Sometimes in life, it feels as though we’re lost in a foreign land – in a place where we’re not meant to be, going through things that just don’t make sense. That’s where Naomi and Ruth and Orpah found themselves. But in those places, the thing we so often lose sight of – is that God is a God who wants to bless us.

Alone in a Foreign Land

I’m so excited today because we are about to kick off a new series of messages – a series, after some prayer, that I have called, “A Journey into the Blessings of God”. Now some people get a bit twitchy, I have to tell you, when they hear some guy talking about the blessings of God. Why? Well, over the years – and this is nothing new – over the years some have twisted this whole thing of God’s blessing into this notion that, if we push this button or pull that lever with God, then money will just roll out. “I can have a big house or a big car or financial prosperity – that’s what being a Christian is all about.”

Some call that the “prosperity doctrine”! And the reason I won’t subscribe to it is because you won’t find it in God’s Word, the Bible. It ignores the fact that Jesus, the very Son of God, died a gruesome death on a cross, without even the shirt on His back, or at least the tunic on His back. So when I talk about the blessings of God, abundant financial blessing is not what I am talking about.

When I talk about the blessings of God, I am talking about something much bigger … something much more than mere financial prosperity. God is a God who wants to bless us – He wants us to be secure and at peace and full of joy, smack bang in the middle of His blessing. And as we take this journey to God’s blessing – the blessing that He promises each one of us who put our faith in Jesus His Son – we are going to travel alone a road with a woman by the name of Ruth.

Now, Ruth has a whole Book under her name in the Old Testament. Granted, it’s a short Book, just four chapters, but nevertheless, a whole Book. That’s quite something when you think about it. And so, each week over the coming four weeks, we are going to take a journey into God’s blessing, walking along the road with Ruth.

And today, we are going to kick it off with just the first part of her story; a story, which I suspect, is all too familiar to many of us. Have a listen. Ruth chapter 1, beginning at verse 1:

In the days when the judges ruled, there was a famine in the land, and a certain man of Bethlehem in Judah went to live in the country of Moab, he and 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 Mahlon and Chilion; they were Ephrathites from Bethlehem in Judah. They went into the country of Moab and remained there.

But Elimelech, the husband of Naomi, died, and she was left with her two sons. These took Moabite wives; the name of the one was Orpah and the name of the other was Ruth. When they had lived there about ten years, both Mahlon and Chilion also died, so that the woman was left without her two sons or her husband.”
Now, let’s just position this time historically in the journey of Israel. You may recall that for centuries Israel was stuck in slavery in Egypt, then when God heard the cry of His chosen people, He led them out of Egypt, through Moses, through the Red Sea into the wilderness on a forty year journey – finally arriving at the Promised Land, the land of Israel, which they had to take bit by bit, battle by battle.”

Once they settled, their system of Government was a theocracy. In other words, God was their head of state and God administered His rule through a number of Judges who judged Israel. Not just the way we understand judges to judge, but also in terms of leadership and government.

So here a famine strikes and Elimelech does something that, well, sure, saves his skin in the short term, but ultimately ends in disaster. He leaves the Promised Land; he leaves the Land flowing with milk and honey because in the short term there is not enough food to go around – there is a famine in the land. And to be sure, for people who were living in those days – hand to mouth subsistence farming situations – when there is a famine in your own land, well, sometimes you had to get up and go to another land to where there was enough food to eat and enough water to drink. The problem here is that Elimelech, whose name literally means ‘my God is king’, forsakes his King; he forsakes the promises of God, the blessings of God in the Promised Land because on the surface of things there is a famine.

Now, it’s the easiest thing in the world for any of us to do – we put our trust in God through Jesus, His Son. “Yea, I believe in God. He is a good God. I believe God wants to bless me. Yes, I believe God is all powerful. Yes, I believe God is powerful enough to deal with every problem and situation in my life.” We even sing songs about those things at church; we listen to sermons about them, but then … at the first sign of trouble we put our tail between our legs and we run away!

It’s what Elimelech did. He took his wife with him, Naomi and his two sons, Marlon and Chilion to Moab. Now the sons end up, after their father’s death, marrying Moabite women, Orpah and Ruth respectively. Never mind that the Moabites are the sworn enemies of Israel; never mind that God said to His people, “Don’t take foreign wives.” So what happens – surprise, surprise – Elimelech and his two sons die, leaving Naomi, Elimelech’s widow and her two daughters-in-law, Orpah and Ruth, stranded. And for Naomi, she was a woman alone in a foreign, hostile land; in a land where she didn’t belong.

Now later on in this programme and over the coming weeks in this series, we are going to see what happens to these women. We are going to see what decisions they make and how God deals with them, in particular how two of them journey back, right into the middle of God’s blessing. Remember, God is a God who forgives and who blesses – He just does.

But right now, let’s focus on the mess they’re in. And the reason they are in this mess is that the head of this household, Elimelech, turned his back on God. Can I tell you, that’s something that many, many of us are familiar with. So many people start off believing in God and His promises, following Him and then in the middle of some adversity or dilemma, they turn aside; they run away; they forsake the promises of God and try and go it alone.

Precisely where God found me! Again, almost two decades ago – I had once believed; I’d once worshipped Him but through the pressures of life and my own stupidity and arrogance, I decided somewhere along the line – like Elimelech – to take matters into my own hands. And what a mess that turned out to be; what a mess!!

Now, none of this was Naomi’s fault, or Orpah’s fault, or Ruth’s fault – they were women and in that time and in that place, in that culture, they did what the head of their household told them to do. But here they were, women – alone and widowed. Women couldn’t own property, they had no legal standing. They were in a mess – a big one. So what happens next? What does God do?

Back to the Promised Land

So there’s Naomi, widowed and destitute in the land of Moab, with two Moabite daughters-in-law – Orpah and Ruth. It was a difficult situation – the Moabites and the Israelites were sworn enemies. Here we had a cross cultural marriage situation, with more than its usual tensions and now the husbands were all gone. What should Naomi do? Should she stay there or go back to her home town, Bethlehem in Judah, from which she had fled with her husband all those years before, because of the famine?

What should Orpah and Ruth do? They were Moabites – should their allegiance rest with the family of their late husbands or should they again become Moabites? Should they go to Bethlehem in a foreign land, with Naomi, their mother-in-law or remain here? Should they continue to worship the God of Israel or should they go back to worship the gods of the Moabites?

These are the questions that confronted them and it’s pretty much a life and death situation. Women without men to provide for them and to protect them were likely to starve to death – it was as simple as that. And the decisions weren’t clear cut. There were pros and cons on each side for all of them.

Well, let’s pick up the story and see how it began to unfold after Elimelech and his sons, the husbands of Ruth and Orpah, had all died. We are reading now from Ruth chapter 1, beginning at verse six:

Then Naomi started to return with her daughters-in-law from the country of Moab, for she had heard in the country of Moab that the LORD had considered his people and given them food. So she set out from the place where she had been living, she and her two daughters-in-law, and they went on their way back to the land of Judah.

But Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, “Go back each of you to your mother’s house. May the LORD deal kindly with you, as you have dealt with the dead and with me.

The LORD grant that you may find security, each of you in the house of your husband.” Then she kissed them, and they wept aloud. They said to her, “No, we will return with you to your people.”

But Naomi said, “Turn back, my daughters, why will you come with me? Do I still have sons in my womb that they may become your husbands? Turn back, my daughters, go your way, for I am too old to have a husband. Even if I thought there was hope for me, even if I should have a husband tonight and bear sons, would you then wait until they were grown? Would you then refrain from marrying? No, my daughters, it has been far more bitter for me than for you, because the hand of the LORD has turned against me.

See, the tension in this story. Things were by no means clear cut, well, at least not for the daughters-in-law, the Moabite women, Orpah and Ruth. But Naomi had made a decision, a pretty pragmatic one, I suspect, to go back to Bethlehem. God had blessed His people, Israel. There was again food in her homeland and her hometown and of course, her wider family was still there. That offered some protection and provision for her. Families looked after one another in that way. They were responsible to provide for the widows amongst them.

