Ruth, Boaz, and the Providence of God

Howdy. It's good to see you all this evening. If you have your bible, turn to Ruth chapter two. God is so good. That that last song we sang is just so rich. I'm so encouraged by that. Great is thy faithfulness. Ruth chapter two. I'm gonna continue our series I started us in in through the book of Ruth.

And last time I was up here, we looked at Chapter one, and we saw a lot of things there, and we'll recap that this evening. This evening, the plan is to get through all of Chapter two, okay? And I think we'll be able to do that. It's really rich.

And I wanna start just by reading the whole chapter and kinda situating us in God's word. So look with me at Ruth chapter two verse one. Now Naomi had a kinsman of her husband, a man of great wealth of the family of Elimelech, whose name was Boaz. And Ruth the Moabitess said to Naomi, please let me go to the field and glean among the ears of grain after one in whose sight I may find favor.

And she said to her, go, my daughter. So she departed and went and gleaned in the field after the reapers. And she happened to come to the portion of the field belonging to Boaz, who was of the family of Elimelech. Now behold, Boaz came from Bethlehem and said to the reapers, may the Lord be with you.

And they said to him, may the Lord bless you. Then Boaz said to his servant who was in charge of the reapers, whose young woman is this? The servant in charge of the reapers replied, she is the young Moabite woman who returned with Naomi from the land of Moab.

And she said, please let me glean and gather after the reapers among the sheaves. Thus she came and has remained from the morning until now. She's been sitting in the house for a little while. Then Boaz said to Ruth, listen carefully, my daughter. Do not go to glean in another field.

Furthermore, do not go on from this one, but stay here with my maids. Let your eyes be on the field which they reap and go after them. Indeed, I have commanded the servants not to touch you. When you are thirsty, go to the water jars and drink from what the servants draw.

And she fell on her face, bowing to the ground and said to him, why have I found favor in your sight that you should take notice of me since I'm a foreigner? Boaz replied to her, 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 wages be full from the Lord, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have come to seek refuge.

Then she said, I have found favor in your sight, my Lord, for you have comforted me and indeed have spoken kindly to your maidservant, though I am not like one of your maidservants. At mealtime, Boaz said to her, come here that you may eat of the bread and dip your piece of bread in the vinegar.

So she sat beside reapers. And he served her roasted grain, and she ate and was satisfied and had some left. When she rose to glean, Boaz commanded his servants saying, let her glean even among the sheaves and do not insult her. Also, you shall purposely pull out for her some grain from the bundles and leave it that she may glean, and do not rebuke her.

So she gleaned in the field until evening. Then she beat out what she had gleaned, and it was about an ephah of barley. She took it up and went into the city, and her mother-in-law saw what she had gleaned. She also took it out and gave Naomi what she had left after she was satisfied.

Her mother-in-law then said to her, where did you glean today and where did you work? May he who took notice of you be blessed. So she told her mother-in -law with whom she had worked and said, the name of the man with whom I work today is Boaz.

Naomi said to her daughter-in-law, may he be blessed of the Lord who has not withdrawn his kindness to the living and to the dead. Again, Naomi said to her, the man is our relative. He is one of our closest relatives. Then Ruth the Moabitess said, furthermore, he said to me, you should stay close to my servants until they have finished all my harvest.

Naomi said to Ruth, her daughter-in-law, it is good, my daughter, that you go out with his maids so that others do not fall upon you in another field. So she stayed close by the maids of Boaz in order to glean until the end of the barley harvest and the wheat harvest, and she lived with her mother-in-law.

Alright. So here's a question, something to think about. Is there such thing as a coincidence or an accident in the world? Is there a God who is actively involved in the day to day affairs of your life? Now if God doesn't exist, then everything is an accident and meaningless.

And this is the atheistic worldview of of many, and one atheist philosopher gives us a bleak picture of this reality. Bertrand Russell says this, man is the product of causes which had no prevision of the end they were achieving. His origin, his growth, his hopes and fears, his loves and his beliefs are but the outcome of accidental collocations of atoms.

