the book of Ruth. One law concerning widow was the gleaning laws. Now the gleaning laws meant that when you harvested your field, you could not harvest your entire field. You had to leave the edges of your field ungleaned or unharvested so that widows and the poor could come and harvest the edges of your field. There was no welfare program, mind you. Widows and the poor did not sit home and wait for somebody to bring them the gleanings from the field. Widows and the poor had to get up every day, go to the field in their work clothes and work to harvest what was left for them to glean. So they were responsible for working to provide for themselves, but the covenant community was responsible for making that available to them so that they could go and work and provide for themselves. Ruth meets Boaz as she is gleaning in his fields. If you don't understand this, you're sort of lost when we get to that part of the book. There's also the idea of the leave right marriage. Leave right marriage is the idea that if there are brothers, if a man marries a woman and that man dies and he does not have a male heir to carry on his name, his brother is responsible for marrying his widowed wife providing her with a son, that son bears the name and lineage of his dead brother so that his brother's name is not blotted out in the history of Israel. There's also, related to that, the idea of the kinsman redeemer. Kinsman Redeemer is a relative who has the right, if not the responsibility, to marry a widow. You'll find out more about that as we go through this book as well. But you have to understand those background issues in order to understand what we find here. in the book of Ruth. So let's look at scene one, shall we? Chapter one in this story. And again, as we look at this story, some look at it as just that. It's just a beautiful story. It's just a love story. Is it a beautiful story? Yes. Is it a love story? Yes. Is it just that? No. By the way, it's not love story in the way you think love story. Much different than that. Some think that this is, you know, the story of the redemption of one family. who goes through a difficult situation and is redeemed out of that situation. Is it that? Yes, it's that, but that's not all it is. Others would say that this is a story really about widows and the treatment of widows, the plight of widows. Is it about that? Yeah, it is about that, but that's not all. There are others who look at this book from various other different angles to try to figure out what the book of Ruth is all about. As you read the book of Ruth, there are a couple of things, and we'll get to these at the end. But let me just allude to a couple of them here. Providence. The providence of God. That's what this book is about. You see the providence of God in the book of Ruth. unlike just about anywhere else in the Bible. There's a second thing that this is about. This is most assuredly about the covenant community, the significance of the covenant community, the preservation of the covenant community. This is also a story about kindness. the kindness of God and the kindness of God's people because they are God's people. They don't get to be God's people because they're kind. They're kind because they're God's people. This is also about faith. There's another theme that runs through this book. So as we look at the book of Ruth, know that we are not just taking a four-week jaunt through an interesting piece of literature, but we are spending these four weeks looking at these very important biblical and theological themes. By the way, I left out the most important one. The book of Ruth is about the preservation and continuation of the promised seed and the redemption of God's people in spite of their circumstances. As we look at this story, there is an arc that we find here. And here is the arc. We go tragedy. in the first main paragraph. We go from tragedy to irony in Ruth's response. Tragedy and irony give way to commitment, or Naomi's response in the irony, commitment in Ruth's response. That gives way to despair from Naomi. And then the last line gives us a glimpse of hope. That's the arc here in the first chapter. Tragedy, irony, commitment, despair, hope. Let's look at these in turn. First, let's see the tragedy. In verses one through six. 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, 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 Malon and Chilion. They were Ephrathites from Bethlehem in Judah. Now, Bethlehem is referred to as Ephrathah before it's referred to as Bethlehem. However, Ephrathah, Bethlehem, Judah, those are all important because there was another city called Bethlehem. So, those names are important to let you know where they are from and to give you some idea of their lineage. They went into the country of Moab and remained there. But Elimelech, the husband of Naomi, died, and she was left with her two sons." Now, we've found tragedy already, right? A man and his wife and their two sons leave the promised land. That's tragic enough because of famine. Now, the man who leaves the promised land with his wife and two sons because of famine dies. So we know that we're not about to read about a limeleck. So I guess we're about to read about Naomi and her two sons outside of the promised land in the midst of a famine, right? Which is tragic. But wait, there's more. These took Moabite wives, which would be considered tragic. They're marrying women from outside of the covenant community. The name of the one was Orpah. The name of the other, Ruth. They lived there about 10 years and both Malon and Chilion died. So that the woman, Naomi, was left without her two sons and her husband. That's tragedy. they leave the promised land because of famine. Tragedy. Her husband dies. Tragedy. But she's got her sons, right? They marry Moabite women. Tragedy. They die. Just your sons dying, just children preceding