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0:36Man, Ruth is a book that the last two weeks I've been studying and it's really blown me away. It's kind of like if you take a towel and you throw it in a bucket full of water, I'm kind of like somebody grabbing that towel and I'm going to begin to wring out just the riches of this book, Lord willing. It's an incredible book, and many of you are familiar with the story. You know, we begin with the darkness of Naomi's circumstances, and Ruth comes in, and there's that amazing ending to the story. And if you're not familiar with the story, well, you should be excited because it's incredible.

1:20The book of Ruth reminds me of a quote. And if you've seen the movie recently, Great Awakening, you might remember Benjamin. Franklin saying this, the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth that God governs in the affairs of men. Ruth is a book where we see God's sovereign providence on display. We see God delivering a family from destruction. Ruth is a book about the significance of the physical land of Israel and God's plan.

2:02Ruth is a book about self-sacrificial love as God's ideal. And Ruth is a book about David, ultimately, and ultimately Messiah. Ruth points us in that direction. And Ruth is a book about how God welcomes strangers into the fold of his own people. And so you'll see all of these themes come out of Ruth as we go through it this summer. Now, who wrote Ruth? You know, that's the age-old question. The short answer is we don't know. It would have been somebody who lived either during or after David's reign. But the most important thing about the author of Ruth is he knows how to tell a good story. He's a master storyteller. One of the things you'll see in Ruth is it's a literary masterpiece. And people see this as one of the great works of literature and human history. History. It has all of the elements of a good story. It has plot twists and rising action. It's incredible.

3:11Our goal this evening is just to get through chapter one. And chapter one's pretty full, so you know, we're going to work through it. In chapter one of Ruth, we see two images primarily. That's what the author wants us to see. The primary image we see in chapter one is a woman whose life has been turned inside out, upside down, torn apart, and she struggles to see how God could bring something good out of it. I think we can all relate to that. That woman's story is a story of bitterness and bereavement, and it's Naomi's story in chapter one.

3:55The second image is that of a younger woman whose life is similarly destroyed, but who makes an amazing decision of self-sacrificial love toward Naomi. That's Ruth. And in Ruth, we see that self-sacrificial love offers hope in situations of bitterness and bereavement and suffering. And so my goal tonight is to take you kind of by the hand and walk you through chapter one. And I want you to see. These two images and how they relate to your life, and especially how they relate to God's providence.

4:38There's really, in chapter one, there's three movements, and it's pretty simple. There's verses one to five, we see Naomi's bereavement. Verses six to nineteen, we see Naomi's return, and in verses nineteen to twenty-two, we see Naomi's emptying. And those will make more sense as we move through. But let me just begin by reading verse one. Let's start with Naomi's bereavement. Right? Verse 1, verses 1 to 5 start with a family disaster. And there's three crises we see in verses 1 to 5. Look with me at verse 1, chapter 1. The first crisis we see is a famine. Now, it came about in the days when the judges governed that there was a famine in the land. Okay, stop there. So, before we get anything with Ruth, our author wants to situate us in the time period. And he says, it's in the days when the judges governed. What does that mean? Well, if you look to the left of your Bible, you can see the book of Judges. And so, very simply, it's everything that transpires in the period of the book of Judges. And just a little recap of history: God brings the nation of Israel out of Egypt. And Moses passes off the scene, and Joshua steps up to lead the nation into the land of Canaan that God had promised. And the conquest starts, and Joshua leads his people into the land, and the conquest ends, and the land is parceled out, and different clans and families settle on their inheritances according to God's will. And so things start out well, but then things start to go off the rails. You know, Israel begins to abandon God and pursue false religion. And we see Judges as a book of darkness. That's what characterizes the period that Ruth, the events of the book of Ruth, happen in. It's a period of ignorance. You could say it's like the dark ages of the Old Testament and really of the Bible as a whole. People are ignorant of God's law. There's anarchy. There's violence, especially against women, genocide. By the time we get to the end of the events of the book of Judges, we see a city in Israel had become just as bad as Sodom.