So in other words, you are just the result of some atoms bumping together in that worldview. So if God doesn't exist, there is no meaning. There's nobody controlling history. That's a really bleak picture. The Christian worldview is opposed to this. There is a God, and he does reign and control the universe.

And he works all events and circumstances to accomplish his plan for his glory. And there's a word for that, and we call that providence. That's one of my favorite words because it it's a word that always reminds me of the fact that God is working all things for his glory and for the good of his people and that nothing in my life that happens to me is meaningless or accidental.

In contrast with Bertrand Russell, George Mueller was a Christian who lived with this reality and view. He lived almost every day of his life totally convinced of the fact that God controls and orders all things for his glory and the good of his people. If you're not familiar with George Mueller, how many of you have heard of George Mueller?

Okay. Good. Many of you. We know that George Mueller ran an orphanage in Bristol, England, and thousands of orphans came through that orphanage. And they had no money, but they never went into debt. And Mueller's philosophy was that he was just he would never advertise his needs. He just simply relied on prayer, and God always provided.

And it's in the most just crazy circumstances. They never lacked anything. To me, there's something just so attractive about a life like that, just totally trusting in God's provision. But I think a lot of us just struggle with actually living that out. At least I do. You know, does God really provide?

Can he really do stuff like that? Is he really involved, you know, in day to day life? And often, at least in my life, so often I don't acknowledge God's kindness or providence toward me. Now fortunately, Ruth chapter two has answers for us and it offers help. And that's what I'm excited about tonight.

And just to give you a little flashback to chapter one, if you remember, we had an Israelite man, Elimelech, and he moves his family out of Bethlehem into Moab because there's a famine. But tragedy, you know, hits and all of the men in Elimelech's family die, his sons, himself, and it just leaves Naomi and her two daughters in law.

Naomi's devastated, but she hears that there's food in Bethlehem, so she moves back. And her daughter-in-law, Ruth, stays with her amazingly and commits herself to take care of Naomi in this foreign land. And it's important to remember that the cloud hanging over the whole book of Ruth, all four chapters, is this problem, Elimelech's line and his land, obliteration of those things, the permanent loss of Elimelech's tribal land and his family because there's no males in the family anymore.

And that's the main crisis of the book. And the question is, how is God going to solve that problem? And so when we start chapter two, we gotta remember that Naomi is in a place of doubting God's kindness in her life. And remember in chapter one, she said, the hand of the Lord has gone forth against me.

And the lesson that Naomi is gonna see by the time we get to the end of the narrative is that God providentially shows favor to his people's needs through ordinary, faithful people so that they'll appreciate his kindnesses in their life. And that's what Naomi will realize at the end of the chapter.

She'll begin to appreciate God's kindness. That's the same thing I want you to see this evening, something we all need to see in our lives and appreciate God's kindness to us through his providence. So chapter two is pretty simple. There's really three movements. Verses one to three, we see the need.

In verses three to 17, we see the answer. And in the last portion, we see the hope of God's kindness. So let's start first with the need. Look with me at verses one to three of chapter two. These kind of frame the set the setting for us. They give us the initial crisis.

And it's simply this, Ruth needs food. Now look with me at verse one, and it's kind of this sudden introduction of some information we're not expecting. Verse one. Now Naomi had a kinsman of her husband, a man of great wealth, of the family of Elimelech, whose name was Boaz.

Now why does he drop that in there? Because he goes on and completely goes away from Boaz in verse two, And he's hinting at us that this guy is gonna have some role to play in the story. The guy's gonna work through him, spoiler alert, to show favor to Ruth.

Now notice it says that Boaz is a kinsman. That means he's related to Naomi's family and her dead husband. And he's a man of great wealth. He's wealthy. He's influential. He's powerful in the city of Bethlehem. And so the author is kind of introducing us to this guy and not really telling us what role he's gonna play yet.

Now look at verse two now. And Ruth the Moabitess said to Naomi, please let me go to the field and glean among the ears of grain, after one in whose sight I may find favor. And she said to her, go, my daughter. So she departed and went and gleaned in the field after the reapers.

