Ruth 1: Hope in the Darkness
Notes
Transcript
Hope in the Darkness
Hope in the Darkness
Ruth 1:1–10 “During the time of the judges, there was a famine in the land of Judah. So a man from Bethlehem in Judah went to live as a resident foreigner in the region of Moab, along with his wife and two sons.(Now the man’s name was Elimelech, his wife was Naomi, and his two sons were Mahlon and Kilion. They were of the clan of Ephrath from Bethlehem in Judah.) They entered the region of Moab and settled there.Sometime later Naomi’s husband Elimelech died, so she and her two sons were left alone. Both her sons married Moabite women. (One was named Orpah and the other Ruth.) And they continued to live there about ten years. Then Naomi’s two sons, Mahlon and Kilion, also died. So the woman was left all alone—bereaved of her two children as well as her husband! So she decided to return home from the region of Moab, accompanied by her daughters-in-law, because while she was living in Moab she had heard that the Lord had shown concern for his people, reversing the famine by providing abundant crops. N…”
INTRODUCTION: HOPE.
During the time of the judges, there was a famine in the land of Judah. So a man from Bethlehem in Judah went to live as a resident foreigner in the region of Moab, along with his wife and two sons.
To understand Ruth you need to understand Judges. And to understand Judges you need to understand Joshua and to Understand Joshua you need to understand Deuteronomy.
The entire Bible is one unified story. Really, to understand the entire Bible at All you need to see where it fits in the big picture.
God creates the world, sin enters the world through adam and eve. God Kicks them out of paradise, their decendants become increasingly wicked. God destroys the world. He hits the reset button on the decendants of noah.
Within one generation, they go astray.
Out of noah’s decendants, god picks one guy, Abraham, and says, hey, I’m going to redeem the world through you and your decendants.
Those decendents end up in Egypt, under the slavery of Pharaoh, and God miraculously defeats the Egyptians, and tells these people
OK, I’m initiating operation redemption right now. And you’re going to cooperate. You’re going to be my people. Set apart for my purposes.
He leads them out in the desert and he instructs them on what it looks like to be God’s people.
Within like 30 seconds they forget, God raises up a new generation and say OK you’re going to cooperate with me, you’re going to be part of my redemptive plan. I’m going to give you a land.
And toward the end of deuteronomy we get the jist of a covenant, a contract, that God lays out with his people. that basically says:
“if you do what I say, it’s going to be good for you” “If you don’t do what I say, it’s going to be bad”
But either way you go, the result will be the same. People will know that I am the LORD.
Deuteronomy 28:1-6
Deuteronomy 28:1-6
“If you indeed obey the Lord your God and are careful to observe all his commandments I am giving you today, the Lord your God will elevate you above all the nations of the earth. All these blessings will come to you in abundance if you obey the Lord your God: You will be blessed in the city and blessed in the field. Your children will be blessed, as well as the produce of your soil, the offspring of your livestock, the calves of your herds, and the lambs of your flocks. Your basket and your mixing bowl will be blessed. You will be blessed when you come in and blessed when you go out.
And he goes on like that. Then in verse 15 we get the other side of that coin.
Deuteronomy 28:15-19
Deuteronomy 28:15-19
“But if you ignore the Lord your God and are not careful to keep all his commandments and statutes I am giving you today, then all these curses will come upon you in full force: You will be cursed in the city and cursed in the field. Your basket and your mixing bowl will be cursed. Your children will be cursed, as well as the produce of your soil, the calves of your herds, and the lambs of your flocks. You will be cursed when you come in and cursed when you go out.
Notice how these sections are almost exact parallels of each other.
Obey God good. Disobey god bad.
As you get into the book of Joshua you see God playing out that covenant.
Joshua is a fun book if you’re a military geek, if you like to read about military tactics and battles and maps, and you enjoy playing the board game “Risk” Joshua is a great book to read.
If you’re an empathetic type if you like to read stories about people and relationships, Joshua is a tough one.
But either way you get to the end of the book of Joshua and Joshua gathers all the people up after they’ve won their battles and they’ve taken posession of the Land God promised and Joshua Re-affirms that covenant that god made back in Deuteronomy.
He says OK, God made good on his end of hte bargin. You’re going to do the same, right.
In chapter 24, Joshua basically says Are you going to keep the deal that we made with God.