7:08So it's a period of darkness. And we're not told exactly when in that period the events of Ruth happen, but somewhere it's situated in that time period. Okay, back to verse 1. It came about in the days when the judges governed that there was a famine in the land. So a famine that's A drought, right? A drought is striking Israel, the rains have failed, and people, crops aren't growing, and there's no food. And that's not a good situation. And often that was associated with God's judgment. And the author doesn't tell us that that's the case here, but it's very possible, I would say likely, that this drought is a result of Israel abandoning God's law, as we see in Judges. But look with me again at verse 1. And a certain man of Bethlehem in Judah went to sojourn in the land of Moab with his wife and his two sons. The name of the man was Elimelech, and the name of his wife Naomi, and the names of his two sons were Machlon and Killion, Ephraites of Bethlehem in Judah. Now they entered the land of Moab and remained there. So now the author zeroes in. He set the scene, and now he's going to zero in on how this crisis of a famine affects a certain man, Elimelech. He's living in Bethlehem, which ironically that means house of bread, the city of Bethlehem. He has a wife, Naomi, two sons. And he needs to survive, right? Imagine you have a family, there's no food, and you hear maybe there's some food in this place across the Jordan River. You know, what are you going to do? You're going to go there and try to find some food. So Elimelech determines that. That's his only option. Now, Moab has an interesting history. It's related to Israel. Anybody remember Lot, Genesis 18 and 19?

9:14Lot was related to Abraham, but they go separate ways. Long story short, Moab goes off the rails as well. It becomes a place of paganism and false religion, and the people worship Chemash. a false god. And so there might be food in Moab, but there's also that component culturally. But Elimelech moves his family there, his wife, his two sons. His wife, Naomi, that name means pleasant. Keep that in mind. That'll become important. Just write that down somewhere. Pleasant.

9:54So that's crisis one. Crisis two, we see in verse three. Look at verse three. Then Elimelech, Naomi's husband, died. She was left with her two sons. Stop there. Elimelech just dies suddenly in the narrative. And our author doesn't give any explanation for what happened. It's just sudden. Bam. Tragedy. And it suddenly breaks this almost idyllic family image. I imagine, like, if you're in a you know, a family gathering and everybody's talking, and somebody drops a big glass vase and just silences the room, and there's just a shock moment for a second. That's what I imagine the narrator trying to get across to us. Tragedy strikes Naomi. Okay, crisis two is Naomi is widowed. She loses Elimelech. What's crisis three?

10:57Crisis three is she loses her two sons. Look at verse four. Then they took for themselves Moabite women as wives. This is Naomi's sons. The name of the one was Orpah, and the name of the other, Ruth, and they lived there about ten years. Verse 5. Then both Mathlon and Chileon also died, and the woman was bereft of her two children and her husband. So not only does she lose her husband, she loses her entire sons.

11:34And she's lost her whole family at this point. And notice there's a phrase that the author uses here. Verse 3. Then Elimelech, Naomi's husband, died, and she was left with her two sons. Verse 5, then both Mathlon and Killion also died, and the woman was bereft of her two children and her husband. Naomi's bereaved. The author emphasizes verse 5. He really wants us to see that Naomi's left alone. And not only that, the major crisis here is this. Elimelech's family is going to go extinct. That's the wording of one commentator.

12:21More significantly, his tribal inheritance, that land he had in Bethlehem, is going to go to somebody else. God wanted his people to be living in the land and enjoying the blessings of fellowship with him, but we see that's no longer going to be possible for Elimelech's family because we've lost Elimelech and we've lost his two sons. I mean, what else is going to happen at this point? And really, the fate of Elimelech's land is something that becomes really prominent the rest of the book. And we'll see more about it then. But really, in chapter 1, the author is zeroing in on Naomi and the experience of her suffering. And it's at this point where we begin to ask, why?