And we'll stop there. So Ruth comes to Naomi and says basically the situation is they're sitting in Bethlehem. They're broke. They're widows. They have nobody to provide for them, and they need food. And Ruth sees that and she takes the initiative to go and say, hey, I need to go gather some food.

And so but notice her need is to find favor. Now why is that? A little bit of cultural background here. Again, I mentioned this summit when I we went through chapter one, but Ruth and Naomi are widows, and there's no welfare system in the culture. There's nobody to provide for them.

's nobody no males to take care of them or farm Elimelech's tribal land. And so nobody's really looking out for them. But remember, in Chapter one, the last verse of Chapter one, we're told it's the barley harvest right now, coincidentally. And farmers are out harvesting barley in their fields.

Now usually what would happen is the gleaners would go through and they'd grab some stalks of barley and they'd cut them off and they'd hold them under their arm. And if you're a beggar and you want to get some food, what you do is you follow the gleaner and you hope that maybe he'll drop one or two stalks.

And you can just get a few heads of grain and survive. Now if you're really ambitious, you would actively try to steal crops from the farmer. And so it's probable that if you were a beggar coming into a field, you'd probably be viewed with suspicion, maybe ostracized and kicked out, especially at this time in Israel's history.

But what's interesting is that beggars, the orphan, the widow, these people that had nothing were always close to God's heart, and we see this in the Mosaic law. Deuteronomy twenty four nineteen, God says to to Israel, when you reap your harvest in your field and have forgotten a sheaf in the field, you shall not go back for it.

It shall be for the alien, for the orphan, and for the widow in it, in order that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work of your hands. You see the wisdom of God there and the kindness? So Ruth says, please let me go to the field and glean among the ears of grain after one in whose sight I may find favor.

So Ruth basically needs somebody to be nice to her. But what makes her situation bad is she's a foreigner. She's not even an Israelite. So she's in a really bad situation in that not only is she a beggar and might be viewed with suspicion, but she's not even from around here in Bethlehem.

And it's really just a pitiful scene, honestly, when you realize this young woman has her whole life together and is going to try to pick up some scraps after the reapers in a field. And so Ruth goes out of the city of Bethlehem early in the day hoping against hope that she will get something to bring back to her and Naomi.

And so the need is pretty simple. Ruth needs to find favor so she can get some food. Now let's look at the answer. How does God answer this need? Look with me at verse three, and I want you to notice something before I read the rest of verse three.

There's two things in chapter two that are about to intersect. Remember Boaz in verse one? The author introduced him to us, And the author also presents to us Ruth's need for favor. And these two things are about to connect. And that's what's amazing about verse three. It's the turning point of the chapter.

So look at this. Second half of verse three. And she happened to come to the portion of the field belonging to Boaz, who was of the family of Elimelech. I love this. So Ruth goes out at random into the fields of Bethlehem, and the first one she goes into is Boaz's field.

And it seems like Ruth just got really lucky. She just it's just a happy coincidence. Like, it's exactly what Bertrand Russell was talking about. But is that really what happened? I don't think so. I think the author of Ruth is almost humorously signaling something to us here. He's winking at us.

And he's saying, hey, there's somebody working behind the scenes here. There's somebody writing the story, and there's somebody who has a greater purpose in all of this. And he doesn't say it explicitly. He almost undersells it humorously. But God is the one at work controlling these coincidences. And he's gonna unfold his plan, and he's gonna show Ruth favor through the faithfulness of this guy, Boaz.

Alright? Now look at verse four. Boaz suddenly bursts onto the scene. Now behold, Boaz came from Bethlehem and said to the reapers, may the Lord be with you. And they said to him, may the Lord bless you. Now this kind of introduces us to a new section of this guy Boaz and everything about him and what he does with Ruth.

And there's really couple things the author wants us to see about Boaz. And number one is that he serves God. Look again at verse four. We see this by what comes out of his mouth. He comes to his gleaners and he says, may the Lord be with you.