Naomi made the right choice to return to her homeland, her family and whether she realised it or not, to the promises of blessing from God in the Promised Land. This land of Israel, after all, was THE Promised Land; the land that God had promised to Abraham and to Isaac and to Jacob all those centuries before. And as we will see over the coming programmes, that was absolutely the best decision she could have made.

Can I tell you something? When my life was in a mess, almost twenty years ago now, it was in a mess because I had turned away from the promises and the blessings of God. And when you are sitting there in your dung heap – in your disaster which is by and large of your own making – you kind of look around and wonder, ‘Well, what should I do? Should I pick up the pieces here? Should I try and rebuild my tower of Babel or should I turn back and go back to where I belong, in the promised land of God?’

For me, that ‘turning back’ was a bit scary at first. What will God say? What will God do? Will there be blessing or punishment at the other end of this if I turn back to Him? I had never heard of Naomi or Ruth or Orpah back then, but I did a “Naomi”. I went back to the Promised Land, back under the covering of God. And as I think of it, maybe I was more of a “Ruth” than a “Naomi”. At least Naomi was an Israelite, one of God’s chosen people by birth. Me, I was more a Moabite, more an enemy of God and God’s people.

Can I tell you something? I hated Christians. I absolutely hated Christians, so to that extent, I was very much a Moabite. It didn’t feel natural to turn back to God and isn’t that what Naomi says to the girls? “Look, go back to your own families. Go back, worship your own gods. Go back to where you belong.” That was good, worldly advice. And as we will see, one of the daughters-in-law decided to stay and the other decided to go.

But for now let’s just immerse ourselves in this reality: the last thing that any of them were expecting was God’s blessing because they were in a mess. They were making decisions in difficult physical circumstances and difficult emotional circumstances. Just as you and I have to make such decisions when we are under duress; when we are hard pressed by difficult circumstances. Should I stay here and worship my own gods or should I turn back to the one true God? Should I throw my lot in with those who are against God, albeit that I know them better, or with those who are for God, headed off to some promised land?

You see, eventually, that’s a dilemma that confronts each one of us.

Ruth Takes a Stand

You know, sometimes in life we have to take a stand and often it happens when we come to a fork in the road of our lives. ‘Will I go this way or will I go that way. Everyone wants me to go left – the world is telling me, “Go left”, but deep in my heart I know that’s the wrong way. I need to take a stand here – I need to go the right way.’ Yes, sometimes in life we need to take a stand and we need to make some hard decisions.

That’s exactly what happened to Ruth in these difficult times. Let’s take a look. I’m reading here from the Book of Ruth in the Old Testament, chapter 1, beginning at verse 8:

Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, “Go back each of you to your mother’s house. May the LORD deal kindly with you, as you have dealt with the dead and with me. The LORD grant that you may find security, each of you in the house of your husband.” Then she kissed them, and they wept aloud. They said to her, “No, we will return with you to your people.”

Then they wept aloud again. Orpah kissed her mother-in-law, but Ruth … Ruth clung to her. So she said, “See, your sister-in-law has gone back to her people and to her gods; return after your sister-in-law.”

But Ruth said, “Do not press me to leave you or to turn back from following you! Where you go, I will go; where you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people and your God my God. Where you die, I will die — there will I be buried. May the LORD do thus and so to me, and more as well, if even death parts me from you!” When Naomi saw that she was determined to go with her, she said no more to her.”

High drama indeed! Naomi was right, from a human perspective, the two younger women were far better off with their Moabite families, worshipping the Moabite gods in the safety of their own country and their own family and their own kinsmen. What lay ahead, back amongst the Israelites for these two Moabite women, was nothing but danger and persecution; rejection. They would always be outcasts, they would always be foreigners, they would always be looked down upon by the Israelites.

But here, right here, Ruth took a stand. Who knows what she was thinking; who knows what she was feeling. But she takes a stand; she makes a tough decision to go with her mother-in-law to a place she has never been to; to a country she has only heard about; to be amongst the people who would at best, look down their noses at her. Something in her heart moved her deeply and ultimately, it was her love and her respect for her mother-in-law that made her so determined.

Don’t press me to leave you or to turn back from following you. Where you go, I’ll go; where you lodge, I’ll lodge. Your people will be my people, your God will be my God. Where you die, I will die – there I will be buried.

Words of love and friendship and loyalty! Ruth knew this journey back home would be difficult for this older woman, Naomi, her mother-in-law, all on her own. Ruth knew she would need a friend on the journey and she throws herself at Naomi and says, in effect, “I don’t care what you say, I’m coming with you. I’ll be your friend, I’ll be your family, so long as we breathe.”

Names were important in Hebrew culture. God often speaks to us, not only through what some of the characters in the Bible do and say, but through their names and the name “Ruth” literally means “friendship”. That’s who Ruth was and based on whom she is and her love for Naomi, she takes a stand; she goes on this uncertain, dangerous journey with her mother-in-law.

In the context of these two nations, two peoples – the Moabites (Ruth) and the Israelites (Naomi) who were sworn enemies, this was a risky and a courageous stand. “Your people will be my people and your God, my God.” In one fell swoop, Ruth cuts her ties with her homeland, her family, her culture, her people and swears allegiance to Naomi and to Israel and perhaps, most importantly, to the God of Israel – the one true, living God.

Earlier we chatted about the fact that taking tough decisions under pressure isn’t always easy. Perhaps it made sense for Naomi to return to her home town, her family, her extended support network, but Ruth? Uh uh! No way! She is a Moabite; an enemy of God’s people and that to a great extent, is how I felt when I was in a mess and had to make a tough decision. That’s how I felt when it came time for me to take a stand – either for Jesus or against Him.

I didn’t know about Ruth back then but later when I first heard of her story it kind of struck me that her story, for many of us, is our story – enemies of God – and when we are confronted by this Jesus – as we all are one way or another, at some point in our lives – man, going and worshipping Him, throwing our lot in with Jesus, can be a very tough choice. And I know that beyond any shadow of any doubt, that of all the people listening to this message, this week right around the world, there are some, in fact there are many, in that place right at this moment.

Perhaps you once believed and then you went your own way and now through God’s Word, you hear God calling you back. Perhaps you live in a place where putting your faith in this Jesus is about as dangerous as being a Moabite on a journey to Israel in Ruth’s day. Perhaps you have known all along that Jesus is the Son of the one true, living God and maybe He is calling you and you have been trying to ignore Him. Perhaps you have been warming a pew in a church for a good many years, but when it comes right down to it, you have never really thrown your lot it with Jesus, living a lukewarm, sham of a faith.

Come on! Let’s all call a spade a spade, given where we are in our own lives. Well today, right this moment, I believe God is calling a few people to this same place – to make this same difficult stand that Ruth made when she said to Naomi, “Your God will be my God. Your people will be my people.” And if something … if something is holding you back, then I encourage you to stick with us over these coming weeks on the programme because so far the one person we haven’t spoken about yet is God Himself.

He is the great unseen player in all of this. And friend, what we are going to be discovering is how He blessed Ruth for the stand that she took that day. If I could take you back a couple of decades to where my life was when I finally woke up to my senses; when I finally gave my life to Jesus, can I tell you, the last; the very last thing that I expected was God to bless me. I really thought that the most appropriate thing for God to do would be to punish me. But it wasn’t till later that I discovered and I learned that Jesus was punished for my sin. Jesus died on that cross for my sin. Jesus died so that the door could be open for me to come back to God – to make that decision without fear, without uncertainty and discover the love and the blessing that God has in His heart for me.

Friend, if you have been struggling to finally make this decision; if you have been struggling to give your life to Jesus, can I tell you something? I believe God is calling you today, to take this stand, to say with Ruth, “Your God will be my God.”

It’s a decision I have never regretted. It’s a decision I took almost two decades ago and I can honestly say, not once on my walk since then – as difficult, let me say, as it has been sometimes – not once have I regretted throwing my lot in with Jesus.

When we find ourselves in what can best be described as a rotten place in life, the last thing we tend to expect is the mighty hand of God – the favour of God, the blessing of God. Not sure why that is – but that’s how it goes. And so as we stumble through the darkness – we often end up missing the blessings that God put there right under our nose.

