The God Who Welcomes

Intro - story helps us know people better

Vs1

Ruth 1:1 (NIV)

1 In the days when the judges ruled, there was a famine in the land. So a man from Bethlehem in Judah, together with his wife and two sons, went to live for a while in the country of Moab.

In the days of the Judges

Judges 21:25 (NIV)

25 In those days Israel had no king; everyone did as they saw fit.

Bethlehem to Moab

Ruth 1:1–2 (NIV)

1 In the days when the judges ruled, there was a famine in the land. So a man from Bethlehem in Judah, together with his wife and two sons, went to live for a while in the country of Moab. 2 The man’s name was Elimelek, his wife’s name was Naomi, and the names of his two sons were Mahlon and Kilion. They were Ephrathites from Bethlehem, Judah. And they went to Moab and lived there.

Sin / Faithlessness

Irony:

Bethlehem - house of bread - has no bread

Elimelek - God is King - does not live as if God is King

Naomi - Pleasant - far from plesant

They go from Bethelhem to Moab and what happens?

Ruth 1:3–5 (NIV)

3 Now Elimelek, Naomi’s husband, died, and she was left with her two sons. 4 They married Moabite women, one named Orpah and the other Ruth. After they had lived there about ten years, 5 both Mahlon and Kilion also died, and Naomi was left without her two sons and her husband.

“Sin will take you farther than you want to go, keep you longer than you want to stay, and cost you more than you want to pay. ”

Liberty

Relationships

Have you ever been in Moab and wondered, where is God in my brokenness and life?

But the story takes a turn when Naomi hears that God has come to the aid of her people

Ruth 1:6–11(NIV)

6 When Naomi heard in Moab that the Lord had come to the aid of his people by providing food for them, she and her daughters-in-law prepared to return home from there. 7 With her two daughters-in-law she left the place where she had been living and set out on the road that would take them back to the land of Judah.

8 Then Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, “Go back, each of you, to your mother’s home. May the Lord show you kindness, as you have shown kindness to your dead husbands and to me. 9 May the Lord grant that each of you will find rest in the home of another husband.”

Then she kissed them goodbye and they wept aloud 10 and said to her, “We will go back with you to your people.”

11 But Naomi said, “Return home, my daughters. Why would you come with me? Am I going to have any more sons, who could become your husbands?

Ruth 1:12–14 NIV

12 Return home, my daughters; I am too old to have another husband. Even if I thought there was still hope for me—even if I had a husband tonight and then gave birth to sons—13 would you wait until they grew up? Would you remain unmarried for them? No, my daughters. It is more bitter for me than for you, because the Lord’s hand has turned against me!” 14 At this they wept aloud again. Then Orpah kissed her mother-in-law goodbye, but Ruth clung to her.

What was the impetus for Naomi to return home?

God’s Kindness

Repentance / Returning toward the Lord is precipitated by His Kindness

Romans 2:4 (NIV)

4 Or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness, forbearance and patience, not realizing that God’s kindness is intended to lead you to repentance?

For you and me, Maybe you’re on your way to Moab, or Maybe you're in Moab, The LORD is inviting you to return to him.

The God I wish you knew is the God Ruth met. The God to whom Naomi returned. The God who welcomes.

God welcomes both the outsider and the returner.

Matthew 1:5–6 (NIV)

5 Salmon the father of Boaz, whose mother was Rahab,

Boaz the father of Obed, whose mother was Ruth,

Obed the father of Jesse,

6 and Jesse the father of King David.

David was the father of Solomon, whose mother had been Uriah’s wife,

Action: repent, turn to God

Mark 1:15 (ESV)

15 and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.”

LORD/God referred to 6x in the first 18 verses.

Ruth 1:1-17 this first section is a story not about geography. Yes there is a hugh emphasise highlighting the transit from Bethlehem to Moab; but there’s more to it than that.

1:1 Famine in Bethlehem - irony “the house of bread” has no bread.

So, Naomi leaves the promised land to go to enemy territory

They leave it seems because they don’t trust God’s provision in the midst of hardship

Judges, Ruth Scene 1: The Setting for the Crisis (1:1–2)

Elimelech appears to be a sentence name meaning either “My God is king” or “El is Milku,” expressing the faith of the one who gave and/or bore the name. Elimelech’s departure for Moab may reflect his own doubts about the truth his name declared. Naomi is mentioned secondarily to her husband, but she will turn out to be the key character in this chapter. As the explanation in vv. 20–21 suggests, her name derives from a root, nʿm, “to be pleasant.” This may be an abbreviated name, missing the theophoric element and thereby suppressing the role of God

Why do we leave? Wander away from God and his people? Because we don’t trust Him.