Joshua 24:16-24
Joshua 24:16-24
The people responded, “Far be it from us to abandon the Lord so we can worship other gods! For the Lord our God took us and our fathers out of slavery in the land of Egypt and performed these awesome miracles before our very eyes. He continually protected us as we traveled and when we passed through nations. The Lord drove out from before us all the nations, including the Amorites who lived in the land. So we too will worship the Lord, for he is our God!”
Joshua warned the people, “You will not keep worshiping the Lord, for he is a holy God. He is a jealous God who will not forgive your rebellion or your sins. If you abandon the Lord and worship foreign gods, he will turn against you; he will bring disaster on you and destroy you, though he once treated you well.”
The people said to Joshua, “No! We really will worship the Lord!” Joshua said to the people, “Do you agree to be witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen to worship the Lord?” They replied, “We are witnesses!” Joshua said, “Now put aside the foreign gods that are among you and submit to the Lord God of Israel.”
The people said to Joshua, “We will worship the Lord our God and obey him.”
3 times. Are you going to do what God says? yes.
And in my bible, The book of Judges is on the very next page.
And the first chapter or so of Judges is really just a recap of the last few pages of Joshua.
I want to show you how many pages it takes until they break that promise.
The israelites did evil, over and over and over.
The whole book of Judges is a trainwreck of disobedience.
And then we turn the page to Ruth.
During the time of the judges, there was a famine in the land of Judah. So a man from Bethlehem in Judah went to live as a resident foreigner in the region of Moab, along with his wife and two sons.
The text doesn’t explicitly tell us that this was an act of Divine punishment.
It frankly just says “A famine happened”
We don’t know for certain, when exactly this famine happened. The book of judges takes place over about a 400 year period.
To put that in perspective that’s like me saying I’m going to tell you a story that happens “some time between when the pilgrims landed on plymouth rock and today.
That doesn’t narrow it down much does it.
The author of Ruth really seem to care exactly when it happened, the author really just wants to set the stage so we can get to the point of the story.
During the time of the judges, there was a famine in the land of Judah. So a man from Bethlehem in Judah went to live as a resident foreigner in the region of Moab, along with his wife and two sons.(Now the man’s name was Elimelech, his wife was Naomi, and his two sons were Mahlon and Kilion. They were of the clan of Ephrath from Bethlehem in Judah.) They entered the region of Moab and settled there.
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Sometime later Naomi’s husband Elimelech died, so she and her two sons were left alone. Both her sons married Moabite women. (One was named Orpah and the other Ruth.) And they continued to live there about ten years. Then Naomi’s two sons, Mahlon and Kilion, also died. So the woman was left all alone—bereaved of her two children as well as her husband!
Notice here again, we don’t get a reason for “why” Just like the famine...
The text kind of just lays it out like “ it just happened”
We don’t get a statement like “because Elimelek went to Moab, or “Because he sinned in some way” It just says “he died” It just happened.
Her two sons, they married Moabite women, something that was extremely discouraged. Intermarrying in that time period almost always went inter-mixing religion.
God specifically told the israelites not to marry foriegners. And it had nothing to do with God disliking other ethnicities and everything to do with the fact that God knew that when you
There was probably an act of divine punishment on the two sons for their disobedience. Maybe maybe not. There’s probably some act of divine punishment in the famine, probably some act of divine punishment on Elimelek for leaving israel instead of having faith in God
Maybe. Maybe not.
The text just says “it happened” We’re not going to dwell on why it happened.
Because Elimelek and mahlon and kilion are not the point of the story.
Naomi is the point of the story. Ruth is the point of the story.
Even if we can make the case that Elimelek was punished because of his own sin, and Mahlon and Kilion were punished because of their sins. And mybe we can make that case.
What did Naomi ever do? What did Ruth ever do? What did orpah ever do?
Are they to blame for the actions of their husbands?
And so from their point of view, these things just happened.
We live in sin-filled world, with 8 billion sin-filled people.
we live in a world where like it or not, we experience the consequences of our sin, and we experience the consequences of the sin of the other 8 billion people on the planet.
when a 16 year old is killed on the road by a drunk driver. She is experiencing the consequences of his actions.
Her parents experience the consequences of his sin.
the paramedics that shows up on the scene and has to go home with those images plastered into their brains experience the consequences of his actions.
How do we reconcile that. It would be great if we could only experience the consequences of our own sins but we live in an interconnected world in which my my sin effects you and your sin effects her and her sin effects me.
And so to a certain extent some stuff really does just happen to us.
That’s why we need hope.