The First Step into Blessing

Now you may remember last week we headed off into a journey of the blessings of God, with a woman called Ruth, back in the Old Testament. She is a Moabite who marries an Israelite but then her husband dies so she decides to follow her mother-in-law to Israel. Now, all that sounds pretty mundane until we realise that Moabites and Israelites back then, were sworn enemies. And Ruth was embarking on a journey with her mother-in-law, Naomi, whom she loved dearly, to a hostile land, an unknown land, without any prospect of a husband (remember, she is a Moabite) and therefore, no security and safety and income. That’s just how things were back then.

But it turns out that her decision to follow Naomi to the Promised Land was going to be a decision with huge ramifications. She was journeying back into the blessings of God, whether she realised it or not. And here’s the thing: sometimes we are kind of wondering, ‘Where is life headed?’ And things are looking risky and scary, but if we give our lives to God, as Ruth did, then let me tell you He has a journey ahead and it’s a journey back into His mighty blessings.

Let me share it with you – reading now from the Book of Ruth in the Old Testament, about Ruth and Naomi’s return to the Promised Land. We are starting here at Ruth chapter 1, verse 22:

So Naomi returned together with Ruth the Moabite, her daughter-in-law, who came back with her from the country of Moab. They came to Bethlehem at the beginning of the barley harvest. Now Naomi had a kinsman on her husband’s side, a prominent rich man, of the family of Elimelech, whose name was Boaz. And Ruth the Moabite said to Naomi, “Let me go to the field and glean among the ears of grain, behind someone in whose sight I may find favor.” She said to her, “Go, my daughter.”

So she went. She came and gleaned in the field behind the reapers. As it happened, she came to the part of the field belonging to Boaz, who was of the family of Elimelech. Just then Boaz came from Bethlehem. He said to the reapers, “The LORD be with you.” They answered, “The LORD bless you.”

Then Boaz said to his servant who was in charge of the reapers, “To whom does this young woman belong?” The servant who was in charge of the reapers answered, “She is the Moabite who came back with Naomi from the land of Moab.

She said, ‘Please, let me glean and gather among the sheaves behind the reapers.’ So she came, and she has been on her feet from early this morning until now, without resting even for a moment.

So as we saw last week, surprise, surprise, Ruth and Naomi get back to Bethlehem just when the harvest is happening. That’s good! Harvest is the time when there’s food around; harvest is the time when you can store up some grain to keep you going until the next harvest. Remember, back in those days, women on their own were destitute – they had no rights, it was very difficult to earn a living wage and they couldn’t own land. They needed husbands and neither Ruth nor Naomi had one.

But listen to this: there’s this guy called Boaz; a relative of Naomi’s, on her late husband’s side. He is wealthy and well regarded and Ruth hears about him. What does she do? Does she stay on the couch channel surfing, expecting God to bless her? No, she heads into the field, Boaz’s field as it turns out, to do some gleaning.

Now this is what gleaning is: God’s law to His people included a provision for allowing the poor and the needy to pick up the leftovers from the harvest. They would walk along behind the labourers (the reapers) and pick up what was left over. Have a listen to this: Leviticus chapter 23, verse 22:

When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap to the very edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest. You shall leave them for the poor and for the alien. I am the Lord your God.

See, this was God’s law to provide for the poor. So Ruth went and laboured in the field as one of the poor. She took a step … a step of getting off her backside and doing some hard work … a step toward God’s blessing. Why? Well, we have looked at it in verse 2, of chapter 2:

Ruth the Moabite woman said to Naomi, “Let me go to the field and glean amongst the ears of the grain behind someone in whose sight I might find favour.

See, she went in order to put herself into the proximity of God’s blessing, of God’s favour, to give God the opportunity to bless her. It wasn’t going to happen if she sat around on the couch waiting. She had to step out – are we hearing this? – she had to step out into the blessing of God.

See God doesn’t bless couch potatoes so much. He doesn’t bless the lazy. Sure, we all have different capabilities and limitations – God understands that, but within our capabilities and limitations, He expects us to step out. And surprise, surprise, what happens?

She came to the part of the field belonging to Boaz, who was of the family of Elimelech. Just then, Boaz came from Bethlehem

Just then?! Was this a coincidence? No, this was God’s timing. God’s blessing was on the way – on a journey from Bethlehem to the field where Ruth had chosen hard work.

Hello! Do we see what’s going on here? And it’s at this point that her goodness and her honour and her decency shines forth. Firstly, Boaz has already heard about her loyalty to his relative Naomi, Ruth’s mother-in-law. He understands; he appreciates the courage it took for a Moabite woman to come to the land of Israel. He is impressed. And secondly, his servant tells him, “She came and she has been on her feet from early this morning until now, without resting even for a moment.”

So, not only is she loyal, but she is diligent. Not only is she courageous in the big decisions of life, she is hard working in the mundane things of life. Do you see the two things that Ruth has done: firstly, she is a good, decent, honest, hard working woman and secondly, when the chips are stacked against her, she goes and humbles herself? She says, “Yes, I am poor; I am destitute, so I will humble myself to go and glean in the field, from dawn until dusk. Maybe I’ll find favour in someone’s sight.” And God honours that. He brings Boaz along, just at the right time, to notice her.

Can I tell you the number of times I have been between a rock and a hard place and afraid – and fear immobilises me. Then … then I spend some time with God and He causes me to look around – to survey the landscape of my life or my ministry or whatever it is, and he points me to a field. “Go and work over there.” Or He points me to a blessing that I hadn’t really ever noticed before, that I would never have noticed unless I had been led into this difficult place and He says, “Go Berni, go and labour over there.” And time and time again, it’s out there doing the things that God has called me to do; that someone else notices the need, or pulls alongside and the blessing of God chases me down.

Just at the right time – just like Ruth. It’s something our God will do time and time again. He calls us into a journey towards His blessing. The question is: will we get off our backsides and go?

The Mighty Favour of God

Now what we just saw was the decision to come to God’s Land, God’s people and then set about stepping out into the blessing of God was really starting to pay off. Just at the right time Boaz shows up and he notices Ruth. He remembers her loyalty to his relative, Naomi. He see how hard Ruth has been working – picking up the gleanings in the field from dawn until now – the leftovers, that according to God’s law, were to be left there for the poor and the needy to pick up.

Now, think about it: they return to this Promised Land when, just at the time of the harvest, they can get the blessing of food; Boaz shows up – when? Just at the right time to notice Ruth. Exactly what she intended as she walked ahead; stepped out into the field of God’s blessing. And then … then the mighty favour of God begins to fall on her life. Let’s pick up the story in the Book of Ruth, chapter 2, verse 8:

Then Boaz said to Ruth, “Now listen, my daughter, do not go to glean in another field or leave this one, but keep close to my young women. Keep your eyes on the field that is being reaped, and follow behind them. I have ordered the young men not to bother you. If you get thirsty, go to the vessels and drink from what the young men have drawn.

Then she fell prostrate, with her face to the ground, and said to him, “Why have I found favour in your sight, that you should take notice of me, when I am a foreigner?” But Boaz answered her, “All that you have done for your mother-in-law since the death of your husband has been fully told me, and how you left your father and mother and your native land and came to a people that you did not know before. May the LORD reward you for your deeds, and may you have a full reward from the LORD, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have come for refuge!”

Then she said, “May I continue to find favour in your sight, my lord, for you have comforted me and spoken kindly to your servant, even though I am not one of your servants.”

Now, all that may seem a little bit too much to thee and me – she falls down at his feet and all that stuff, but remember, she is a widow. In those days, widows were destitute. She’s a Moabite, an enemy of Israel in this foreign, what must have seemed to her, dangerous land. She’s hard up against it – she’s at the end of her rope. Her very life dangles in the balance because the lack of a husband; the lack of protection and provision that only comes through a husband, back in that time and place.