So we go to pave our own way and plan

and their two sons marry moabites! (which was “forbidden”)

Then all the men die - life happens and the women are left behind.

Naomi is filled with bitterness toward God

Her name means “pleasant” but her life exp is far from pleasant.

Why does she return to Bethlehem? verse 6

Ruth 1:6 NIV

6 When Naomi heard in Moab that the Lord had come to the aid of his people by providing food for them, she and her daughters-in-law prepared to return home from there.

The Lord had come to the aid of His people

The Lord was providing

Lord welcomes them back even though the return from foreign lands.

verse 8 is interesting

Ruth 1:8 NIV

8 Then Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, “Go back, each of you, to your mother’s home. May the Lord show you kindness, as you have shown kindness to your dead husbands and to me.

Naomi knows the Lord is KIND even though he’s “dealt bitterly with her”

Intro

The God I Wish You Knew The God Who Welcomes Ruth 1:1-17

How do you get to know God?

When we are getting to know other people, someone we want to date, someone in one of our classes, a new coworker, or a new neighbor, we spend time with them. We listen to stories about their life and we experience them and their nature and character.

But when it comes to knowing God, many of us approach the process differently. We look at our own lives, our situation, our circumstances, and we make projections on who God is, what He must be like, and even if He exists. The reason we do this is because the concept of God seems so far beyond, mysterious, spiritual…different.

But God is a relational being. He desires for us to know Him and be in relationship with Him and so He has chosen to reveal Himself to us. He shares with us His nature, His character, what He is like and His invitation for us to know Him and be in relationship with Him. He does this through His Word and through the stories He shares about Himself.

Today we start one of these stories. It is a true story that happened about 3,000 years ago in the land of Israel. While the cultural context of this story is a bit distant from us, we will see the relationships, the people, and how God makes Himself known is incredibly relevant. This is the story of the God I want you to know. Let’s begin.

“In the days when the judges ruled…” – Ruth 1:1 NIV

Whenever we approach a text from Scripture, it is essential to understand the context of the passage. The times of the judges was between the period of time after Joshua led the people of Israel into the Promised Land and before their first king, a man named Saul. In-between those events, Israel was tribal, there was no federal government and no king. It was supposed to be a time when God was King over the people and if they would have followed His Law it would have been a wonderful time of prosperity and health. Instead, the book of Judges summarizes the time of the judges this way: In those days Israel had no king; all the people did whatever seemed right in their own eyes. Judges 21:25 (NLT)

In other words, it was not too different from today. Despite the rising levels of people who don’t identify with any faith, the majority of people in our society still identify as Christian, they just don’t live like it. It was the same during the time of the judges. People said they were God’s Chosen People, they just didn’t live like it. They obeyed some of His Law, but not all of it, especially if it would have infringed on their immediate material success.

But not everyone lived that way. There were some who remained faithful, because there have always been a remnant of those who have been found faithful even when it wasn’t easy, popular, or common. We meet some of those faithful people in this story and we learn how we can be faithful regardless of what is going on around us.

§ So, if you feel like you are just one student at your school and you can’t make a difference, or if you are just one employee, or just one parent, or just one retiree, and you wonder if you matter, this story is deeply relevant for you.

§ In fact, if you want to know God, His nature character and heart, Ruth is for you.

§ If you are far from God and have never been a follower of Jesus, Ruth is for you.

In the days when the judges ruled, there was a famine in the land. So a man from Bethlehem in Judah, together with his wife and two sons, went to live for a while in the country of Moab. The man’s name was Elimelek, his wife’s name was Naomi, and the names of his two sons were Mahlon and Kilion. They were Ephrathites from Bethlehem, Judah. And they went to Moab and lived there. –Ruth 1:1-2 NIV

This story is filled with contrasts. We have Elimelek, whose name means God is King, yet he doesn’t act like God is King. That is because he leaves Bethlehem, which means house of bread, because there is no bread in the house of bread. As this man leaves the land of his God, he goes to the land on another god for food, he brings his wife, Naomi, whose name means pleasant, but we are about to see how her life becomes far less than pleasant.

They leave because of a famine. Many of us have a difficult time understanding how devastating a famine would have been for the people of Israel. We live in a part of the world and during a time when food is generally accessible and much of it shelf stable. But in the Ancient Near East when there was a famine, there was no food. You didn’t eat. So this family made the most unpleasant decision to leave Israel.