their parents and death, Tragedy. But here's the woman Naomi outside of the promised land because of famine and starvation. Her husband dies, but she's okay because she has sons. Her sons can take care of her. Her sons now die. So she's in a foreign land, outside of the land of promise, away from the covenant community with two Moabitesses. Things are not well for Naomi. That is the tragedy that we find in the book of Ruth. We're not told why this happens, just that it happens. There is speculation as to why it happens. But we won't even bother with the speculation as to why it happens because why it happens is evidently not important because the author doesn't tell us why it happens. All the author leaves us with is tragedy. Now usually when we find tragedy, the question that we ask is, where is God? Isn't that what we do? If you're Naomi, isn't that what you ask? Ladies, if your husband died, what would you do? God, where are you? How can you let my husband die? If your two sons then immediately die thereafter, now it's God, not only did you take my husband, but you took my sons. God, what did I do to you? And immediately we think, God must have forsaken us. Immediately Naomi thinks, God must have forsaken me. Immediately that's her thought. Here I am, with two Moabite daughters-in-law, outside of the covenant community, husband dead, sons dead. God, what did I do and why are you punishing me? To which God if he had desired to let her in on what he was doing, would have responded, be quiet Naomi, you have no idea what I'm doing. Because one of these girls is going to be an answer to prayer. What's the prayer? Not to give away too much too soon, but just so you can see the hand of God as we go through this. When does this happen? During the period of the judges. When's the period of the judges? Right after the period of the conquest. So what happens? There is the conquest and God raises up a great general and his name is Joshua. Moses is dead, but Joshua is alive and well. And in the book of Joshua, God's people move in and conquer. There was a land that they would not take and now they're taking it. and they're moving and marching and winning and conquering. Entire cities are falling down before their eyes. The walls of Jericho just crumble. Then Joshua was gone. People begin to do what's right in their own eyes and they ebb and flow. Then they are taken over by other nations and God raises up a judge and delivers them. Always a very imperfect judge. then that judge is gone. And the next thing you know, they're back down in the valley again, and they're being conquered again. And somebody's coming in and eating all their food like locusts, causing a drought in the land. And then God raises up a judge who delivers them again. But it's only temporary because again, after the judge is raised up, the people begin to do what is right in their own eyes. There is this ebb and flow and ebb and flow. And God's people are not conquering the land that they're supposed to conquer. But what's the answer? God's going to give them a king. And one king in particular through whom they will know prosperity and godliness like they've never known before or won't know thereafter. Who is this king? His name is David. Why is he born? Because God took Naomi to Moab and took her husband and her sons and left her with two Moabite widow daughters-in-law. That's why David gets born. That's why the book of Ruth is important. That's why you must not stare your tragedy in the face and shake your fists at God. That's why you do not define providence as Christian luck. If a good thing happens, it's providential. If a bad thing happens, it's unfortunate. No! This is the providence of God. The death of her husband, providential. The death of her sons, providential. The drought and the famine, providential. That is the providence of God. It is a frowning providence, but it is a providence nonetheless. The greatest deliverance you have ever or will ever received came because a man was brutally murdered on a cross. Providence is not always happy. Providence is not always pleasant. Providence does not always include that which is desirable. Providence oftentimes Looks tragic. But on the other side of it, it is not tragic at all. Just difficult to understand. We move from tragedy to irony. Look with me at verses six to 14. Then she, Naomi, arose with her daughters-in-law to return from the country of Moab, for she had heard in the fields of Moab that the Lord had visited his people and given them food." There's irony. Where did she learn that God had provided food for his people? While she was gleaning in the fields in Moab. Verse seven, 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 daughters-in-law, go, return each of you to her mother's house. May the Lord deal kindly with you as you have dealt kindly with the dead and with me. The Lord grant that you may find rest, each of you, in the house of your husband." Then she kissed them and they lifted up their voices and wept. Here's irony. Naomi looks at her daughter's-in-law and she says, I'm going back to the land of promise, to the place where God's people dwell, the covenant people of God. Don't come with me there. Go back to Moab. Really? There's a better place to be than where God's people are? No, there's not. And then what does she say? Basically, she gives them a blessing. The blessing is, you've been kind to me and you were kind to my sons before they were dead. May the Lord be kind to you. Back in Moab. No, God's gonna be kind to Ruth in Israel. And may you find rest in your husband's house, back in Moab. No, Ruth's gonna find rest in her husband's house in Judah. The irony continues. They said to her, no, 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? 