And now, as we began to see earlier, Boaz tells her what he knows of her: her faithfulness to his widowed relative, Naomi; her incredible courage in coming to this land of Israel; the decision to come under the wings of the Lord, the God of Israel for protection. What Boaz is saying is. “You have chosen well, you are a good person,” and he blesses her. “May the Lord reward you for your deeds and may you have a full reward from the Lord, the God of Israel, unDer whose wings you have come for refuge.”

Now, was Ruth perfect? No! No doubt she made some mistakes along the way but she had made some good choices – loyalty, courage, hard work. And this had been noticed. Can I tell you something? You and I, we are not perfect either and sometimes we make bad choices that gradually work us into such a terrible place – bad choices that ruin our lives.

I remember for much of the first thirty six years of my life, I made a lot of bad choices and eventually, they put me in a place where I was at the end of my rope too. The circumstances, they were different to Ruth’s, but no matter, the result was the same. It was in that dark place that Jesus came and found me and as I began to discover His love, He began to teach me to make good choices. Over time – and it did take time – those good choices began to bear fruit. My life began to turn around. Good choices, good fruit. Not rocket science, is it?

And as we make good choices … choices of loyalty and sacrifice and diligence and hard work just as Ruth did, as we embark on what sometimes feels like the difficult journey towards God’s blessings, people begin to notice. They notice that God is at work in our lives. They can see the fruit starting to grow and then … then the mighty blessing of God falls on our lives. When things aren’t going well, we are tempted – seriously tempted, let me say – to make bad decisions; to behave badly. Think about it: when someone turns against us, what do we want to do? We want to retaliate, get revenge. We want to behave badly, don’t we?

Ruth, when her husband died, could have curled up in the foetal position and let out a primeval scream and become all self absorbed and self pitying and retreated into her shell. She didn’t! She honoured Naomi, her mother-in-law. She took a courageous decision to take on the God of Israel as her God and to journey to a foreign land to work hard. People noticed and the mighty blessing of God began to fall on her life. In fact, there’s a lot more blessing to come and we are going to look at that over the coming weeks on the programme – the mighty blessing of God.

Many centuries later the Apostle Paul wrote this verse in the New Testament – it’s a verse that I come back to, again and again in my life because it is such a powerful and important lesson from God. Listen to this – it’s Galatians chapter 6, verse 9:

So let us not grow weary in doing what is right, for we will reap at harvest time if we do not give up.

Friend, God means for us to journey into His blessing. Why? Is He a meanie? Does He want to make it hard work for us so that we have to work for a reward? No, that’s not it. It’s because of His great love, the love of His Father’s heart, that He wants us to experience His blessing in our lives by walking into … growing into the blessing. When you think about it, it’s exactly what any parent wants for their child. Sure, to bless them, but to see them grow and mature into that blessing so that the blessing becomes a rich and powerful influence in their lives.

That’s what God is like and as we are going to see shortly, there was yet more blessing to come for Ruth, just … just as there is so much more blessing to come for you and for me.

Hidden Blessings

Now don’t you wish some days you kind of knew what God was up to? I mean, you look around and things aren’t going quite the way they are supposed to be going. At least, they are not going the way you or I planned them to go. “I stepped out in faith, I think I have been honouring God, I have been working hard, I have been doing my best and now … now all of a sudden things have turned to custard. It’s all gone off the rails and it hurts.”

Anyone who believes in Jesus, anyone who has been walking along their life’s journey for any length of time, knows this feeling. ‘God, it just doesn’t make sense. It’s not working.’ And each and every time we are in that place, it’s as though we have forgotten the lessons we learnt the last time we were in this place. Or am I the only one who is a bit thick when it comes to remembering this Scripture? Isaiah 55, verse 8:

“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways,” says the Lord. “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than yours.”

I must confess, I am slow to learn this lesson. Each time things aren’t working out, my first natural reaction is ‘What’s wrong, what have I done wrong? Didn’t I hear God right the first time?’ When all along, God is up to something and more often than not, He is working in the background, cooking up a hidden blessing that I could never have dreamed up myself.

And it’s that idea of God’s hidden blessing that we are going to chat about right now on the programme together because when things aren’t going quite the way we expect them to be going, the thing we lose sight of so often is that God is a God who wants to bless us.

And it’s in the middle of the things that are going on; the things that don’t quite make sense, that God is already at work, often behind the scenes, often in ways that we can’t see and even if we could see, they wouldn’t make sense. He is at work blessing us with a harvest that, if we don’t grow tired of hanging in there, a harvest that we will reap. When? At harvest time, of course.

Earlier we saw how Ruth was noticed by Boaz, who happened along just at the right time mind you, and Boaz blessed her. He spoke his blessings upon her. She was able to glean the leftovers of the harvest to provide food for herself and her mother-in-law. That’s what we saw – God’s blessing through Boaz. But there was something that she didn’t see.

As she was working out there in the hot sun in the field, picking up the gleanings; the leftovers of the harvest, gathering the grain – hard work – it would have been easy for her to be grumbling to herself, “Oh, I come back here, I follow Naomi, I serve her, I look after her, I accept her people, I even … I even accept her God as my God; this God of Israel. Look at me! Here I am slaving away in the field; here I am working like a pauper, relying on charity, picking up leftovers; the scraps of the harvest! Puw, some God! Some Promised Land!” Have you ever found yourself grumbling like that?

Well, she perhaps could have been thinking to herself, “I’d better work faster. If only I can get over there and pick up some grain, we won’t starve. Quick, there’s something, I have to get over before that old man over there picks it up!” Running around in ever decreasing circles and fear and panic.

Does that sound familiar? It’s what we often do when we are afraid. We either grumble or we panic or we do both when things aren’t working out the way they should be. And God seems to have gone AWOL and left us destitute. Well, the Bible record in the Book of Ruth doesn’t really tell us any of that. And I suspect with the focus and the drive that Ruth displayed thus far, those weren’t the things that she was thinking. Well, we do know what God was thinking because in the background; in the places Ruth couldn’t see, God was cooking up a hidden blessing for her.

So here we are, she has been blessed by Boaz, the rich relative and she goes back out into the field to pick up the leftover grain lying on the ground. Well, this is what happens outside of Ruth’s earshot. Ruth chapter 2, beginning at verse 15:

When she got up to glean, Boaz instructed his young men, “Let her glean even among the standing sheaves, and do not reproach her. You must also pull out some handfuls for her from the bundles, and leave them for her to 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.

Do you see what’s going on here? Behind the scenes, God is at work. He is at work, moving through Boaz, the man with the wealth and the power to make it easier for Ruth. You see, the deal with poor people was that they were only allowed to go along behind the land-owner’s labourers and pick up what was left over. The problem was that was often lean picking so, Boaz tells his labourers, “Look, let Ruth come in with you and get the grain from the sheaves when they are still standing. I know that is not the usual thing but don’t reproach her. And then what I want you to do: pull out some handfuls from the bundles that you have gathered and drop them on the ground to make it easier for her.”

How often does God do that? We are in a place where we don’t want to be and even there, in that place, He finds a way to bless us. And you know what I’ve found? If I am busy grumbling and complaining under my breath, I tend to miss these little blessings along the way. Many is the time I have been praying where I am in a difficult spot and the Holy Spirit has reminded me of the little blessings; the small gentle encouragements and provisions He has provided for me along the way.

And the more I have learned to travel through difficult places, the more I have discovered the joy of finding God in those places – giving me a gentle nudge, meeting this need or meeting that need. It’s such a beautiful thing! And then I realise: while I was wondering, “Where has God gone?” All along He was busy in the background, organising a special little blessing to encourage me along the way, to provide for me and my family.

And after a good many years of working in a faith-based ministry, when there have been times when there hasn’t been enough money to go around, to draw a wage and the bills still kept rolling in, I have discovered that no matter how hard it gets, no matter how bleak it gets, no matter how tough it looks, He never leaves us or forsakes. And time and time again, these hidden blessings – they kind of pop up out of nowhere, why, because on this journey, no matter how dark or stormy the day, it doesn’t change the fact that God is a God of blessing.

And when we read this story of Ruth and Boaz, it’s not just their story, it’s God’s story and God is telling us exactly that, “I am the God who wants to bless you!”