And in verse 6 we get that first glimmer of hope.
Naomi has lost everything.
No home, no husband, no children, no food, no hope
So she decided to return home from the region of Moab, accompanied by her daughters-in-law, because while she was living in Moab she had heard that the Lord had shown concern for his people, reversing the famine by providing abundant crops.
God cares. God shows concern for his people.
The word there literally means he “noticed” or he “observed” It’s the same hebrew word used to describe what a general does when he’s got his soldiers lined up and he’s checking for deficiencies and taking note of what each soldier needs.
Today it would be what’s called an “in ranks inspection” where the platoon seargent goes through the formation and goes to each individual soldier and inspects your uniform, your gear, whatever, and makes sure every soldier is squared away.
It requires an extreme attention to detail.
And the hope that naomi has here, is in the fact that pays attention. God knows every little detail and knows when
Ruth 1:7-12
Ruth 1:7-12
Now as she and her two daughters-in-law began to leave the place where she had been living to return to the land of Judah, Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, “Listen to me! Each of you should return to your mother’s home. May the Lord show you the same kind of devotion that you have shown to your deceased husbands and to me.May the Lord enable each of you to find security in the home of a new husband.” Then she kissed them goodbye, and they wept loudly. But they said to her, “No! We will return with you to your people.”
But Naomi replied, “Go back home, my daughters! There is no reason for you to return to Judah with me. I am no longer capable of giving birth to sons who might become your husbands! Go back home, my daughters! For I am too old to get married again. Even if I thought that there was hope that I could get married tonight and conceive sons,
Naomi looked at the situation and said “I have about this much hope” I’m an old lady. I’m going to go back to Judah and hope that they take care of their widows like they’re supposed to. But you too. Go back home. Get married. Find some sugar daddy in moab with a big plot of land and marry up. Live a good life.
Because I can’t help you.
One of the things you have to understand is the fact that property and inheritences, and really your entire lively hood was entirely based on lineage.
It’s not like our country today where you can come here with the clothes on your back and work your way into fulfilling the american dream, save up and start a business, buy some land. Make a life for yourself.
It didn’t work that way.
If you didn’t have a claim to a piece of farm land, or a place to live through an inheritence, you had nothing.
For these two moabite women, going into what for them is a foriegn country, there’s no chance in them having a good life.
Especially if the god of these people has specifically told them don’t marry foriegn women.
Naomi says look, your claim to anything lies entirely on your ability to produce an heir. and in case you haven’t noticed, I’m not exactly a spring chicken.
And she says even if i could have kids,
surely you would not want to wait until they were old enough to marry. Surely you would not remain unmarried all that time! No, my daughters, you must not return with me. For my intense suffering is too much for you to bear. For the Lord is afflicting me!”
You get the picture here. You’re a 22 year old eligible woman. And you want to, what, come with me and hope that your grey haired mother in law can have a child, and then wait until he’s 18—by then you’ll be old enough to be his mother.
that’s your plan?
She says go back home, marry up, make a life for yourself.
My intense suffering is too much for you to bear. The Lord is afflicting me.
Literally it says “the hand of the lord is against me”
And it’s at this point I think that we as the reader are supposed to relate most with Naomi.
I know the title of the book is ruth. But Naomi is the one who really who is the main character of the story. She’s the person in the story where we look at her and we’re like. YEah. I’ve been there.
I want to jump ahead just a little bit and then go back and talk about what ruth says, but if we jump ahead to verse 19
So the two of them journeyed together until they arrived in Bethlehem. When they entered Bethlehem, the whole village was excited about their arrival. The women of the village said, “Can this be Naomi?”
But she replied to them, “Don’t call me ‘Naomi’! Call me ‘Mara’ because the Sovereign One has treated me very harshly.
Again with the puns on the name, the word naomi means my pleasantness. And mara means bitter.
In Exodus 15:23, the israelites came the waters at “marah” the bitter waters, that they were unable to drink .
Naomi is bitter.
She’s bitter with God.
She’s angry with God.
Because as easy as it is for me to stand up here and say “well sometimes bad stuff just happens.” We live in an interconnected world, and so we experience the sins of other people.
oh well
Yeah that’s great to say and all until it happens to us.
Until my child gets killed by the drunk driver, until my grandchild gets cancer, until my wife passes away, until my suffering increases.
then it doesn’t really feel stuff just “happens” does it. It starts to feel like Gods’ hand is somehow against us.