And they say, may the Lord bless you. Now the author wants us to zero in on this. He could have just as easily left this out, and we really wouldn't have lost that much in the narrative. But he wants us to see something about Boaz. He's a man who loves Israel's God.

And this thing he says isn't just some religious formula that's kind of sterile. You learn a lot about somebody by what they talk about the most. And what immediately the first lines out of Boaz's mouth in the whole book is, may the Lord bless you. I just love that.

He loves the Lord, and his his expressions show that. And remember, this is the Judges period in Israel. This is a dark time, and Boaz just kinda stands out as a light here. Now look with me at verse five. Another thing we see that the author wants us to note is that Boaz shows concern for Ruth.

Look at verse five. Then Boaz said to his servant who was in charge of the reapers replied, she is the young Moabite woman who returned with Naomi from the land Of Moab. And she said, please let me glean and gather after the reapers among the sheaves. Thus she came and has remained from the morning until now.

She's been sitting in the house for a little while. So Boaz comes and he asks his foreman, what's going on here? Who's this? And notice he doesn't immediately just kick her out of the the field. She's a beggar. She's taking my food, my harvest. He doesn't just kick her out.

He's, who is this? And that signals that there's some concern here. And we get a little hint into Boaz's character. That brings us to another thing the author wants us to see. Boaz shows favor to Ruth, who's a foreigner. And that's really the central thing here. Look at verse eight.

Then Boaz said to Ruth, listen carefully, my daughter. Do not go to glean in another field. Furthermore, do not go on from this one, but stay here with my maids. Let your eyes be on the field which they reap and go after them. Indeed, I've commanded the servants not to touch you.

When you are thirsty, go to the water jars and drink from what the servants draw. So something happens that Ruth was totally not expecting when she left Bethlehem that morning. Boaz invites her just to keep gleaning in his field. And he gives her protection. And he gives her access to water.

This is really amazing. And he's very emphatic about her staying in his field for her own protection. And Ruth's completely blown away by this. Verse 10. Then she fell on her face bowing to the ground and said to him, why have I found favor in your sight that you should take notice of me since I'm a foreigner?

So notice Ruth has found favor, but she's surprised and noticed the ground of her question, I'm a foreigner. She's she's ex she went out Bethlehem expecting probably ostracism, but she's been welcomed. Now why does Boaz do all this? Verse 11. Boaz replied to her, 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 in 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. Wow. So Boaz has kind of heard about what Ruth has done for Naomi, and she's left her people, her gods, and she's joined herself to God's people, Israel.

And notice he emphasizes the cost of her decision. He says everything that you've done for your mother-in-law after the death of your husband has been fully reported to me how you left your father and mother in the land of your birth and came to a people that you did not previously know.

And so Boaz invites God to reward Ruth for that. And ironically, God's kind of already doing that through Boaz. That's what's amazing about this. And God is also revealing something about himself to Ruth through Boaz. Boaz says it's God. God is the one under whose wings that she has come to seek refuge.

That's a great place to be. God doesn't turn away those who come to him for refuge. I just love that. Now look at verse 13, Ruth's response again. Then she said, I have found favor in your sight, my lord, for you have comforted me and indeed have spoken kindly to your maidservant, though I am not like one of your maidservants.

So Ruth is just totally blown away by this completely. I mean, she never would have expected this. We see that Boaz has shown her favor, the exact need that she needed when she set out from Bethlehem. So we've seen that Boaz serves God. Seen that he shows favor to Ruth.

Let's look at another thing the author wants us to see about him, and this is significant. He obeys the spirit of the Mosaic law. Look at verses 14 through 16. At mealtime, Boaz said to her, come here that you may eat of the bread and dip your piece of bread in the vinegar.

So she sat beside the reapers, and he served her roasted grain, and she she ate and was satisfied and had some left. When she rose to glean, Boaz commanded his servants, saying, let her glean even among the sheaves and do not insult her. Also, you shall purposely pull out for her some grain from the bundles and leave it that she may glean and do not rebuke her.