Over the last few weeks, we’ve been sharing the story of Ruth’s journey in the Old Testament, towards the blessing of God. And today, we’re going to see that she embarks on a risky part of that journey – one that could well bring her undone. Seems that that’s always part of the faith journey isn’t it – risk!

A Risky Move

Now, you may recall that over the last couple of weeks, we have been talking about this woman, Ruth, a Moabite woman who marries an Israelite. We read all about it in the Old Testament Book of Ruth. It all comes about because there is a famine in the Land of Israel, so one family, headed by a man, Elimelech, with His wife Naomi and their two sons, flees to the land of Moab. There Elimelech and his sons die, leaving Naomi with her two daughters-in-law, Ruth and Orpah, all as widows.

As things turn out, Naomi and one of those young women return to Bethlehem, in Israel because that’s where Naomi’s family is – that’s where her extended support network is. But their problem is quite simply that, as widows – one young, one old – they were destitute. In those days, without a husband, a woman had no way to provide for herself.

And the interesting thing is; the thing that struck me about both Ruth and her mother-in-law Naomi, as much as it hurt, as much as they felt the anguish of their predicament, they just didn’t sit there and wallow in their grief and their misery. Instead, they stepped out, took some risks and went on a journey towards God’s blessing. That’s the key; that’s the thing we learn from them and as they travel along that road, we discover a few things about God too.

Today we are going to look as the mind-set of taking risks along this journey into God’s blessing because stepping out, risking it all is, I think, part of God’s plan. Ruth’s story is a powerful one and we are picking it up today at the beginning of chapter 3 of the Book of Ruth. There’s this relative of Naomi’s, a man called Boaz and he is a wealthy land owner and because young Ruth was prepared to go and glean some of the leftovers in one of his fields during the harvest time, she has already run into him once and he warmed to her. He blessed her and she was shocked by the blessing. Have a listen as we turn back to Ruth chapter 2, beginning at verse 10:

Then she fell prostrate, with her face to the ground, and she said to Boaz, “Why have I found favour in your sight, that you should take notice of me, when I am a foreigner?” But Boaz answered her, “All that you have done for your mother-in-law since the death of your husband has been fully told to me, and how you left your father and mother and your native land and came to a people that you did not know before. May the LORD reward you for your deeds, and may you have a full reward from the LORD, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have come for refuge!

See, Ruth was loyal to her older mother-in-law, journeying to a foreign land with her. She was diligent, she was hardworking, not too proud to pick up the leftovers of the harvest with the other poor people. So by God’s grace, through His doing, she came across Boaz but the story doesn’t end there. Have a listen as we look at what Naomi and Ruth do next. I’m reading here from Ruth chapter 3, beginning at verse 1:

Naomi her mother-in-law said to her, “My daughter, I need to seek some security for you, so that it may be well with you. Now here is our kinsman Boaz, with whose young women you have been working. See, he is winnowing barley tonight at the threshing floor.

Now wash and anoint yourself, and put on your best clothes and go down to the threshing floor; but do not make yourself known to the man until he has finished eating and drinking. When he lies down, observe the place where he lies; then, go and uncover his feet and lie down; and he will tell you what to do.” She said to her, “All that you tell me I will do.”

Now, let me tell you, this was risky; this was very risky. In our time, in our culture, we may not fully understand what’s going on here. “Go and lie down at his feet.” What’s that all about? It seems just a little inappropriate doesn’t it? After all, Boaz is a wealthy land owner; Ruth is young and pretty – as she probably was – was a poor widow. They weren’t married, so whatever we may think of the morals – I mean, every indication is they had no physical intimacy here – just the boldness of initiating this physical proximity which should only ever occur between husband and wife. The bottom line of all this is that Ruth is being asked to do something right out there on the very edge – this is very risky.

She has been asked to lay it all on the line – to step out in a place that would have been quite frightening – to do something that, given the morals and customs of the day, would have been very uncomfortable for her and to risk her reputation and future blessing from Boaz by executing her mother-in-law Naomi’s plans. Now, Naomi seems to have some wisdom from God here – her motivations are right, she’s trying to get security happening for her young daughter-in-law. By doing this, she is asking Ruth effectively, to propose to Boaz. That’s what this means; that is what this is all about.

Now, I’m not going to get hung up on the moral rights and wrongs of all of this – that’s not the point. The point is that Naomi believed that God had put Boaz there for a reason and that that reason was to bless Ruth with long term security, which in turn would bless Naomi. They were prepared to take risks in order to step out into God’s blessing.

Now this is a hard call; it’s by no means cut and dried. But you know, I wonder how often we find ourselves in the proximity of God’s blessing and what’s required is the courage to step out and apparently, take a risk. And what we do instead is we recoil and we miss out on the blessing that God had planned for us in the first place.

Now, I don’t know about you, I often struggle with this. Is it time for me to step out and do something or should I sit and wait for God to do something? On the one hand, I don’t want to be running around doing all this stuff when God has it all under control. That’s how we end up running ahead of Him or working against Him. Half the time we think we have to do it, which is a sign of a lack of faith. But, you know, other times – often times in fact – He’s prepared the blessing; it’s laid out ready to go. But you and I need to step out into it and go and do something … something scary, risky often, to lay hold of that blessing.

And the only way I have been able to figure out how to know which one is which, is to make sure I spend some time every day, praying and reading God’s Word and listening and discerning His will. It seems as time has gone on, that’s something I’m getting better at, although, you know, I don’t think we are ever meant to reach perfection in this area. It’s a faith thing – a part of growing in our relationship with Jesus and God knows our heart. He always honours a good heart. This one thing is for certain though: there are many times when we need to step out and trust Him in order to lay hold of His blessing.

A Gutsy Move

Now, I’m the last person on the planet who is going to suggest to you that you should take unwarranted risks. That would be crazy. Imagine investing your life savings in stock that you don’t know anything about because you heard a friend say that they thought it was going up. Imagine driving through flood waters when the water is up over the bonnet or the hood of the car. Imagine letting yourself be pushed over Niagara Falls in a barrel.

People do some crazy things in life. They take unwarranted, badly calculated risks and whilst sometimes they win, many times they don’t. People lose their savings, even their lives through unwarranted risk. But you know something – sometimes God calls us to take what appear to be risks.

And right now I’d like to kind of explore with you the difference between a risk and a step of faith, because whilst a step of faith may appear risky, actually it’s not a risk at all. Because if it is a part of God’s plan, even though His plan may be that we don’t win the prize we thought we thought we might be entitled to, we are on God’s journey, with our life in His hands – it’s not a risk at all.

It’s just that stepping out in faith is not something we do naturally. It’s something our flesh recoils from. And as we joint Ruth and Naomi on their journey again today, we are going to take another look at this huge risk, massive risk that Ruth took on her journey toward the blessings of God.

But now things get really hairy. As we saw earlier, Naomi cooks up this risky plan for Ruth to go and sleep at Boaz’s feet. Very out there in the context of the culture, let me tell you. This was risky, very risky! In our time and our culture, we may not fully understand what is going on here. “Go and lie down at his feet.” What’s it all about? It seems a little inappropriate, after all, Boaz is wealthy, Ruth is, okay, young and pretty but she was a poor widow – they aren’t married.

This was out there on the edge and from a human perspective; it was anybody’s guess how it would turn out. It was very forward for this poor, young woman to do something like this. And it could have ended in disaster. If God wasn’t in Naomi’s crazy plan, Ruth was sunk. So let’s take a look and see how it turns out. Ruth chapter 3, beginning at verse 6:

So she went down to the threshing floor and did just as her mother-in-law had instructed her. When Boaz had eaten and drunk, and he was in a contented mood, he went to lie down at the end of the heap of grain. Then she came stealthily and uncovered his feet, and lay down. 

At midnight the man was startled, and turned over, and there, lying at his feet, was a woman! He said, “Who are you?” And she answered, “I am Ruth, your servant; spread your cloak over your servant, for you are next-of-kin.” He said, “May you be blessed by the LORD, my daughter; this last instance of your loyalty is better than the first; you have not gone after young men, whether poor or rich.

And now, my daughter, do not be afraid, I will do for you all that you ask, for all the assembly of my people know that you are a worthy woman.”

