Sermon Tone Analysis
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Dave and I just returned from a mini-vacation.
We spent 4 days touring the antique stores of southeastern Indiana.
Our venture also had us make 2 brief treks into nearby towns in Ohio and Kentucky.
If we would have driven directly to our destination of Batesville, IN, the round trip would have clocked at 436 miles.
Instead we put over 900 miles on our rental car.
This morning I want to talk about the journey.
About 6 years ago I met an artist at the Will County Antique Fair.
When I first entered her booth my spirit danced.
The images were so joyful I knew that I had to have one.
I took her card and a year or so later we went down to Bloomington and bought 2 small pieces.
The purchase was bitter sweet because although I was thrilled to have the 2 small prints, I was in love with a larger piece we couldn’t afford.
After we got home I sent Sara an email to thank her for meeting us.
I mentioned that I regretted not being able to buy the bigger piece.
When she replied to my email, she offered to paint me a smaller version at ½ the original price.
Naturally, I said yes.
*Point 1: If God goes before you, so will His favor.
*
Five years later, I got to thinking about Sara, she had been in her 70’s when I met her and had some health issues.
So, I contacted the gallery and then started an email correspondence with her husband.
They had a new website and I got to see some of Sara’s later work.
It wasn’t the same.
Although she still used some of the same images, they were dark – the joy was gone.
I didn’t say anything about the new work to Dave, just that I had been in contact with Sara’s husband.
You often hear Christians say that if God did it for one person, he can do it for me.
My intent this morning is to testify about God’s goodness to me by contrasting the life of Ruth with the journey that Dave & I took last week.
Turn to *Ruth 1*
In the days when the judges ruled, there was a famine in the land, and 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 Elimelech, his wife’s name 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 Elimelech, 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 she heard in Moab that the Lord had come to the aid of his people by providing food for them, Naomi 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.
They had a plan, a road map to get where they needed to go.
Before I go on, you need to know some background information about Dave’s planning process.
My husband is thoughtful and romantic and very generous.
He’s methodical; he needs to mull things over in his mind.
He is not impulsive.
And when something works, he sticks with it.
So when he began to plan my surprise birthday get-away, he ran though a mental check list of things that I enjoyed.
1. Get a mid-size rental car.
2. Trip to the gallery.
3. Stay in a Bed & Breakfast.
4. Antique stores nearby.
Then he spent hours on the computer – and you all know the only websites Dave is familiar with have Pez in the address line.
So this was a major ordeal for him.
Now what you may or may not know about Lisa, is that she hates, loathes, and despises surprises.
And I don’t have a poker face.
If I’m disappointed or annoyed, you can read it in my expression.
So on the Wednesday before our departure, Dave presented me with his master plan.
Mind you, this was just the plan, He hadn’t made any reservations.
*Ruth 1:* 8 Then Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, “Go back, each of you, to your mother’s home.
May the Lord show kindness to you, as you have shown to your dead 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 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 gone out against me!”
14 At this they wept again.
Then Orpah kissed her mother-in-law good-by, but Ruth clung to her.
*Point 2: Always have a plan, do the research, and ask for input from your traveling companions.*
I was really concerned that I would hurt Dave’s feelings when I had to tell him that the gallery stop wasn’t something I wanted to do.
So I asked about the rest of his plans.
I then jumped on the internet and went to the website of the B&B he had chosen and did a search for nearby antique stores.
As I expanded the search, we kept gravitating further and further east.
After about an hour, the destination had changed and our entire itinerary had been worked out with plans and directions for 4 days of travel.
The directions, by the way, no longer took us through Bloomington so with a quick email, the gallery appointment was cancelled.
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*Ruth 1:* 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 anything but death separates you and me.”
18 When Naomi realized that Ruth was determined to go with her, she stopped urging her.
*Point 3: Be ready to correct course.*
With our destination set, Dave made reservations at the Stonebridge Inn & Spa in Batesville, IN.
Batesville is about half an hour from the Indiana~/Ohio border.
The next day I spent a few hours on the Internet, mapping out travel routes and itineraries for each day.
On the day before we were to begin our journey Dave and I laid out everything that needed to go in our suitcases.
We didn't pack.
You can't pack in our house.
You all know that we have a brood of Boston Terriers.
Boston's have great separation anxiety.
All you need to do is take out the suitcase, and they begin sulking and whining.
So in order to pack a suitcase in our house it has to be done at the very last minute when they are being distracted by something else.
In fact, if they see a packed suitcase, they will park themselves at the back door and block your exit.
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*Ruth 1*:19 So the two women went on until they came to Bethlehem.
When they arrived in Bethlehem, the whole town was stirred because of them, and the women exclaimed, “Can this be Naomi?”
20 “Don’t call me Naomi, ” she told them.
“Call me Mara, because the Almighty has made my life very bitter.
21 I went away full, but the Lord has brought me back empty.
Why call me Naomi?
The Lord has afflicted me; the Almighty has brought misfortune upon me.”
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