But if we back up a little bit, When naomi says “go home, I have basicaly no hope”
But Ruth replied, “Stop urging me to abandon you! For wherever you go, I will go. Wherever you live, I will live. Your people will become my people, and your God will become my God.
Wherever you die, I will die—and there I will be buried. May the Lord punish me severely if I do not keep my promise! Only death will be able to separate me from you!”
Notice here at this point ruth isn’t neccecarily loyal to God.
She basically says I don’t care which God I need to worship, I love you Naomi, I care about you naomi, and I’ll go wherever I need to go to be with you.
They enter bethlehem, Naomi is bitter
She says down in verse 21
I left here full, but the Lord has caused me to return empty-handed. Why do you call me ‘Naomi,’ seeing that the Lord has opposed me, and the Sovereign One has caused me to suffer?”
So Naomi returned, accompanied by her Moabite daughter-in-law Ruth, who came back with her from the region of Moab. (Now they arrived in Bethlehem at the beginning of the barley harvest.)
And as we think about our theme, hope in hopeless situations. \
This is about as hopeless as it can get.
honestly.
I don’t think it takes much of an imagination to realize how hopeless naomi feels.
No husband. No sons, no food, no land.
Everything gone.
But there are seeds of hope.
There’s a rule in survival called the 3-3-3 rule.
Basically it’s a rule of thumb if you’re in a survival situation.
The average person can’t survive more than 3 weeks without food
You can’t survive more than 3 days without water
3 hours in harsh conditions without shelter.
You can’t survive more than 3 minutes without oxygen.
It’s a hierarchy so that you know how to prioritize your resources in a survival situation.
Most important thing is can you breathe.
Can you shelterfrom the elements
do you have water
Do you have food.
But there’s a fith 3 I think that comes before all of those.
3 weeks without food, 3 days without water, 3 minutes without air.
But you won’t survive 3 seconds without hope.
Here’s a little bit of the hope that we see here in Ruth chapter 1
They arrived at the beginning of the barley harvest.
She’s going to have food. As we read about next week, the israelites laws were set up in such a way that as long as there was food in the field, nobody went hungry.
They had sort of a “welfare” program that basically said when you harvest your fields you leave some behind so that the orphans and the widows can come in behind you and have food.
And the harvest had begun.
And I know it might not seem like much to say “well at least she had food”
But you know what judah didn’t have for the past 10 years… food.
If you wake up, and it feels like the hand of the lord is against you. and your hope is almost gone.
I want you to go to your freezer.
and I want you to pull out those black bananas.
I know they’re in there. because you put them in there 6 months ago and said you were going to make banana bread, and you haven’t gotten around to it.
And I want you to say well, if nothing else I can makes some muffins.
2. I want you to pay attention to the people who are in your life who are going to be there for you.
There are people in your life who will not abandon you.
When you think all hope is lost, you have people in your life who will look you square in the eye and say “where you go I go” I’m with you right up until the end. Even if I’m not much help I’m there with you.
And I can 100% guarantee that you have people like that in your life, because they’re in this room right now.
3. The third glimmer of hope in this passage.
Naomi decide to return home, because she had heard that God noticed his people.
God sees you. Even if it doesn’t feel like he does. He sees you.
Every step of the way he sees you.
And I don’t know why he doesn’t just step in and fix everything.
There’s some days I wish he would.
But in his infinite wisdom in his infinite knowledge he doesn’t and that’s just a fact of life that we have to face head on. God does not step in and fix everything in our lives.
But he gives us the hope that we need to press on in the fact that he sees you.
He know when you lie down he knows when you get up, he knit you together piece by piece in your mothers womb,
he was there for your first words he was there for your first steps
he was there for your first love he was there for your first loss
and he’s with you right now.
I honestly don’t know if Naomi recognized her hope at this point in the story.
my guess is she probably didn’t see it as fully as she could have.
I don’t know who needs to hear this right now. If you don’t need to hear this now, I want you to pack it away for later, because you’re going to need it at some point.
But in hopeless situations, I want you to look for hope in the little things.
Find hope in the barely harvest of your life. I don’t care what it is there is something in your life where you can say “well, at the very least I’ve got that can of green beans”
If worse comes to worse I can follow behind some farmers and get some grain
I want you to find hope in the people in your life. And they’re there. When you start to think “I have nobody” you’re wrong. whether you believe it or not, you have people who are praying about you, who are just waiting by the phone. Just waiting for you to call.
And i want you to find hope in the fact that God Sees You.