13:11Why does this happen to Naomi? Maybe there's some human elements here. Maybe God's kind of bringing retribution on Naomi. That might be possible. The author gives us some hints that Elimelech's move to Moab may not have been a good idea. The family's problems really started when they left the land of Israel, God's land. Israel's role in the Old Testament was to stay in the land and be a light to the nations. They didn't have a mission mandate the same way we do.

13:48Second element here is that Moab was a place of idolatry. And even we see that Mathlon and Killion marry Moabite women and apparently don't have any children for 10 years, as we'll see later. And Naomi seemed content to stay in Moab after Elimelech's death. So maybe there's something a little bit amiss in this family. But there's no explicit statement about that from the author. And that's because of this. He wants us to focus not as much on the human choices that might have caused Naomi's suffering. He wants us to focus on the experience of the suffering itself. He wants us to get in Naomi's world. And you have to realize this. In that culture, to be widowed is to be left without provision. It's bad enough to lose a spouse. It's bad enough for Naomi to lose her children. But in that culture, it was the men who provided everything, who provided food, who worked the land, and Naomi is left behind. And it's possible she'll spend the rest of her life begging as a beggar, begging for food. And so there's a sense in which Naomi may have felt that she would have rather been among those who passed away than to be left behind with all the mess, to be left alone. So Naomi's bereaved, she's alone, and she's in a place of desperation.

15:25So we see Naomi's bereavement in verses 1 through 5. And let's look now at the next movement in the narrative. And this is where things start to get moved around a little bit. So look with me at verse 6. Something happens to bring Naomi out of Moab and back to Bethlehem. And this something is the providence of God. Look at verse 6 with me. Then she arose with her daughters-in-law that she might return from the land of Moab. For she had heard in the land of Moab that the Lord had visited his people in giving them food. So she departed from the place where she was and her two daughters-in-law with her, and they went on the way to return to the land of Judah. Let's stop there. So, this is the first that we kind of hear about God in the narrative.

16:19And we see a couple things here. First, we see the name of God, the Lord, all caps, as some of your Bibles might have it. That's the personal covenant name of God that he reveals. Deal to Israel, Yahweh. The second thing we see is God's providence. Notice that the Lord visited his people in giving them food. God is the one in control of the universe. He's sovereign. He's sovereign over the reigns. And notice his care. He's gracious to his people. He's visiting them and giving them food. And remember, the period we're in, this is the judges' period. They don't necessarily deserve this. Maybe this is a period where Israel repented. We don't know. But ultimately, this is God's grace in bringing mercy to his people. This idea of God's providence is huge in Ruth, as I said in the beginning. And it's finally what gets Naomi out of Moab and back into God's land. And God wants his people in the land. So Naomi leaves with her daughters-in-law, and she goes back. But we're going to find out that Naomi really doesn't want Orpah and Ruth to go all the way with her. Look with me at verse 8.

17:39And Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, Go, return each of you to her mother's house. May the Lord deal kindly with you, as you have dealt with the dead and with me. May the Lord grant that you may find rest, each in the house of her husband. Then she kissed them. And they lifted up their voices and wept. So, Naomi wants something here. She wants her daughters not to follow her to Bethlehem. Why? Because there's nothing for them there. You see, Naomi's old at this point, and we'll see this in a second. Naomi has no possibility of remarriage and having someone to provide for her and salvage her situation. Her daughters are young enough to where that could be the case. And so she wants them to go back and live a life and a future and have hope. And so she says, Go return each of you to her mother's house. And that's kind of an idiomatic expression. It means she's simply saying you're free to remarry and to have a future and to start a new life. In verse 8, she says, May Yahweh deal kindly with you. May he show his faithfulness, his kindness, because of what you've done with me.

