So far in the Book of Ruth we haven’t had much reason to think that things were going to turn out well for Naomi and Ruth. Famine, infertility, death. This is what we’ve encountered so far.
The beginning of chapter two raises a bit of hope. We meet a man who through his relationship to Naomi’s husband’s family might just be the person who could be of most help. Then we find Ruth choosing a field to glean in and we discover the field belongs to this very man. Things are getting interesting.
Then this man, Boaz, meets Ruth and is kind and gracious to her, something she doesn’t expect and feels she doesn’t deserve. He knows who she is but she doesn’t yet know who he is.
We leave the story at this point but not before some valuable lessons from both Ruth and Boaz, and the anticipation that God may still have something more in store for Naomi and Ruth.
The second act of the drama of the little Book of Ruth opens with Naomi determining to return to Bethlehem. At first, both her widowed daughters-in-law accompany her, but one turns back after Naomi urges her to return to her own mother’s house. Her other daughter-in-law, Ruth, refuses to leave and declares that Naomi’s people and people will become her people and God. She is leaving Moab for good.
Arriving in Bethlehem, Naomi declares her bitterness against God for all he allowed to happen to her. Yet, there may be some hope on the horizon as our author hints at things to come in the closing verse of this Act, in 1:22.
Though this passage is brief, Naomi and Ruth have things to teach us.
Jesus died and rose for one purpose: so that we could be certain of having eternal life with him in heaven. The Apostle John wrote a letter dedicated to helping us know how we could be certain of eternal life. It is his first letter, or 1 John. In this message we’ll start with 1 John 5:13, which tells us we can be certain of heaven, then go back to discover the three steps we must take so that we are certain of heaven.
A famine. A desperate attempt to survive. Childlessness. Death. Three widows left grieving. Tragedy upon tragedy. Where is God in all of this?
Set during the period of the Judges, the story of Ruth, a woman from Moab, and her mother-in-law, an Israelite named Naomi, remind us that even when things are the darkest God is working out his special plan.
The little book of Ruth is an expertly told short story of family tragedy and God’s gracious provision when all seems hopelessly lost. In this message we’ll cover Act 1 of this drama, tracing the travels and travails of an Israelite family from Bethlehem to Moab. It’s just fives verses, but short as it is, it has much to teach us today. Join us at the start of our journey with Ruth and Naomi.
As a second illustration of the consequences of living by the moral code of doing what is right in one’s own eyes (Judges 17:6, 21:25), Judges 19-21 tells a second story from the period of the Judges, likely very early in that period.
We’ll discover that one of the tribes of Israel has lost all sense of what is right and wrong. As a result, they not only refuse to deal with egregious sin in their midst, they defend that behavior even at the risk of their own lives.
Thankfully all of Israel has not lost its sense of what is right and wrong, and they address the problem. However, it costs them dearly to bring about justice and punish the wrong doers.
This is an ugly story and much of it not meant to be read publicly, but it is a story we need to hear because it is a warning to us today about tolerating sin and defending those who choose to live by the code of “doing what is right in their own eyes.”
When we come to chapter 17 of the Book of Judges we encounter the first of two undated incidents that occurred during the period of the Judges. Each serves as an example of the spiritual and moral decline of Israel that occurred during this period.
The first, our passage for this week, is in Judges 17 and 18. It relates the story of a man in Ephraim, a Levite from Bethlehem, and the tribe of Dan. We’ll find that each of these is rocking to the beat of a song whose theme is “Every man did what was right in his own eyes” (Judges 17:6). This was the moral code of many during the period of the judges, and these two chapters illustrate the spiritual and moral results of embracing that code of conduct.
In this message we’ll reveal the lyrics to the song they were rocking to, and the results that letting that song play continuously in their heads led to. The song is strangly familiar, so worth discovering for our own instruction.
The book of Judges focuses most of it attention on six men and one woman who acted as delivers for Israel. There are, however, six other men who served in this role who didn’t get as much coverage. They are easy to overlook or ignore.
But God does not have majors and minors, even though that’s sometimes how these two sets of judges are categorized. Anyone who serves God is on God’s team, period. All count. These six men who got less ‘ink’ remind us that God knows everyone who serves him, regardless of how spectacular or ordinary their contributions are. Let’s take a look at the six men God didn’t overlook and learn from them how God may look at some of us.
You have probably know someone who had great potential but never lived up to it. Such was Samson. Supernaturally caused conception, a mission from God before his birth, great powers, but tragically compromised by his own weaknesses.
We’d hope that as he matured, Samson might turn into the person God intended him to be. But that did not happen. His weaknesses only led to his own tragic end, as we’ll see in this message,
We can be gifted, talented, and be give many advantages, but unless God helps us overcome our own weaknesses, we could end up a tragedy like Samson.
Have you ever made a mistake, then turned around and done it again? Samson repeated many mistakes, but his enemies, the Philistines, matched him at least one-for-one. Unfortunately for them, they totally misunderstood who they were dealing with. The result was that every mistake they made cost them more and more.
What the Philistines failed to recognize was that they were not just dealing with a strong man named Samson. They were dealing with Samson’s God. It was God who was empowering Samson. No effort on the Philistine’s part was going to stop him. They didn’t figure that out even in the face of superhuman feats, so it cost them dearly,
This message warns us about not learning from our own mistakes. We don’t want to be modern day Philistines.
Hidden weaknesses can bring down huge structures. Hidden character defects can bring down otherwise strong people.
In Judges 14 we encounter the strongest man who ever lived, but before his physical strength is revealed, his inner weaknesses are. By the time the chapter is over, we will see his inner weaknesses getting him into the trouble that will eventually be his downfall.
Samson wasn’t the last strong person with hidden problems. None of us want to fail like he did. That makes his story relevant to us.