Word of Salvation – Vol. 44 No.17 – May 1999

 

Naomi’s Faith in God Assailed, Tested & Blessed

 

Sermon, by Rev W.J. Bosker on Ruth 1:1-22

Scripture Reading: Job 2:1-10; Philippians 4:4-9; Ruth 4:13-17

Suggested Hymns: BoW 111A; 18A; 421; 358; 253; 331

 

Dearly loved Congregation, Brothers and Sisters in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Do you appreciate a good love story?  In the book of Ruth we can see that God not only enjoys a good love story, He also writes a good love story!  From cover to cover the Bible is a love story; God’s love for us and how we can love Him and each other.

Well, it’s all here in Ruth!  So much good biblical teaching on faith, hope, trust, loyalty to God, personal relationships, courting and marriage, providence, moving (I can identify with that!) and more.  Woven into the plot is an early picture of a kinsman-redeemer, a pointer to what the Lord Jesus Christ would come to do for us.

The Book of Ruth has its setting around 1200 BC.  Ruth gives us a glimpse at how God works in history to prepare the way for Jesus Christ, our Messiah, Saviour and Lord.

We plan to look at some of the broad themes in Ruth, taking a chapter or so at a time.

The book’s purpose in the Bible is explained by its ending with a family tree from Perez to David.  Here is the line to the Lord Jesus Christ.

What a mixed family tree this is when you look at some of the characters in it!  But that’s how God works.  He works through us, with us, and even in spite of us, to accomplish His good purposes.

Times were pretty tough in Bethlehem.  The last verse of the Book of Judges says: “In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes” (Judges 21:25).  God’s people were doing their own thing.  The nation was in bad spiritual shape.  In desperation they would cry out to God.

Israel treated God like the emergency services.  When in trouble, call out for help.  But otherwise you don’t need Him.  Is that how you treat God?  I hope not.  God graciously responded to Israel’s cry and raised up a leader.  The people would repent and return to the LORD.  He would bless them and then after a while they took God for granted, slipped into a spiritual slide and did their own thing again.

Against this dark spiritual backdrop was a godly family fighting for survival.

I believe this is one reason why God has written this love story for us.  When a nation is falling apart because it is spiritually bankrupt, God preserves those who cling to Him because He loves us dearly.  That doesn’t mean God will give us a bed of roses.  But amongst the thorns God is going to raise up a beautiful flower.  As the Master Gardener, He knows what He is doing.

We see this with Elimelech, Naomi and their two sons.  What would you do?  Stay in Bethlehem, the “house of bread” where there was no bread?  Or go to Moab, a godless country where there was food?

Sometimes we have to make that sort of choice.  I’m not sure Elimelech made the right choice.  But I do know this: the LORD is gracious and He can make something good out of the stumbling turns and bad decisions I make

God’s Word tells us that Elimelech and his family moved to greener pastures in Moab.  Elimelech lost his life; his sons married foreign women; then Naomi the widow lost her two sons and now there was a household of three widows.

Sometimes God’s people go through the most tragic circumstances.  Life seems all thorns and with no rose in sight.  Naomi wants to change her name from “pleasant” to Mara which means “bitter”.  We would probably say the same if we were in her shoes.

In the midst of this tragedy and turmoil, notice that Naomi still calls her covenant and promise-keeping God “the Almighty” (vss.20-21).  Our circumstances may change and life sometimes dishes us up a rotten serve, but our God is the Almighty, the all-powerful One, and it takes the eye of faith to see Him and the tongue of faith to confess Him!  Praise God for such a faith!

Naomi knows that her God, in His care and government has His hands on the world’s levers and nothing happens by chance.  She can talk to God about it and even bring her complaints to Him.

What Satan would like to do in this situation is drive her to despair and unbelief and say, “If that’s how God acts, I don’t want a bar of Him”.  Isn’t that how Satan attacked Job when he was immersed in tragedy?  His wife urged him to “Curse God and die” (Job 2:9).  Job answered her with integrity and wisdom: “You are talking like a foolish woman.  Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?”