I have to chuckle at this every time I read it. I try and imagine going to sleep on my own – I mean, I really enjoy my sleep – and I’m rolling over from one side to the other, around about midnight and all of a sudden I realise there is a stranger, a woman, no less, lying at my feet. Ha, I think I would jump out of my skin. I think you would be scrapping me down of the ceiling. And I would not, let me tell you, be overly impressed by this bold, this rude intrusion into my space.

Take that one step further. Back in that culture where this sort of behaviour by a young woman, amongst God’s people was completely and utterly unacceptable and you start to get some idea of the risk that Ruth was taking. Had Boaz reacted the way he should have, she was in serious trouble. But he didn’t! Why? Because God had gone ahead of Ruth and softened his heart. Instead of cursing her, he blessed. Instead of seeing her behaviour as being inappropriate, he saw it for what it was – an act of loyalty to her mother-in-law Naomi’s family. And Boaz knew … he knew Ruth had every reason to be afraid.

We know that because he said to her in verse 11:

And now my daughter, do not be afraid.

And after that something really quite odd:

Do not be afraid. I will do for you all that you ask for all the assembly of my people know that you are a worthy woman.

Hang on a minute! We didn’t hear Ruth ask for anything here. What did she ask for? Well, by behaving in this way – by going and lying at a man’s feet by night, as only a wife in that culture would have done – she was in fact, proposing to him. She was asking him to marry her. Now even today in the West, whilst some women do propose to men, ninety percent of the time, it’s the other way around. It’s really quite rare for a woman to propose to a man today. And back in that culture, a woman proposing to a man was just completely unheard of – you just didn’t do that, right?

Friend, the point of what God is teaching us here is this: when He is up to something – as He was here with Ruth and Naomi and Boaz – when He has a blessing happening for us, it often seems risky and dangerous. But if it’s from Him, nothing is going to stop that blessing from happening.

I remember I had a meeting recently with a man. I was dreading this meeting. I had to go and give him some bad news. I had no idea how things would turn out. When I walked into the meeting room and began to share the bad news with him, what I discovered was that God had already gone ahead of me, prepared his heart in a way that I didn’t expect. I could never have dreamed up his response myself and it completely blew me away. I just knew that God was in that room with me, smiling, blessing me because I’d gone to the place He had led me to, with the intention to be honest and direct and to honour Him.

As scary as that was, I rediscovered in my own experience what we have learned here from Ruth: fear often accompanies us on the journey into God’s blessing. But nothing … nothing is going undo God’s purposes and God’s plans, let me tell you, absolutely nothing!

The Promise of Blessing

Now, I don’t know if you have noticed, but God doesn’t always bless us in the way we were hoping or the way we were expecting. Have you noticed that? Earlier we saw Ruth take the bold step of going out to the field and in the evening, sneaking along beside Boaz and lying down and sleeping at his feet. Very forward! The sort of thing only a wife would do – it was in effect, a marriage proposal.

And whose idea was this bold move to take the relationship with Boaz, a potential husband, a potential provider, to the next step? Well, it was Naomi’s idea – Naomi being Ruth’s also widowed, mother-in-law. Now let’s just circle back and have another listen to what Naomi tells young Ruth to do – just to remind ourselves – at the beginning of the Book of Ruth, chapter 3, beginning at verse 1:

Naomi her mother-in-law said to her, “My daughter, I need to seek some security for you, so that it may be well with you. Now here is your kinsman Boaz, with whose young women you have been working. See, he is winnowing barley tonight at the threshing floor. 

Now wash and anoint yourself, and put on your best clothes and go to the threshing floor; but do not make yourself known to the man until he has finished eating and drinking. When he lies down, observe the place where he lies down; then, go and uncover his feet and lie down; and he will tell you what to do.” She said to her, “All that you have told me I will do.”

So, Ruth goes and does this and finds Boaz’s favour. That’s the point here. It was a big risk; a big gamble from a human perspective but God’s favour was resting on Ruth. Can I tell you; sometimes I think we miss this whole point of God’s favour. God is a God who loves us – like any Dad. He knows we are not going to be perfect and His heart is to see us grow and develop with His help, to be all that He has made us to be. And He loves us! And when we are walking in His will, His favour rests upon us, even in, let me say, especially in difficult and dark circumstances.

When Israel was in slavery to Egypt and God called Moses to go to Pharaoh and to lead His people out of Egypt into the Promised Land, this is what it says when God told them to go and ask the Egyptians for gold and silver. Exodus chapter 11, verse 3:

The Lord gave the people favour in the sight of the Egyptians.

See, that’s what God does. And we should never, never forget that – the favour of God. So the favour of God here rested on Naomi and Boaz knew exactly what her daughter-in-law Ruth, was asking him. Her bold act, as we saw earlier, was in effect, a marriage proposal – one that took such great courage. Remember what Boaz said to her:

And now my daughter, do not be afraid, I will do for you all that you ask, for all the assembly of my people know that you are a worthy woman.

See, he got it! So, at this point, Ruth’s spirit must have soared. She has been on this long, impossible journey – she stepped out time and time again. She has done some pretty scary things in order to chase down the blessings of God.

And that’s exactly what God calls us to do sometimes – walk an apparently dangerous road … an uncertain road as we journey towards His blessings. And it seems to her that she has finally arrived – she has won the prize. Yippee!! And then all of a sudden, she is almost there. This is what Boaz says to her. Ruth chapter 3, beginning at verse 12:

But … (Don’t you love it when you are almost there in a blessing and someone comes up with a ‘but’?) But now, though it is true that I am a near kinsman, there is another kinsman more closely related to you than I am. Remain this night, and in the morning, if he will act as next-of-kin for you, good; let him do it. If he is not willing to act as next-of-kin for you, then, as the LORD lives, I will act as next-of-kin for you. Lie down until the morning.

So she lay down at his feet until morning, but got up before one person could recognize another; for he said, “It must not be known that the woman came to the threshing floor.” Then he said, “Bring the cloak that you are wearing and hold it out.” So she held it, and he measured out six measures of barley, and put it on her back; then he went into the city.

She came to her mother-in-law, who said, “How did things go with you, my daughter?” Then she told her all that the man had done for her, saying, “He gave me these six measures of barley, for he said, ‘Do not go back to your mother-in-law empty-handed.’” Naomi replied, “Wait, my daughter, until you learn how this matter turns out, for the man will not rest, but will settle the matter today.”

See, Ruth is almost there and Boaz falls back on tradition. The tradition was that if a woman in the family was widowed, then within that family there was a hierarchy of responsibility for marrying her. I mean, I know it sounds a bit weird these days, that a relative of the dead man would marry his widow, but it was a very practical tradition because remember. A woman without a husband was destitute in this patriarchal society. It actually made a lot of sense.

And here, Ruth thinks she has arrived; she has won the prize – this gentle, kind, wealthy Boaz, who has blessed her and has noticed her and been kind to her. I mean, man, what a husband; this is like winning the jackpot! What a catch but … wait – he comes back to her with this huge “BUT”! She might get farmed off to another kinsman! Who could that be? What is he like? He might be rude or horrible; he might be a wife-beater.

‘Oh, goodness! I thought I was there. I thought I had God’s blessing!’ So Boaz sends her off in the morning with a stack more food – a huge blessing, and only the promise … the promise that, either someone else would marry her and if not that other man, then Boaz would marry her. Can you imagine the uncertainty with which she returned home to Naomi in the morning – the burden in her heart? Her whole future hanging in the balance! But in her great wisdom, her mother-in-law gives her this advice:

Wait, my daughter, until you learn how the matter turns out, for the man will not rest, but will settle this matter today.

God doesn’t always take us on a direct journey – He doesn’t always make it easy. Seems that at every turn on this road toward His blessing, He takes the opportunity to stretch us and to grow us and to develop our faith in Him. He wants us, not just to have His blessing kind of dropped in our laps, He wants us to grow in His blessing; to experience His blessing; to learn about His faithfulness. That’s what He is up to!