Leaving Israel for Moab was a big deal. Moab was an enemy of Israel. When the Israelites were crossing from the desert into the Promised Land, the people of Moab mistreated the Israelites and encouraged them to get involved in promiscuous activity and to worship other gods. So there was bad blood between Israel and Moab. In this culture, to leave a land meant to leave a god and to go to another god. Even if Elimelek and Naomi didn’t worship the god of Moab, leaving Israel sent a strong message that they didn’t believe they could survive in Israel and they didn’t believe God would provide for them.

The way this text reads, they had only planned to take a short trip to Moab to get food, but they ended up staying a long time, as we’ll see, over ten years.

Many of us know this experience.

§ It was hockey season and we were busy, but then you started hanging with a different group of friends at school and you never intended to stop being involved in church, it just happened…

§ We graduated high school and we got really involved in college and the classes and working and our social life and we never intended to not be involved in church, we just needed a few weekends to get settled…

§ Or we got busy with work, Sunday travel, working nights, weekend shifts. We were just trying to be practical and put food on the table, we never meant to disconnect from our faith…

And we suddenly realize, it has been 10 months, or 10 years, or more.

We so understand Naomi. Maybe going to Moab was her idea, maybe she pushed Elimelek to go. Or maybe she went grudgingly. Whether she found herself in Moab willingly or unwillingly, she isn’t where she belongs. And there tragedy strikes.

Now Elimelek, Naomi’s husband, died, and she was left with her two sons. They married Moabite women, one named Orpah and the other Ruth. After they had lived there about ten years, both Mahlon and Kilion also died, and Naomi was left without her two sons and her husband. –Ruth 1:3-5 NIV

Since women didn’t have standing and didn’t have the opportunity to hold employment in this agrarian society, losing one’s husband meant she was fully dependent on her boys for survival. There was no social support system, especially for an Israelite in Moab. Being practical, she gets her boys married, something that would have likely been heartbreaking for her without Elimelek. Then both boys die. Without any grandchildren.

This turn of events is heartbreaking for anyone. Some of us know the pain. Some of you know all too well what it feels like to be widowed. Others know the pain of holding a funeral for your child. Others of us know what it feels like when all the things we were hoping for, all the things we were trying to do to make our life work fail us and we are left with nothing. But, for this culture, this was especially challenging. Naomi now had no one to support her. She went to Moab, either by choice or not, in hopes of survival, and now, everyone who could support Naomi is dead. When those boys died, so died her hope. She had no one to turn to, no place to go and no way possible for her family name to carry on. Everything she had hoped for was gone.

We understand this, we never intended to leave our faith, we were just trying to be practical, we were just trying to live life and then life failed us and now our hope is gone.

But then, surprising news.

When Naomi heard in Moab that the Lord had come to the aid of his people by providing food for them, she and her daughters-in-law prepared to return home from there. With her two daughters-in-law she left the place where she had been living and set out on the road that would take them back to the land of Judah. –Ruth 1:6-7 NIV

I want us to take note that when Naomi heard God had come to the aid of His people she planned to return. This is a massive theological statement and it is so important for you and me. We will come back to this is just a moment. But before we do, notice Naomi’s practicality.

Then Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, “Go back, each of you, to your mother’s home. May the Lord show you kindness, as you have shown kindness to your dead husbands and to me. May the Lord grant that each of you will find rest in the home of another husband.” –Ruth 1:8-9NIV

She is concerned about the future of her daughter-in-laws. In the midst of heartbreak she is still worried about what is best for them. “Go back home, get remarried so you can survive.” Then she asks God to bless them and help lead them to a new marriage.

Then she kissed them goodbye and they wept aloud and said to her, “We will go back with you to your people.” But Naomi said, “Return home, my daughters. Why would you come with me? Am I going to have any more sons, who could become your husbands? Return home, my daughters; I am too old to have another husband. Even if I thought there was still hope for me—even if I had a husband tonight and then gave birth to sons—would you wait until they grew up? Would you remain unmarried for them? No, my daughters. It is more bitter for me than for you, because the Lord’s hand has turned against me!” –Ruth 1:9-13 NIV

For those of you who are practical, a realist, you have to love Naomi. She is telling it like it is, she is explaining to them that there is no hope for them if they go with her. She has nothing to offer to them, no future, and the chief reason she gives isn’t her age or how unrealistic it is she could even help them get married in Israel as Moab women, but the chief reason she says is “The Lord’s hand has turned against me.”So Naomi, plans to return to Israel, believes God has the power and the goodness to bless her daughter-in-laws from Moab, and yet, is convinced God’s hand is against her.