18:59Verse 9, she says, May the Lord grant that you may find rest. The idea of rest there is remarriage, security, provision. I think if I was in Naomi's situation, that's what I would want for Ruth and Werpa. I wouldn't necessarily want them to participate in my experience of suffering. But unfortunately for Naomi, they don't turn around because they're loyal to her. Look at verse 9. After Naomi, Naomi says this, then she kissed them, and they lifted up their voices and wept. And they said to her, No, but we will surely return with you to your people. Oz, there. So they refused. They want to go with her to Bethlehem, to this foreign land, to take care of her. And Naomi's initial request was kind of polite. It was restrained. And we're about to see her true emotions about the situation come out.

19:59Let me read verses 11 to 13. But Naomi said, Return, my daughters. Why should you go with me? Have I yet sons in my womb that they may be your husbands? Return, my daughters. Go, for I am too old to have a husband. If I said I have hope, if I should even have a husband tonight and also bear sons, would you therefore wait until they were grown? Would you therefore refrain from marrying? No, my daughters, for it is harder for me than for you, for the hand of the Lord has gone forth against me.

20:38So there's this emotional explosion from Naomi. And I want you to feel the emotions there with what she's saying. Notice the first thing she says in verse 11: Return, my daughters. Why should you go with me? Have I yet sons in my womb that they may be your husbands? That's a rhetorical question. The answer is no. She's past menopause. She can't have children. Verse 12, she says, this, return, my daughters, go, for I am too old to have a husband. If I said, I have hope, if I should even have a husband tonight and also bear sons, would you therefore wait until they were grown? Another rhetorical question. The answer is no.

21:25Would you therefore refrain from marrying? Again, the assumed answer is no. And then she says, For the hand of the Lord has gone forth against me. And verse 13 before that, she says, for it is harder for me than for you. What does that mean? The word harder there is the word bitter. She's saying, my circumstances are too bitter for you to partake in. Think of the, if you ever tasted something really bitter, I can think of several examples of my life. That's the imagery here. It's bitterness, bitter suffering. And Naomi doesn't want her daughters-in-law to be part of that. And notice the last part of verse 13, she says, For the hand of the Lord has gone forth against me. Who does Naomi credit for her circumstances? She credits God. She takes for granted that God is the one bringing this into her life. And one commentator rendered it. The hand of the Lord has attacked me. God's attacking my life.

22:35The hand of the Lord in the Old Testament, it pictures God as this warrior attacking Naomi's life. And we're kind of looking for that expression of trust that caps off Naomi's emotional outburst here. But we don't have that. She doesn't say, though you trust me, though you slay me, yet will I trust you, like Job does. We just have the raw emotional experience of someone whose life has been destroyed by the bitter providence of God. Naomi's faith started kind of bright when she left Bethlehem, and then she goes into this land of Moab. And we kind of see that her faith begins to fracture, and now we're seeing the cracks. The suffering of Naomi is bringing out her true heart. She looks at her life and she concludes that God's attacking me. He's made my life bitter. He's taken everything from me, and he's destroying my life.

23:44Have you ever felt that way? Do you know someone who feels that way? There have been times in my life where I've felt tempted to conclude that of God. Naomi gives God the The lip service of causing her calamity, but not the trust that he deserves. Some of you might be struggling with this right now. It's usually in the valley of suffering. Actually, it's always in the valley of suffering where your true theology about God comes out. I know that's been true in my life, even recently, with circumstances. My truth, you have my professed theology, you know, what I would confess, and then suffering hits. And then I discover what was really in my heart comes out. That's what we see with Naomi.

24:42Do we trust God when his providence is bitter? Now, how did Ruth and Orpa respond to Naomi begging them to leave? Look at verse 14. Sorry, yeah, verse 14. And they lifted up their voices and wept again, and Orpa kissed her mother-in-law. Stop there. That's a farewell kiss. Orpah is saying, okay, I understand. And I see what you want, Naomi, and I'm going to go back. And so Orpa kisses her mother-in-law goodbye, and she starts back on the road back to Moab. Okay?