And my prayer is that, as you journey towards His blessings and you are stretched and you are tested by God, that the Holy Spirit would bring this truth to rest in your heart. That the Holy Spirit would remind you of the journey of Ruth into God’s blessing.

When we hear someone talking about God’s blessing, we immediately think to ourselves – oh, I get it. That’s about God blessing me. But actually, that’s not always it. Sometimes – shock, horror – He’s blessing someone else. And sometimes that blessing requires a sacrifice from us. And that … that right there can be the greatest blessing of all.

Blessing Overboard?

Thanks for joining me again today on the program, our last in a series that I’ve called, “A Journey Into The Blessings Of God”. Now some people I know are going to struggle with this whole idea of God blessing us. I certainly used to. I mean if you could have seen me when I first met Jesus – it’s heading on to a couple of decades now – I’d been fighting against God all my life and that had left me ragged and bleeding and hurting and it was in that place that Jesus came to set this captive free, to bind up my broken heart, to open my eyes to His truth and give me sight when I’d been so blind.

And truly can I tell you back then if I’d heard some joker on the radio in a series of messages called, “A Journey Into The Blessings Of God” I would have been asking myself, what is that guy smoking? What planet is he living on? Blessing? Blessing? Come walk in my shoes for a mile or two Buddy and then dare to tell me about blessing.

And that’s why over these past three weeks we’ve been journeying with Ruth who frankly was dealt with a lousy hand in life. She’s a Moabite married to an Israelite and pretty much a Romeo and Juliet tragedy waiting to happen and her husband dies so she follows her mother-in-law, also widowed now, to Israel which was her homeland but to Ruth it was a dangerous and hostile place.

She turns her back on the land of Moab, the gods of Moab, her own people, to follow Naomi to Israel and worship the God of Israel. And when she gets there, being destitute widows as they both were, here’s what she does and this is what we’ve been looking at week by week over the last three weeks, she steps out into the blessing of God.

She doesn’t sit around the house and mope, she gets off her backside, goes and works in the burning sun in the field picking up the leftovers of the harvest as poor people did back in those days and she does it with a specific purpose in mind. Ruth chapter 2, verse 2:

And Ruth the Moabite said to Naomi, ‘Let me go to the field and glean among the ears of grain behind someone in whose sight I may find favour’.

She decided to step out into the favour of God. To put herself out there in a place where God could bless her and bless her He did. She’s noticed by this wealthy land owner Boaz who just happens to come along at the right time, who hears about her faithfulness to his relative, Ruth’s mother in law Naomi, and starts blessing her.

And so what does Ruth do? Does she rest on her Loral’s here? I’ve got plenty of grain now from Boaz’s field, got enough to keep us going for a few weeks, time to put up my feet in front of the telly. No. She keeps heading down this path, this journey towards God’s blessing taking one bold step after another to chase down God’s blessing through Boaz to the point where she effectively proposes to him by sleeping at his feet. You can read about it yourself in the Old Testament book of Ruth chapter three.

Now this was a risky step but it gets a positive response from Boaz. Ruth chapter 3 beginning at verse 8:

At midnight the man was startled and turned over and there lying at his feet was a woman and he said, ‘Who are you?’ And she answered, ‘I’m Ruth, your servant. Spread your cloak over your servant for you are next of kin.’ And he said, ‘May you be blessed by the Lord my daughter, this last instance of your loyalty is better than the first. You have not gone after young men whether poor or rich and now my daughter do not be afraid. I will do for you all that you ask for all the assembly of my people know that you are a worthy woman. But now though it is true that I’m a mere kinsman there is another kinsman more closely related than I’.

See he wants to bless her, he actually wants to marry her but as there so often is on the road towards the blessing of God, there was yet another hurdle. Have you ever noticed that? In this case, it was some Israelite tradition about relatives marrying widows, there was a hierarchy if you will, a pecking order and Boaz was second in line to marry Ruth. Another man was first in line. Dang, so here’s what happens, have a listen, Ruth chapter 4 beginning at verse 1:

No sooner had Boaz gone to the gate and sat down there then the next of kin of whom Boaz had spoken came passing by. So Boaz said, ‘Come over friend, sit down here’ and he went over and sat down. Then Boaz took ten men of the elders of the city and said, ‘Sit down here’ so they sat down. He then said to his next of kin, ‘Naomi who has come back from the country of Moab is selling the parcelled land that belonged to our kinsmen Elimelech. So I thought I would tell you of it and say buy it in the presence of those sitting here and in the presence of the elders of my people. If you will redeem it, redeem it but if you will not tell me so that I may know for there is no one prior to you to redeem it and I come after you’.

So the man said, ‘I will redeem it’. Then Boaz said, ‘The day that you acquire the field from the hands of Naomi you are also acquiring Ruth the Moabite, the widow of the dead man to maintain the dead mans name on his inheritance’.

Now, it’s pretty clear from what Boab said to Ruth, we heard it earlier, that he’s in love with her and he wants to marry her. And it’s pretty clear from Ruth’s actions in pursuing Boaz that she wants to marry him too. What a perfect blessing that would be. Two people who love each other. Ruth, is a destitute Moabite widow, would hit the jackpot by marrying this, not only wealthy but also kind and generous man Boaz. Perfecto.

Just one problem – a hurdle. Something completely outside her control and his control, the tradition of the pecking order and he had to do the right thing. Now I’m not going to share with you how all this turns out for the moment, that’s a little bit later. Of course you can just go and open your Bible right now, the Book of Ruth, about a third of the way into the Old Testament and find it out for yourself. And the reason I just want to hold off telling you right now is that that’s exactly how things are when we’re on the journey towards God’s blessing.

See so often we hit hurdles. There are things completely outside our control. So far Ruth has been able to act, to step out, albeit it was risky sometimes on her journey into God’s blessing. But here and now was something she couldn’t control. How would things turn out? Was she anxious? Well sure she was. Read the last part of chapter 3 of the Book of Ruth. And these are the times as much as there are times when we have to act and step out in faith, these are the times when God is also stretching and growing our faith.

There are times on our journey when we have to simply have no option but to leave it in the hands of God. They’re important times, very important. Is it important for God to teach us to step out and to act in faith? Yeah, absolutely. And that is what Ruth has been doing all along but if every blessing from God relied on us doing something we could get completely the wrong impression. We’d start imagining that it’s all up to us somehow and so God blesses us sometimes with times of tension and uncertainty where we have the opportunity to leave it to Him, to trust the outcome to Him, to believe to whatever He chooses whether it’s what we were hoping for or not is the right thing, the perfect thing, the wondrous blessing of God. Friend, waiting on Him in faith is one of the most important lessons that you and I can learn.

God Makes It Happen

So as we saw before the break, here it is, it’s completely out of Ruth’s control, it’s completely out of Boaz’s control and it’s up to this other man, we don’t even find out his name, completely at his whim and his mercy. Don’t you just hate that when something that is so important is out of your control?

Okay, we know the theory at least that God is in control, that’s the theory isn’t it? All things work together for good blah, blah, blah but man when you’re in the thick of it, when everything appears to hang on a knifes edge we feel completely out of control. We can have panic attacks, we, well you know the rest because you’ve been there just like I have been there.

We imagine somehow that we’re on a journey into Gods blessing but it just doesn’t feel like it and it feels like Gods making us jump through yet another hoop. Well enough suspense, how does this whole thing turn out? Ruth chapter 4 beginning at verse 5:

Then Boaz said, ‘The day that you acquire the field from the hand of Naomi you are also acquiring Ruth, the Moabite, the widow of the dead man to maintain the dead mans name on his inheritance’. At this the next of kin said, ‘I cannot redeem it for myself without damaging my own inheritance. Take my right of redemption yourself for I cannot redeem it’.

Now this was the custom in former times in Israel concerning redeeming and exchanging. To confirm a transaction the one took off a sandal and gave it to the other, this was a manner of testing in Israel. So when the next of kin said to Boaz, ‘Acquire it for yourself’ he took off his sandal. Then Boaz said to the elders and all the people, ‘Today you are witnesses that I have acquired from the hand of Naomi all that belonged to Elimelech and all that belonged to Kilion and Mahlon. I have also acquired Ruth the Moabite, the wife of Mahlon to be my wife to maintain the dead mans name on his inheritance in order that the name of the deed may not be cut off from his kindred and from the gate of his native place. Today you are witnesses’.