That is astounding to me. She wants to and feels free to return to God even though she believes God’s hand is against her. She would rather be with God, even if God is against her, than be on her own.

At this point we start to realize there is more going on with this story than we first realize. We start to understand that this story has much more to do with God than we realized. We start to realize the nature, character, and ways of God are more complex and nuanced than we ever realized. We are starting to understand that the God Naomi knew is a God who welcomed her back.

But something even more surprising is what happened next.

At this they wept aloud again. Then Orpah kissed her mother-in-law goodbye, but Ruth clung to her. “Look,” said Naomi, “your sister-in-law is going back to her people and her gods. Go back with her.” –Ruth 1:14-15NIV

Naomi’s urging to Ruth moves from practical to theological. Don’t come with me, I have nothing to offer you. Don’t come with me, my God is against me. Don’t come with me, go back to your people and your gods. And that was the moment of clarity Ruth needed.

Ruth has a moment of clarity about what she believed.

Moment of clarity can be seasons in our life, or they can be specific points of time, a certain day, a certain conversation, and singular moment in time. I’ve had several of these in my relationship with God, but one of the clearer moments for me was my sophomore into my junior year of college. I grew up, like Naomi, in a household where we followed Jesus. From an early age I knew about Jesus and prayed to accept Him as my Savior at an early age. But my senior year of high school and my freshman year of college, I was trying to sort out my faith and a sense of direction, after a poor first year at college I moved to Moab. Ah, Madison. Madison, Wisconsin attending the University of Wisconsin. Madison doesn’t exactly have a great reputation for being a place of grand spiritual direction, but it was the best thing for my relationship with Jesus. When I got to Madison, I realized, I could go any way I wanted. I was away from home, on my own, with so many options and opportunities in front of me. I am so thankful because when I arrived on campus I got involved in two things that changed my life. I joined the Navigators which is a college campus ministry, and I started attending Black Hawk Church. Over that next year God gave me several moments of clarity, forcing me to decide if I actually was going to follow Jesus and not my own path and not the way of the world. That path wasn’t always in a straight line and involved a few times of retracing my steps and coming back to God, but it was a time of great clarity for me. Have you had a similar moment or season of your life? A moment or a season where you decided to follow Jesus?

Ruth’s moment of clarity changed for her everything. Listen to what she said to Naomi:

But Ruth replied, “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me.” –Ruth 1:16-17 NIV

This is Ruth’s moment of conversion. As Naomi turns back to God, Ruth now turns to God for the first time. But why would she make such a dramatic statement? Was she just caught up in the emotions of the moment? The decision to go with Naomi to Israel was full of risk. We’ve already established that women didn’t have social standing or the ability to be employed, they were to raise kids and take care of the household while they were provided for by their father, their husband, or their sons. Ruth moving to Israel--she had none of these things. Neither did Naomi. They had nothing. There was no confidence that Ruth, a Moabite woman, would even be accepted in Bethlehem. She could be abused, kicked out of town, or taken advantage of by others with no legal resource. The journey alone from Moab to Bethlehem was a long, dangerous trip for anyone to make, let alone two women. She is placing all her trust in God. She has no backup plan.

Why would she do this?

I’m convinced because of Naomi’s witness to her. She had lived with Naomi for a number of years, and she heard the stories of the God of Israel. She would have heard Naomi pray, seen how she mourned for her two sons, watched how she cared for her family, and listened as she spoke the stories of God’s faithfulness to His people. Then she saw Naomi choose to return.

Even though Naomi’s life had become deeply unpleasant, even though she had lost everything, nothing was working for her, all of her hope was gone and even though she felt God Himself was against her, Naomi knew she was welcome to return home. Naomi’s powerful witness was not living a perfect life of faithfulness to God (which is a relief to all of us). Her witness was in the midst of her hopelessness she turned back to God!

Ruth realized that same God who welcomed back Naomi was now was welcoming her. She had nothing to offer God. She was not from the right people, didn’t come from the right family. She didn’t have the right religious upbringing. She didn’t know all the stories. She was an outsider, a foreigner, a woman from a pagan past. And yet, she was welcomed by God because she trusted in God for her salvation. She left her past, left her gods, left her history, and trusted everything to God.

The God I wish you knew is the God Ruth met. The God to whom Naomi returned. The God who welcomes.