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 have grown? Would you therefore refrain from marrying? No, my daughters, for it is exceedingly bitter to me for your sake that the hand of the Lord has gone out against me. They lifted up their voices and wept again. Orpah kissed her mother-in-law, but Ruth clung to her. Here's greater irony. Why does Naomi tell them to go back? Go back, because I don't have a son to marry you according to the law of levirate marriage. And because I don't have a son from the bloodline of my father, here's the first thing, are there sons yet in my womb? In other words, even if I had a son now, it would have to be a son from my husband so that he would be related to my other sons and therefore be obligated to marry you and leave a right marriage. There's the first problem. The first problem is, legally, I have nothing to offer you. By the way, who's Boaz? The kinsman redeemer, because of his relationship with the Limelech. Go back to Moab, because I got no relatives for you to marry. That's irony. Besides that, there's this time thing. Even if I got married and had sons, what are you going to do? Wait until my sons are old enough to marry you? You're just gonna hang out with me until then? Leave me because I have nothing to offer you. Here's the irony in that. Naomi has God and that's who's going to meet Ruth's need. Instead she was pointing her back to her family Go back to Moab go back to your kin folks even go back to your gods Because I don't have anything to offer you when the fact of the matter is everything that they need is God and God's people God's people provide for these widows so that they can eat because of the gleaning of the fields that God has commanded of his people. God's people, because of the law of the kinsman redeemer, will provide a husband for Ruth in the land of promise. And Naomi ironically says, I love you girl, but go back to Moab because I got nothing for you. Because Naomi was looking at what she could give to Ruth. Not at what God could give to Ruth. The answer is God. The answer is God's people. The answer is the covenant community. The answer is God indwelling His people and using His people Bless. Do we trust God to be enough? Or do we do inventory and look only at what it is that we have to offer and determine that we can't be a blessing because we're not wealthy enough? or well-connected enough? Or do we actually believe what Naomi finds out? And that is that God is enough. That you don't need more than God. Because with God, whatever else you're lacking can and will be supplied. And if He does not supply it, then you really didn't need it. From tragedy and irony, we come to commitment. The commitment is also ironic. because it comes from the Gentile Moabite. Verse 15. This is one of my favorite passages in all the Bible. Listen to the words here. She said, see your sister-in-law has gone back to her people and to her gods. Return after your sister-in-law. Don't miss that statement. Orpah has gone back, not just to her people, but to her gods. You need to go back to your people and your gods and let me go back to my people and my gods. Verse 16, but Ruth said, you just might want to memorize this one day. 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. Those sound like wedding vows don't they? please don't ask me to stop following you because I won't do it I'm going where you go and I'm gonna live where you live and your people your people are my people Your God, your God is my God. In fact, when we're both dead, I don't even want my body taken back to my people. I want my body buried with you and your people. Why? Because I belong to you and I belong to your people. And when I'm dead, that's what I want. When I'm dead, don't call my mama and say, your daughter is dead. Come get her body. Cause you want to bury her back in the town where you and all your family was born. When I die, call my mama and say, your daughter who left you and gave herself to me has died. We're burying her here because she's mine and not yours. You make that connection. And then she makes that covenantal vow. Basically, may God abandon me if I ever abandon you. What beautiful words. You know what's beautiful about those words? These words are not about Ruth. This is what God says to his people. You're my people, and I'm your God. And you are going to continue to be my people, and I'm going to continue to be your God. No matter what happens, I'm your God, and you're my people. The beauty of this statement is that this statement is found in the context of a story that is about God saying to his people, and remember, this is during the period of the judges. And God's people are floundering and going back and forth and back and forth. And God does not say during that time, I am sick and tired of you. I'm going in another direction. God says, you're my people. and I'm gonna save you in spite of you. And the book of Ruth says, here's how I'm gonna do it. This book is about covenant. And this is a picture of covenant. And this is what the people of God ought to sound like. In a few moments, we're gonna have a membership ceremony at the end of the service. And we're gonna say words, not dissimilar to this, to one another. Because we're not flippant about belonging to each other. Right after this, we see words of despair. Look at verse 19. So the two went on 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, Do not call me Naomi, or Pleasant. Call me Marah. or bitter. For the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. 