So she gleaned in the field until evening. Then she beat out what she had gleaned, and it was about an ephah of barley. So notice, the first thing that Boaz does here is he invites Ruth to a meal. And notice it's Ruth the Moabitess, and again emphasizing that she's a stranger here.

She's a foreigner. And yet he's welcoming her in to fellowship with his people to share a meal. And now it's kind of at this point where we begin to ask ourselves, you know, maybe Boaz has an ulterior motive here. He's kind of maybe there's some romance happening here.

That's not what's happening. We've got to be careful when we read Book of Ruth not to import twenty first century categories into what's happening. Right now, we'll get to chapter three. Right now, the author wants us to just see that God's showing favor to Ruth through the faithfulness of Boaz.

And notice what Boaz says. He says, come here. And you could literally literally, it's draw near. And Boaz welcomes her into fellowship, and that's just an amazing display of favor. I noticed verse 14, it says she sat beside reapers. He's brought her into this kneel of fellowship with his own workers.

We also see that Boaz obeys the spirit of the law when he lets Ruth glean among the bundles. And what does that mean? Basically, Boaz is like, don't just pick up the scraps after my reapers. He tells the servants, let her glean from the collected bundles of barley and then pull out other stalks of barley and just drop them on the ground for her to pick up.

And remember that verse in the Mosaic Law I read earlier about how God said, You shall not go back and pick up those sheafs that you drop? Now Boaz could have just done that. And on a kind of technicality, he would have been within, in a certain interpretation, the boundaries of that command.

But in reality, that kind of this kind of generosity and kindness was God's intention behind that law. Boaz is getting at the heart of what God intended here of generosity, welcoming the alien and the stranger and showing kindness and getting at the heart of God. And so Boaz gets to the heart of the law and cares for the stranger.

He shows favor to Ruth. Now look at verse 17. It says that Ruth collected an ephah of barley. That's about 30 pounds that she collected, which is crazy because if you imagine just following behind some reapers and collecting a few scraps of and stalks of barley, you would never get 30 pounds in a day.

That's just amazing. God has answered all of Ruth's needs. And so verse 17 kind of brings us to the end of our interaction with Boaz for the chapter. He's a man who serves God. He shows favor to Ruth, and he obeys the spirit of the Mosaic law. And now notice the author has positioned Boaz as the answer through which God shows kindness to Ruth and provides for her needs.

And Boaz is kind of a savior here. And Boaz is just a faithful guy, an ordinary guy, who just loves the Lord and is getting at the heart of what God wants from his people, Israel. And it's hard to, at least for me, to read about Boaz and not think about the greater Boaz.

Christ, you know, Christ is the one through whom God would providentially show favor to those who draw near to him. And Christ always served the father and pleased him. And Christ shows favor to those who draw near to God through him, and Christ perfectly obeyed the law on our behalf.

And so I encourage you if, you know, you feel like you're alienated from Christ tonight, draw near. Experience the forgiveness of sins. Christ died to forgive you. And if you look again at verse 12, Come under the wings of God's refuge. Seek refuge if you don't know him.

Jesus says in John six forty, for this is the will of my father that everyone who beholds the son and believes in him will have eternal life, and I myself will raise him up on the last day. God doesn't turn away people who seek refuge in him and draw near to him.

There really is a God, and he really does offer so seen need. We've seen Ruth's need for favor. We've seen the answer, God's answer through the faithfulness of Boaz. Let's look now at the hope of God's kindness, kind of the we're getting at the heart of what's going on in this chapter.

Look with me at verses eight verse 18 or starting verse 17. So she gleaned in the field until evening. Then she beat out what she had gleaned, and it was about an ephah of barley. She took it up and went into the city, and her mother-in-law saw what she had gleaned.

She also took out and gave Naomi what she had left after she was satisfied. Her mother-in-law then said to her, where did you glean today where did you work? May he who took notice of you be blessed. And notice Naomi is just also surprised here because Naomi wasn't expecting her daughter-in-law to come back with 30 pounds of burley.