25:28We would expect this. Naomi told Orpa to do this. She wants Orpa to go back. This is expected. It's what we'd ordinarily expect. But look again at verse 14 now. And I want you to use your imagination here and picture something. Orpa kisses her mother-in-law goodbye forever. They'll never see each other again. And she steps away and starts back toward Moab. And Orpa's receding into the distance. She's getting further and further away. Keep that image in your mind. And look at verse 14.

26:05The last part. Orpa kissed her mother-in-law, but Ruth clung to her. So Orpa leaves, but Ruth has embraced Naomi, and she's not letting go as Orpa recedes into the distance. Look again, and Naomi says this in verse 15. Then she said, Behold, your sister-in-law has gone back to her people and her gods. Return after your sister-in-law. Ruth, you have to go back. There's no future for you with me. There's nothing for you in Bethlehem. You still have an opportunity to have a future. Go back.

26:48And notice she says, return to your people and your gods. And it's not certain there whether Naomi is acknowledging the existence of other gods. It's not clear. But she's basically saying, return to your people, return to your traditions, your religion. Now look at verse 16, and we love this part. This is so famous. But Ruth said, Do not urge me to leave you or turn back from following you. For where you go, I will go. And where you lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God. Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried. Thus may the Lord do to me, and worse, if anything but death parts you and me.

27:45That has to be one of the most famous expressions in scripture. There's so much here. There's so much to unpack. It's beautiful. What we see from Ruth from a 50,000-foot view is one of the most amazing acts of self-sacrificial love in the Bible, really, even in the Old Testament. We see Ruth committing herself to Naomi. Where Naomi goes, Ruth goes. Where Naomi stays, Ruth stays. Where Naomi dies, Ruth dies. Where Naomi is buried, Ruth will be buried. She's committing herself to the people of Israel, and she's committing herself to Naomi's God. And this is where Naomi. Ruth counters Naomi's statement, return to your people and to your gods. Ruth says, No, your people are my people. Your God, Yahweh, is my God. Now, this is amazing because who did Naomi just blame for all of her circumstances? She blamed God. And yet, Ruth here is committing herself to the true God. This is really the clearest conversion we have in the Old Testament of a non-Jew to the living God.

29:02And it's amazing. Ruth's saying, The Lord is my God. And notice verse 17. Ruth says, This, May the Lord do to me and worse, if anything but death separates you and me. Now, this is an oath in the Old Testament context. And Ruth is making basically an irreversible commitment. She's severing all ties with her people and her gods. And she's saying, May God hold me accountable if I don't keep my word to you, Naomi. This is amazing.

29:38There's really four implications that we see from Ruth's decision. Number one, it was a decision that was voluntary. Ruth didn't have to do this. Naomi told her to go back. That's what makes it amazing. Orpah does what's ordinary, what you'd expect. We would have never expected Ruth to do so. Something like this. It's incredible. Number two, it was voluntary. Number two, it was a decision that was costly. It costed something for Ruth to display this kind of love to Naomi. She's giving up her future. She's moving to a land where she might be ostracized as a foreigner. And I didn't mention this earlier, but there is bad history between Moab and Israel. We have one episode in the Old Testament where Moab tried to seduce Israel away from the Lord. And so there's a bad history between these two peoples. But Ruth is giving up her people, her nation. She's giving up her false religion. She's giving up everything to Naomi. Number three, it was a decision that was permanent. And that's what we see in verse 17. She's severing, she's burning the bridge behind her. There's no way that she can get herself out of this after she makes the decision. She's binding herself to Naomi and to Israel's God. Number four, it was a decision ultimately that was loving. Ruth's decision to give up her future, her life, everything was born out of self-sacrificial love toward Naomi.