God is a God of welcome. We can assume that in order for God to accept us we have to do all the right things and check all the boxes and that if we choose to leave God, He will hold a grudge and turn His back to us and we will be on our own. But that isn’t how God reveals Himself in the Bible. He created us to be in relationship with Him. He loves us and He wants us to live fully, He knows we can only truly live when we are in relationship with Him. He doesn’t want to pay us back for walking away from Him, He wants to bring us back to Himself. That is the God Ruth knew and the God Naomi knew and the God they want us to know.

How do we respond to this story?

Some of us today are like Naomi. We have walked away from God. We could have dramatically left the church and our faith, deconstructed and just left it all. Or, for others of us, we’ve been faithful and stayed with our faith, except for that one area of our life where we aren’t trusting in God’s provision. It could be one area where have slowly walked away and today we are realizing, we are far from home and it is time to return.

Others of us are like Ruth. We might feel like an outsider when it comes to church. We don’t know the words, don’t know how this all works, don’t know all the stories, and yet, God is welcoming us to trust Him. Being welcomed by God has nothing to do with our performance. We have nothing to offer God, He is the one who gives an offer to us.

But like Ruth and like Naomi, we can’t stay in Moab and move home to Bethlehem. We have to choose. God’s invitation of welcome is for all of us, but we accept His welcome when we choose to trust Him. We accept His welcome when we make the bold decision to turn away from how we have been living and turn toward Him. We no longer have a backup plan, we are trusting God for everything.

Ruth trusted her life and her survival to the God who welcomed her. We do the same. The reality is all of us will live for eternity someplace. God makes it very clear that we will live forever someplace, either with Him for all eternity or with ourselves, separated from God for all eternity. Not choosing to follow God and not choosing to trust Him means rejecting Him and trusting in ourselves. There is no third option where we can trust both. God is welcoming us to trust Him fully and trust Him only.

The question is how will you respond to the God who welcomes?

When Jesus, God in the flesh, started His ministry on earth He said,

“The time has come,” he said. “The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!” Mark 1:15 (NIV)

Repenting simply means to turn, to turn like Ruth did from her gods and her former life and turn toward God. Or to turn, like Naomi did, returning back to the God she left.

Jesus makes this repenting possible. He welcomes us because He took the punishment for our sin upon Himself. Scripture tells us, “While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” God doesn’t forgive us because we’ve impressed Him with our actions. He forgives us because He loves us and offers us forgiveness so we will come home to Him.

But like Ruth and like Naomi, we must trust Him by leaving where we’ve been. We do that by saying Yes to Him.

Prayer

§ I Said Yes moment & repentance moment.

Main Passage:

Ruth 1:1–18 NIV

1 In the days when the judges ruled, there was a famine in the land. So a man from Bethlehem in Judah, together with his wife and two sons, went to live for a while in the country of Moab. 2 The man’s name was Elimelek, his wife’s name was Naomi, and the names of his two sons were Mahlon and Kilion. They were Ephrathites from Bethlehem, Judah. And they went to Moab and lived there. 3 Now Elimelek, Naomi’s husband, died, and she was left with her two sons. 4 They married Moabite women, one named Orpah and the other Ruth. After they had lived there about ten years, 5 both Mahlon and Kilion also died, and Naomi was left without her two sons and her husband. 6 When Naomi heard in Moab that the Lord had come to the aid of his people by providing food for them, she and her daughters-in-law prepared to return home from there. 7 With her two daughters-in-law she left the place where she had been living and set out on the road that would take them back to the land of Judah. 8 Then Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, “Go back, each of you, to your mother’s home. May the Lord show you kindness, as you have shown kindness to your dead husbands and to me. 9 May the Lord grant that each of you will find rest in the home of another husband.” Then she kissed them goodbye and they wept aloud 10 and said to her, “We will go back with you to your people.” 11 But Naomi said, “Return home, my daughters. Why would you come with me? Am I going to have any more sons, who could become your husbands? 12 Return home, my daughters; I am too old to have another husband. Even if I thought there was still hope for me—even if I had a husband tonight and then gave birth to sons—13 would you wait until they grew up? Would you remain unmarried for them? No, my daughters. It is more bitter for me than for you, because the Lord’s hand has turned against me!” 14 At this they wept aloud again. Then Orpah kissed her mother-in-law goodbye, but Ruth clung to her. 15 “Look,” said Naomi, “your sister-in-law is going back to her people and her gods. Go back with her.” 16 But Ruth replied, “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. 17 Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me.” 18 When Naomi realized that Ruth was determined to go with her, she stopped urging her.

Action:

I said yes,

Baptism

Serve