That was not in the cards for them. Now notice Ruth's response. Ruth says, the name of the man was Boaz. And now look, Naomi has two realizations here that bring hope to her situation. And remember just the darkness of Naomi's situation. And we see a hint of that just in the fact that she didn't even follow Ruth out to glean after the reapers.

She's just in this place of despair. And then Ruth comes back with 30 pounds of grain and says it was from Boaz. And again, remember verse one, the author introduced to us Boaz who's of the family of Elimelech. And Naomi begins to have some realizations here. So look at verse 20.

Look what Naomi realizes. The first thing she realizes is that God has not withdrawn his kindness. First part of verse 20. May he be blessed of the Lord who has not to And And we're do and kindness to Elimelech's family. Now this is huge for Ruth I mean, Naomi.

She said in chapter one, the hand of the Lord has gone forth against me. I went out full, but the Lord brought me back empty. Call me Mara, bitterness. And suddenly Naomi is acknowledging, God hasn't abandoned me. He's showing kindness. So that's Naomi's first realization. Her second realization is this, God has provided a redeemer.

Notice the second part of verse 20. Let me read the whole thing. Naomi said to her daughter-in-law, may he be blessed of the Lord who has not withdrawn his kindness to the living and to the dead. Again Naomi said to her, the man is our relative. He is one of our closest relatives.

Now this is huge. This is a huge turning point in the book of Ruth. Now circle the word closest relative. And if you have a different Bible than mine, it might say something else. The word really should probably be translated redeemer. And this is something we'll explore more when we get to Chapter three.

But for now, a redeemer under the Mosaic law was a member of the family clan who had a really important role in caring for the clan. Whoever stepped forward to take on the role, he was responsible to buy back or redeem land for a brother who had to sell his land because he was in debt.

Or maybe he bought back a brother who had sold himself into slavery. Or in other cases, he might step up and marry his brother's widow after if his brother died to raise up children to farm that land. So God had this very careful system to make sure that his people remained on their land.

And the author is hinting at us that Boaz could be the one who steps up and takes on this role for them, for Ruth and Naomi, for Elimelech's family. Now he's hinting at that right now. Naomi's like, maybe this is possible. Maybe this could happen. But we'll see more of the resolution of that in chapter three.

And Boaz is the one who can take on this role and rescue Elimelech's line and land from obliteration. And this is just amazing. This is God's providence at work in their life. And to give even more hope, in the remaining verses we learn, Boaz wants Ruth to stay in his field the whole harvest period.

Look at verse 21. Then Ruth the Moabitess said, furthermore, he said to me, you should stay close to my servants until they have finished all my harvest. Naomi said to her daughter-in-law, it is good, my daughter, that you go out with his maids so that others do not fall upon you in another in another field.

So she stayed close by the maids of Boaz in order to glean until the end of the barley harvest and the wheat harvest, and she lived with her mother-in-law. And so we see that, again, chapter two, like chapter one, ends on this note of hope that God has provided and shown favor to Ruth.

He's not withdrawn his kindness to Naomi. And he's provided a redeemer, somebody to step up and bring, in air quotes here, salvation to the family of Elimelech, deliverance from this situation. And it's, again, it's hard for us to to not think of the fact that in a different way for us today, God has provided a redeemer and obviously his son, Christ.

And Christ is the one who redeems us from our sins and debts and and purchases us by his blood and redeems those who draw near to the father through him. And God shows favor to us through him. And Galatians four four, in the fullness of time, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem us from the curse of the law.

God has raised up a redeemer, and God is kind to all those who draw near to him. Now before we land the plane here, I wanna go back and circle back to verse 20 again because there's something just significant in this chapter that I I really want to leave with you leave you with.

Look again at Naomi's initial response. Naomi said to her daughter-in-law, may he be blessed of the Lord who has not withdrawn his kindness to the living and to the dead. We have the impression here that Naomi, again, really thought that God had abandoned her and that God had totally withdrawn his kindness from her family.

And there might be some of you who are in that place today tonight. You feel like God has just withdrawn his kindness from me. And maybe you'd never say that out loud. You know, you kind of I mean, I know I can be this way sometimes. You know the theological answer to give.