31:26And it's not kind of a romanticized sentimentalism. That, you know, Ruth is suddenly overcome with this, you know, so that she's lost all control and she's just doing this. This is a decision that Ruth makes toward Naomi, and it just almost defies explanation. Why would Ruth do this? I have to say, if I had a daughter, I really wouldn't particularly want her to give up her entire future to go take care of an old, suffering widow who's bitter against God with no possibility of anything ever changing. I wouldn't want that for my daughter.

32:11But this is self-sacrificial love. This is Ruth saying to Naomi, I'm for you. I'm for you in your suffering, Naomi. And so this brings us to the question: is this type of self-sacrificial love something that's unique to Ruth? Is it something that God expects of everyone? To put it another way, is it something, how do we know whether or how to apply something like this in our lives as Christians? One thing we have to keep in mind is this is Old Testament narrative. You know, it might just be describing something that happened without necessarily giving us God's interpretation of those events, what God requires.

33:00God doesn't expect us to go and lead a conquest against unbelievers like he did with Joshua and Canaan. He doesn't expect us to avoid unclean foods as Christians. And so it might be that God is telling us this story, but he doesn't necessarily expect us to follow through with things like Ruth does here. Maybe it was just a set of circumstances that was unique to Ruth. And it doesn't seem like the author explicitly tells us that we should imitate Ruth, at least here. Or does he?

33:40Of course, some of you know where the story of Ruth is going. And we're not getting into chapter 2 yet, but I am going to read a scripture from that chapter. And y'all know where this is going, and we'll pick it up next month in chapter 2. But later in the story, Ruth is told something by a very important person, Boaz. We'll talk about him, don't worry. Boaz tells Ruth this at one point: All that you have done for your mother-in-law after the death of your husband has been fully reported to me, and how you left your father and your mother and the land of your birth and came to a people that you did not previously know. May the Lord reward your work and your wages be full from the Lord, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have come to seek refuge.

34:31What do we see in the story of Ruth, for those who know the story, and the good ending? We see that God rewards Ruth for this decision. And the author wants us to see that. And it's Ruth's self-sacrificial love that becomes the thing that brings hope to Naomi's situation. And it's through that decision that God begins to move the chess pieces in Naomi's life to restore Elimelech's family and to save it from extinction. And so we see this principle that self-sacrificial love is God's ideal. It's not something that was intended to be exceptional to Ruth. It was something that God desires in all of us.

35:21Now, what does this mean for Christians, right? I can't help but be reminded when I look at Ruth of that incredible example of voluntary self-sacrificial love in Jesus Christ, who came, Mark 10:45, not to be served, but to serve, and give his life a ransom for many. See, that's who Ruth is pointing us toward. You know, Jesus didn't have to step out of heaven and take on human flesh to save sinners who've repented. Rebelled against God.

36:02He voluntarily did that. I think of the scene in John 13, right? The Last Supper, you know, the disciples are in the upper room, and there's a problem, though, is that their feet haven't been washed, and their feet are dirty in that culture. And one of the disciples should have stooped down to meet that need, but nobody does. And we see Jesus stooping down, displaying that voluntary self-sacrificial love to meet that need and wash the feet of sinners. Romans 5:8, God demonstrates his own love toward us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Jesus voluntarily died in the place of people who were not deserving, who were sinners.

37:00So when this kind of love from God comes into your life and rescues you through the new birth, you get new taste buds. You become a person who begins to love God and to love other people. And maybe it starts as a trickle, but it begins to grow into a stream and then into a river. Because the more you understand the love of Christ in the gospel, the more your life will reflect that same kind of self-sacrificial. Love, of course, never perfectly in this life.

37:35God desires his people to be known as a people who loves. That's the norm. See, Ruth isn't extraordinary for the Christian, it's the norm. 1 John 3:16, we know love by this, that he laid down his life for us. And what's after this? And we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. Jesus says this in John 13, 35. By this, all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another, if you have love for one another.