God’s commentary on Job’s attitude and reply is “in all this, Job did not sin in what he said” (Job 2:9,10).  May God be able to say that of you when tragedy strikes and you question God.  The Bible says we can be honest with God because He is honest with us.  But don’t let go of your faith.  Keep holding on to God.  He is your Rock and your salvation (Psalm 18:2).

Jesus had to reassure Simon Peter of His faithfulness before Peter denied that he knew Jesus.  Our Lord said to him, “Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift you as wheat.  But I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith may not fail.  And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers” (Luke 22:31-32).  That’s what we see in this account of Naomi.  In Chapter 2 she is a great encouragement and strength to Ruth, her widowed daughter-in-law.

An Old Testament scholar, Alec Motyer, describes our God Almighty as “the God who is at His best when man is at his worst”.

The Lord’s reply to Paul when he pleaded for his thorn in the flesh to be removed was, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect (complete) in weakness” (2Cor.12:8).  Paul could go on to say: “Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.  That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties.  For when I am weak, then I am strong” (2Cor.12:9-10).

I think Naomi was learning this lesson, and look at how God blessed her!  She became a relative in the line of David and to our Lord Jesus Christ when Ruth and Boaz had a son!  The story ends in chapter 4:17 with the women of Bethlehem saying, “Naomi has a son”.  They also said, “Praise be to the LORD, who this day has not left you without a kinsman-redeemer.  May he become famous throughout Israel!  He will renew your life and sustain you in your old age.  For your daughter-in-law, who loves you and who is better to you than seven sons, has given him birth” (Ruth 4:14-15).

The LORD marvellously fulfilled these words.  Ruth’s son was in the line of Someone very famous!  We celebrate His coming to earth and wearing our flesh each Christmas.  He is Christ the Lord!  That God would have planned all this so long ago proves that He can still raise up roses from a bed of thorns.

I wonder how much thought Elimelech gave to moving to Moab? (1:1).  If he knew that he and his sons would die there as Jews in a foreign land, would he have ever gone?  I wonder how much thought and prayer accompanied Naomi’s decision to return to Bethlehem (1:6) and advising her daughters-in-law to stay in Moab? (1:8f).  I don’t know the answer to these questions.  Just like I don’t know what the future holds.  But I do know who holds the future!

Ruth must have seen a godly, living faith in Naomi.  She saw something in her mother-in-law which was so attractive that she wanted it for herself.  In the New Testament we read that our walk and talk with God should make the teaching about God our Saviour attractive, i.e., adorn the gospel with beauty (Titus 2:10).

We have Ruth’s great confession recorded in these words: “Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay.  Your people will be my people and your God my God” (Ruth 1:16).  It glorifies God and pleases Him immensely when our children, relatives and friends say that to us!  Imagine the joy it would give you to hear that said of you!  It must be one of the greatest blessings available to us.

What a challenge this text places before us to want to strive to make the gospel so attractive to others.  Not through flashy shows and extravagant church programmes, but through changed lives.  Especially in how we handle hardship, being honest with God and still gentle and submissive in our responses.

From this part of God’s Word you can see that you are allowed to bring your troubles to God.  Be a real Christian in a real world.  But make sure you keep holding on to your faith which connects you through Christ to our Almighty God.  Despite the stumbling turns we take, God is still making straight blows with crooked sticks.

One of our hymns says it like this:
   “What God ordains is always right
            and He will not deceive us.
   He leads us in the way of light
            and will not ever leave us.
   In Him we rest, who makes the best
            of all the stumbling turns we take
            and loves us for His mercy’s sake” (BoW 365:2)

Let us celebrate with joy the coming to earth of our Saviour.  But even more, let us look forward to what He is going to do when Christ comes again.  Not as a Babe in a manger, but as the King of kings and Lord of lords.  Praise God that He is in the business of using us to achieve this purpose!

Amen.