You know, God is sovereign. God's good. You know, God cares for me. But deep down, it just there's an emptiness there. It just doesn't feel real for you. And you're starting to doubt that maybe God's withdrawn his kindness from me. I noticed by the time we get to the end of the chapter, Naomi's gone from doubting God's care for her to appreciating his kindness to her.

And I want you to know the more you look for God's providence and care in your life for you, the more you'll appreciate his kindness. But if you like Naomi, when we started the chapter, if you sit in the darkness of your circumstances and refuse to acknowledge God, you'll never see his kindnesses in your life.

You'll always only be looking at God is against me. The hand of the Lord has gone forth against me. God's attacking me. If you look for God's kindness in your life, it'll bring hope. I like what Samuel Rutherford says. He wrote to somebody once. Faith believes no evil about God.

Faith believes no evil about God. God is kind to his people, and he's faithful to show favor to his needs and even to your needs tonight, whatever they are. I don't know what they are because I can't see people's hearts. I'm fallible. But God knows, and he wants you to see him that way in this chapter.

And if you belong to him, he's not withdrawn his kindness from you, and he's provided you with a redeemer. And you've got to know that. You've got to believe that. That will bring joy and hope. It's not just true for Ruth and Naomi. You know, Ruth chapter two verse three doesn't just happen for Naomi and Ruth.

It's true for believers today. Look for it in your life. I mean, we see in this chapter, God saw this one young woman wandering out at random into the fields of Bethlehem. God saw her, and God provided her needs. I think about how many times in my life, you know, I've gone through my day and I I, you know, I'm busy, I'm doing different ministry things, and I breathe out some, you know, rushed prayer.

Lord, help me with this. And then I forget about it. And and then God answers that prayer later that I don't even notice. You know? And I I know that there's been hundreds of times like that in my life of just being totally oblivious to those small kindnesses of the Lord providentially.

And one way to remember is just to write those things down. If you see a kindness of the Lord, writing it down will help you appreciate it. I think of Psalm one zero seven verse one. Give thanks to the Lord for he is good, for his loving kindness is everlasting.

Let the redeemed of the Lord say so. Let it be on their lips. And so Ruth chapter two has shown us this case study of God's providence to show favor to the needs of his people. He really does this. He really is involved in the day to day of your life.

There is a God who's sovereign over the universe. He is attentive to his people's needs. He does hear them, and he does answer them. And that's what God wants you to see in Ruth two. Bertrand Russell is wrong. God is real, and he loves his people. So learn to trust in God's goodness in your day to day and appreciate his kindnesses to you.

And on this side of the cross, again, George Mueller is a brother who learned to trust God for his day to day needs. And something else that struck me, I I was providentially given a copy of his autobiography this week. As I was reading it, parts of it, Mueller learned to praise God and appreciate his kindnesses as God met his needs.

That's what you see too with Naomi learning in a very embryonic form in chapter two. So I wanna close just with an entry from Mueller's diary that I think just captures the idea here. This is what Mueller writes. October 29, the Lord has given us this day our daily bread.

Although in the morning, there was not the least prospect of obtaining supplies, we are trusting in God day by day. He meets our needs faithfully in so many ways as we wait patiently upon him. Our needs are great, but his help is also great. Our needs are great, but his help is also great.

That's God. That's the God that you know if you're a believer. God shows favor providentially to answer his people's needs. So let's pray. Father, we we just rejoice at your character seen in Ruth chapter two that you care for your people. Lord, we thank you that you see and you saw that young woman, who were thousands of years ago in a little speck of a town in Israel wandering out into some fields, and you provided for her.

And, father, it's just amazing, and we celebrate that. Lord, we thank you that you're the same God who can provide for us, whatever our needs are. And Lord, you want us to see you as a generous God. Father, a loving God, as a God who has not withdrawn his kindness and has provided us with redemption through his son.

And I pray that you would help us to see you that way, ask these things in Jesus' name. Amen.