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?" Notice that Naomi does not say what we normally say. what we normally say when something happens is a natural disaster occurred and because of this natural disaster my life has changed what Naomi says is God has dealt bitterly with me what we would say is The economy took a downturn, and because the economy took a downturn, I lost everything. What Naomi would say is, God took everything from me. He used an economic downturn to do it, but God took everything from me. We don't talk like that. Why? Because we define providence as Christian luck. And it's only providential when it's good. So if there's an economic upturn, then we go, praise God. God provided me with lots of money. But if there's an economic downturn, we go, man, God blinked. And while he was blinking, the economy went bad and my money's gone. My money's up. God's in control. My money's down. God forgot me. My husband is alive and well. My sons are strong and well married. Praise be to God because God has provided for me. My husband dies. My sons die. And I come back home with just half of my daughters-in-law. See what the famine did to me? No, Naomi says, God has dealt bitterly with me. Notice what she doesn't say. She doesn't say, God has dealt bitterly with me and I'm through with God. She doesn't say, God has dealt bitterly with me and I didn't deserve this. Nor does she say, God has dealt bitterly with me, but that's okay, girl, because you know he's going to turn it around. There's none of that. I'm believing God for better days. No, there's none of that. You get the sense from Naomi, this is what God has done. I'm going to die in this state. The Lord has given, the Lord has taken away, blessed be the name of the Lord. You think God might have known that we were gonna deal with Job this morning? That's what she says, because according to her worldview, the providence of God is not just over the big things or the good things, but the providence of God is over all. Have you never been in a circumstance where you have been at the end of your rope? Because if you have been in a circumstance where you've been at the end of your rope and you're not there today, that means God used whatever that was at the end of your rope to take you through and to whatever he's made you now. And if you are at the end of your rope, let me say a couple of things to you. Number one, don't be too sure. What do you mean by that? What I mean by that is, I bet when Naomi is in Moab, away from the covenant community and away from the promised land and her husband died, she thought she was at the end of her rope. She would have been wrong. There were two sons yet to die. If you're here today and you're at the end of your rope, don't be too sure. It just might get worse. And I didn't say it might get worse before it gets better. It might get worse and never get better. Will you still praise God? Will you still praise God? And if you won't, then have you ever really praised him at all? Or have you just offered to him a pat on the back because he gave you what you wanted? Here's the second thing. You find yourself at the end of your rope. Don't define yourself by your circumstances. and one more we always have hope we always have hope and that's the way this chapter ends with hope verse 22 so Naomi returned and Ruth the Moabite her daughter-in-law with her who returned from the country of Moab, and then listen to this, and they came to Bethlehem, which means the city of bread, at the beginning of the barley harvest. What does Ruth need? Well, her immediate need is food and shelter. How is God going to provide that? She's going to glean in the fields. And the last line of chapter one says, she gets there just in time for the barley harvest. By the way, the wheat harvest is just a couple of weeks down the road. This is good. There's hope. Why did Naomi have to leave the promised land? Because of a famine. But was God going to leave his people in a famine forever? No, sir, he was not. They come back and it's the beginning of the barley harvest. There is hope, but it's not just that hope. There is more hope. What more hope? Here's the more hope. How is Ruth going to meet Boaz? Gleaning in his fields. What does the end of chapter one say? It was the beginning of the barley harvest. She's about to meet her man, y'all. There's hope, but it doesn't end there. This is written during the period of the judges. What do God's people need during the period of the judges? Something more permanent than the judges. They need a king who is a man after God's own heart. How are they going to get a king who is a man after God's own heart? Boaz is going to marry Ruth and eventually we're going to get David. It was the beginning of the barley harvest. But there's still more. Why is David significant? David is significant because his lineage reaches back to Judah. And he is significant because his lineage reaches forward to the lion of the tribe of Judah, who is the promised seed, the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, Jesus Christ. How do we get to Jesus? It was the beginning of the barley harvest. Who is Jesus? The bread of life. Don't you dare think this is just a love story. This is about Christ. This is how God saves his people under the old covenant and the new. What do we need? We need a Redeemer. What does God provide? He provides a Redeemer. When your circumstances are bad, What do you need? A barley harvest? If you do, God will provide a barley harvest. However, if it ends at a barley harvest, you've got nothing. You need a barley harvest that results in a King and a Savior. That's what you need more than anything else that this world could ever offer you. And God says in the book of Ruth, even when you cannot see it. Don't worry. Why? First of all, because the accomplishment of the thing does not depend upon your seeing it. Second of all, because the accomplishment of the thing does not depend on your doing it. Third of all, because the accomplishment of the thing happens at God's hand, in God's timing, and for God's purpose. And His ultimate purpose is to save a people for Himself, for His glory, and to conform them to the image of His Son. And sometimes he uses suffering in order to bring that about. And when he does, he is still God and he is still good. Do not despair. There is yet hope.