38:13So I wish I could say that, you know, I could stand up here and say, man, I've really mastered this. I've got this self-sacrificial love thing down. I've got that taken care of. That's not the case in my life. And I see so many areas for me where I fall short in this area, even as a Christian. And if me and you are brought before the judgment seat of Christ today, and Jesus were to evaluate our works as a believer and how we stewarded our lives, would he see Orpa, somebody who does what we expect? Ordinary, or we see Ruth, somebody who does what we don't expect and displays that self-sacrificial love toward others.

39:13Somebody who's truly grasped the implications of the love of Christ. What we see with Ruth is that she brings that love into a situation of somebody who's in almost incomprehensible suffering. And the question for us is: when God brings those suffering people, those Naomis, into our lives, do we retreat or do we press in and begin to say, I'm for you in your suffering because Christ was for me and showed his love to me and forgave me.

39:53Often, when someone's in horrible suffering, they find out really fast who their friends, who their real friends are. You know, maybe the situation gets a lot of attention at first, but then it doesn't quite get the quick fix that we all wanted. And then people start receding into the background. And then it gets forgotten about. People start disappearing and moving on. And then people start to say, I didn't know you were still dealing with that. You haven't gotten over that yet.

40:31Too often, we settle for Orpah, we settle for ordinary, and we fall short of God's ideal. And God's ideal is that self-sacrificial love that Christ perfectly modeled for us. Now, don't hear what I'm saying in isolation from the gospel. I'm not saying, okay, go try to will up and through law, try to create this in yourself. No, God has saved you, and He's given you the Holy Spirit to empower you to walk in love and me. You can only love well when you understand the mercy of Christ. So, who is the Naomi in your life or in my life? Who's the Naomi in your church family? Okay.

41:25That brings us to the end of this long return scene with Naomi. Ruth's choice is amazing, and it closes off this scene that started in verse 6 and ends in verse 19. So, we've seen Naomi's bereavement, verses 1 to 5. We've looked at her return journey to Bethlehem in 16 and 19. Now, we come to the last section, the emptying of Naomi. And so, at this point, the spotlight kind of turns back to Naomi from Ruth. Look with me at verse 19.

42:00So they both went until they came to Bethlehem. And when they had come to Bethlehem, all the city was stirred because of them. And the women said, Is this Naomi? So Naomi makes it back to Bethlehem. And the whole city's in a stir. And they're seeing her walking in. They're saying, Is this Naomi? Because remember, Naomi's been gone for over a decade. She looks different. She's coming back alone. Her life's been destroyed. She's grieved. And that shows on a person physically. And so there's almost a sense in which they're saying, is this Naomi?

42:43Now, remember, Naomi's name means pleasant. And so she's hearing this. She's hearing, is this pleasant? Pleasant's back. Pleasant came back to Bethlehem. She's here. And she's hearing her name. And she's reminded constantly of the fact that her life has been anything but pleasant. So Naomi hears this, and she snaps back in verse 20: Do not call me Naomi. Call me Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. What does the name Mara mean? It means bitter.

43:21God's brought bitterness into her life. Her circumstances, right, they're so bitter that she identifies herself that way. Way now. Notice what she says, verse 20. For the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. I went out full, but the Lord has brought me back empty. Why do you call me Naomi, since the Lord has witnessed against me, and the Almighty has afflicted me? So God's dealt bitterly with her. Notice in verse 21, she went out full. She left Bethlehem full. She's got her family. She's got her children, her husband. She came back empty. It's like God took the glass of her life and dumped out everything that made her life zestful and enjoyable. Notice again in verse 21, it says, she says that God's witnessed against me. And it's the idea there is a courtroom image that God is taking the stand against Naomi, and he's afflicted her. And so this really confirms that Naomi is viewing God as the enemy of her life.

44:32She attributes entirely the blame for her life circumstances on God. And we're beginning to think that her suffering has almost destroyed her trust in God. If you're in that situation, has that happened? God brings all of us through that suffering, the valley of suffering, sooner or later. God wants us to trust him. We don't see that with Naomi, but we want to see that in our lives. Now, here's the thing that Naomi couldn't see, or really anyone in the book of Ruth. We never see in Ruth an instance where an angel comes from heaven or God gives some revelation, and this is how the situation is going to end. You know, God doesn't reveal that to anybody in the story.