Then all the people who were at the gate along with the elders said, ‘we are witnesses, may the Lord make the woman who is coming into your house like Rachel and Leah who together built up the house of Israel. May you produce children and bestow a name in Bethlehem and through the children that the Lord will give you by this young woman may your house be like the house of Perez whom Tamar bore to Judah.

Well eureka! It works out just the way Ruth and Boaz had hoped. For whatever reason taking Ruth as his wife doesn’t work for this man in the family who, according to tradition, has the first right of refusal and it seems that all are going to live happily ever after. Great blessing, great joy, there’ll be a wedding and of course children will come along. What a blessing from God they will be, we’ll look at that after the break.

But right now there’s cause for joy and celebration. Hallelelujah! But you and I know, we know through hard often painful experiences that as we’re journeying through life we sometimes, no let me say we often wish that things would turn out one way and they go completely the other way. We pray that our parents will come to know the Lord before they die and they seem not to come to a saving knowledge of Jesus. We want this relationship to be healed and restored. And we want this thing that we stepped out into in faith to succeed as it flounders.

The ending isn’t always a happy ever after ending is it? Question is, how do we handle that? Do we trot out that well used Scripture, Romans 8, verse 28?

We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to His purpose.

It can feel a bit lame when we’re hurting can’t it? Like a cop out. Oh well, I believe God for this and for that and it didn’t turn out that way, I guess I have to believe that He had something else in mind, I guess. Me? Here’s what I do. I believe God for good. I believe that God wants to bless me but I am prepared to accept that what I think is blessing and what He means by blessing aren’t always the same thing.

See God has this great and mighty plan for the world – a plan of which you and I are only a small part. It’s not always going to turn out the way we hoped from our perspective and I learned that from Apostle Paul as he goes on to write after this well known verse, Romans 8, verse 31:

What then are we going to say about things? If God is for us who can be against us? He who did not withhold His own Son but gave Him up for all of us, will He not with Him also give us everything else? It is Christ Jesus who died, yes who was raised who is at the right hand of God who intercedes for us. Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword? No! In all things we are more than conquerors through Him who loves us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life nor angels nor rulers nor things present nor things to come nor powers nor height nor death nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Don’t you love that? Paul’s saying, look I don’t care what the world throws at me and remember in Paul’s case it threw rather a lot. Hardship, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, perils, sword, I don’t care because God loves me and nothing can separate me from that love. No circumstance, no unfulfilled hope or dream because in Christ, this Jesus who died for me and who rose again, I am more than a conqueror.

Can I tell you something friend? It’s only in the difficult times that we learn the truth of this, that having complete confidence in the power and the love of God through Jesus Christ is the place of true security. If we go looking for security in our circumstances, in things we are going to be sadly, sadly disappointed in life. But if in the face of hardship, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril or sword we boldly put our trust in God then that, that right there is the place of blessing and it’s a blessing the world can’t offer us. It’s a blessing of peace and joy and security amidst the highs and the lows of life. That right there is what God calls blessing.

The Richest Blessing of All

It’s a funny thing when we talk about God’s blessing. You know what we immediately understand by that? We immediately think, oh, that means me. God’s going to bless me. God wants to bless me. But that’s not always the way it works. Consider parenting. Parents sacrifice so much for their children in order to bless them and bring them up to become responsible adults. Now none of us is perfect and sometimes we resent the sacrifices as parents, but over all hopefully most of us would say that our sacrifices were worth it to bless our children, would you agree?

Jesus suffered so that you and I could be blessed. Can’t put it any more simply than that. His thirty three and a bit years on this earth involved trial after trial culminating in the brutal cross so that you and I would be blessed with forgiveness and a new life and a eternal life in close fellowship and relationship with Him.

When we put ourselves in the centre of the universe then blessing’s all about us. When we wake up to finally realise that we aren’t the centre of the universe then we realise that sometimes someone else’s blessing from God is going to cost us something. It’s a basic Kingdom truth. And so it was with Ruth. This young Moabite widow who had to go through so much as we’ve seen over these past few weeks in order to be blessed.

But there was more, something much more to her suffering. Well it turns out that there was and in fact there still is. Ruth’s suffering; Ruth’s difficult journey yielded a blessing that you and I still enjoy today. Incredible, you say? Well let’s have a look at how Ruth’s trials and suffering blesses you and me. Before the break we saw how, after her long journey, she pretty much hit the jackpot, snares Boaz as her husband and she got married. But that blessing goes on. Let’s have a look, Ruth chapter 4 beginning at verse 13:

So Boaz took Ruth and she became his wife. When they came together the Lord made her to conceive and she bore a son. Then the women said to Naomi, ‘Blessed be the Lord who has not left you this day without next of kin and may His name be renown in Israel. He shall be to you a restorer of life and a nourisher of your old age for your daughter-in-law who loves you, who is more to you than seven sons, has born him’.

Then Naomi took the child and laid him to her bosom and became his nurse. The women of the neighbourhood gave him a name. A son has been born to Naomi, they named him Obed. He became the father of Jesse, the father of David.

Okay, so Ruth turns out she’s the grandmother of King David. Great, how is that still a blessing to you and me here and now? Well, let’s wind the clock forward a thousand or so years to the birth of Jesus and let’s go to the genealogy of Jesus. Now you might be pleased to know we’re not going to read through the whole genealogy of Jesus in Matthew chapter 1 although I did preach on it one time at our Church some time back and Pamela, the woman who did the Bible reading which was the whole of Matthew chapter 1 including the genealogy, she got a standing ovation for her efforts when she finished.

What we discover in the genealogy of Jesus is that He is a descendant of King David and to King David was promised an heir who would sit on his throne for ever and ever. You can read about it in 2 Samuel, chapter 7, verse 12. God promises him an heir for ever and ever. And so that promise is fulfilled through Jesus but who were David’s grandparents? Boaz and Ruth and incidentally the genealogies were written down the male line in those days, it was a patriarchal society which of course is a little silly because the only way you can guarantee a genealogy is down the female line.

Anyhow, so all the people mentioned in Jesus genealogy are men except four. Tamar who deceives Judah by acting as a prostitute. Rahab, also a prostitute. Ruth a Moabite, a sworn enemy of Israel and Mary, this young teenager who fell pregnant, apparently out of wedlock, with the child Jesus. Four women of ill repute each of which played a mighty part in bringing Jesus to us, to you and to me, this same Jesus who died for us and rose again to give us forgiveness of sin and a new life and an eternal life.

God had a mighty plan to use Ruth, this young Moabite widow who journeyed to Israel against all better judgement to bless you and me here and now. Albeit she wasn’t one of His chosen people, she wasn’t one of the beautiful people and He had her journey through great trials to become an ancestor of Jesus. Why? Well we don’t know why, maybe God wanted some of her DNA in the body of the Son of man. Maybe God wanted some of her faithfulness and loyalty to be handed down to Jesus all through those generations. Who knows? But listen to me, through Ruth’s trials and suffering you and I are blessed here and now for all eternity in Jesus.

Could Ruth have had any idea, any inkling of what God’s great and mighty plan was back then? Of course she couldn’t. As far as she knew she was blessed and that was what mattered. But God’s blessing ripples on for generations, for millennia because that’s how God’s blessing works.

You and I are not, let me say it again, we are not the centre of the universe. We are a part of a great and mighty plan that we simply can’t comprehend and sometimes we’re blessed in the here and now and sometimes we suffer in order that others might be blessed and sometimes it’s both as it turned out to be for Ruth. Both suffering and blessing.

For me, as I’ve come to realise that I’m not the centre of the universe, shocking as that seemed at first. But as much as God loves me, as much as He knows about everything going on in my life and He cares about everything, I am just a small part of His great and mighty plan for this world. The suffering has started to make sense. And these days when I travel through times of suffering you know what, I can sit right in the middle of that and be overcome by joy and peace because I know He loves me. He has a plan.