45:31But what we see is God's providence working for Naomi's good. We even see that with Ruth already in chapter 1. Naomi doesn't return to Bethlehem alone, she returns with Ruth. Look with me at verse 22. So Naomi returned, and with her Ruth, the Moabites, her daughter-in-law, who returned from the land of Moab, and they came to Bethlehem at the beginning of the barley harvest. So our chapter has been very heavy. We see Naomi's life destroyed, but we see that it ends on a little ray of hope. Naomi comes back to Bethlehem with Ruth. And notice also that it's the beginning of the barley harvest. Why is that significant?

46:23It signals that God is solving one of Naomi's needs, which is food. And barley... Of course, it becomes almost a symbol of hope in Ruth. Ruth encounters a barley farmer in a field, and that begins to move all of the circumstances into, through God's providence, into salvaging and rescuing Naomi. And we'll see that as we progress through the book. But we see chapter one ends with this note of hope in God's providence. And I couldn't help it. I was reminded of that last hymn we sang, you know, God moves in a mysterious way. Think about the last two verses of that hymn. His purposes will ripen fast, unfolding every hour. The bud may have a bitter taste, but sweet will be the flower. Blind unbelief is sure to err and scan his work in vain. God is his own interpreter, and he will make it plain.

47:35So, earlier in the hymn, it says, Behind a frowning providence, he hides a smiling face. Naomi couldn't see that, and I don't even think Ruth could see that. But we'll see that as we move through the story: that Ruth is a book about the providence of God in rescuing this family situation. That's what we see in verse 22. The author's. Kind of winking at us. See God's providence here. You know, wink, wink, wink. You know, God is the one, he's signaling to us that God is the one who's sovereign over rain and barley and the universe. And he's going to bring something good from Naomi's circumstances. It's going to come through Ruth's decision of self-sacrificial love.

48:24And that choice is going to bring hope to the situation. And Ruth's bitter suffering, Elimelex family. And ultimately, we know that Ruth is someone in the line of Christ. You know, we'll end Ruth and we'll see that. I wish I could spend a whole sermon just introducing the book of Ruth because there's just so much here. But chapter one has taken us on a journey. You know, we've seen Naomi's bereavement, verses one to five. We've seen that return scene to Bethlehem in 6 to 19.

49:00And we saw how Naomi understands her circumstances, her emptying in verses 19 to 22. We could summarize it differently. Remember those two images I mentioned at the beginning? The image of that suffering woman, Naomi, blaming God for her suffering, not seeing God's hand in the providential circumstances of her life. Her faith is warping and buckling under the strain. And that starts off the chapter and ends the chapter. But in the middle, we see that second image of a suffering young woman giving up her future to embrace Naomi and her God. And that's what brings hope to the story. And so, in a sense, Naomi is this, her circumstances are this backdrop against which God is going to show his goodness in this story. He's going to do it through decisions of self-sacrificial love from Ruth and from others. So, there's a lot more to the story. I guess you could say this is a cliffhanger. Unfortunately, I won't be up here again until June, so hang with me. But there's a lot more to the story, and we'll see that. So, let me pray for us.

50:30Father, we thank you for your providence. We thank you that you're sovereign over the events of our lives and even over those bitter circumstances that you bring. And, Lord, we trust you, Father. We don't want to be those who scan your work in unbelief and doubt you. And, Lord, I pray you give us faith to see your goodness and that you are working All things together for good for your people, and most importantly, for their eternal good. Father, help us to see that self-sacrificial love of Ruth, who gave up everything, and you rewarded that so graciously. Lord, we desire that in our lives. We desire that. We pray you create that in us and grow that in us, Father. Jesus' name, amen.