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December 17, 2003
Midweek Advent 3
Ruth 1:1-17
Pastor Joel Zank

RUTH WAITED FOR THE ONE TO COME!

(Ruth 1:1-17) But Ruth replied, "Don't urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God.17 Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the LORD deal with me, be it ever so severely, if anything but death separates you and me."

In Christ Jesus for whom we wait, dear fellow redeemed,

For the person who comes to know Christ as Savior, life will be forever changed-for the better, right? We, of course, want to say yes. But before we do, we should really understand what we mean by better. If by better we mean an easier life here on earth, then we would have to say, no a believer's life is not always better. Just ask the believer named Ruth whom you met in our text. In many ways her life became more difficult after coming to faith in Christ. And yet, Ruth would have been the first to tell you that in spite of her troubles, her life was better. Let's see why as we consider how Ruth waited for the One to Come. She waited filled with faith; and she waited filled with love.

Given Ruth's background, it's a wonder that we are even talking about her today. You see Ruth was not born an Israelite. And though she could trace her ancestry back to Abraham's nephew Lot, her people, the Moabites, had long ago become the sworn enemies of God's chosen nation.

The hatred between these two peoples ran deep, but not so deep that it would stop an Israelite family from moving to Moab to avoid starvation. That's what Elimilech and Naomi did. Suffering from the effects of a severe famine, they left their home in Bethlehem in order to save the lives of their two sons, Mahlon and Kilion. This happened during the days of the Judges when Israel's spiritual life was at an all time low. And yet this particular family demonstrates by their words and actions that they are faithful to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

But as we've already said, being a believer doesn't make a person immune to the pain and sorrows of living in this sinful world. Death came to this family, striking first at its leader, Elimilech. How alone and isolated Naomi and her sons must have felt. How sad they must have been to have to bury their loved one in a land so far from home. But as time passed, the sorrow of death gave way to the joy of marriage. Both Mahlon and Kilion took Moabite wives. How they must have looked forward to returning to Bethlehem to raise a family there. But once again, before that could happen, death struck. This time it claimed Naomi's two sons, leaving only a family of three lonely widows.

Here's where it may become difficult to understand how God works in the lives of his people. Through marriage, the two Moabite women, Orpah and Ruth, had learned about Israel's God-the only true God. We know this because it is the name of the LORD, the God of free and faithful grace that Naomi invokes in her prayerful blessings when speaking to these women. It is the same LORD who is credited for coming to the aid of his people by bringing an end to the famine that had plagued Bethlehem and the entire land of Israel.

But with such power, couldn't the same LORD have spared Naomi, Orpah and Ruth from the emptiness that death had brought to their lives? Wouldn't the spiritual life of these two Moabites have been better served if their husbands had remained among the living? Look at the effect their deaths had on the faith of a veteran believer. Naomi, whose name literally meant "Pleasant One" became bitter with the thought that the Lord's hand had gone out against her (Ruth 1:13). But as sad as she was for herself, her words show us that she had even more concern for her daughters-in-law.

Naomi made plans to return to Bethlehem. There she would be among her own people, able to depend on the charity of her relatives and neighbors. But from her perspective, Bethlehem could offer only more loneliness, more emptiness to Orpah and Ruth. It was one thing for two Israelite men to marry Moabites in Moab, but the chances of these two foreigners finding husbands in Bethlehem were slim to none. They were outsiders from a land of enemies. So with many tears on the part of all three women, Naomi tells Orpah and Ruth to return home and find husbands among their own people. After a great deal of urging, Orpah heads back to Moab. We have no idea if her choice to do so was a reflection on her relationship with the true God expect for the fact that when Naomi urges Ruth to follow Orpah's example she says, "Look, your sister-in-law is going back to her people and her gods. Go back with her."

How tempting it must have been for Ruth to do just that. In Moab she could seek to end the loneliness that had come to her life. She would have the company of her parents, the hope of remarriage, and the comfort that comes from being surrounded by people with whom she had once shared so many customs and beliefs. All these things and more might fill the loneliness and emptiness that Ruth was experiencing. I say that they might. But if Ruth was tempted to think so, we'll never know. For all we find in Scripture is a beautiful confession of the faith God had worked in her heart. With the greatest respect, Ruth told Naomi, "Don't urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God" (Ruth 1:16).

We may often second-guess how God chooses to work in the lives of his people, but here there can be no denying that God was indeed at work. The real emptiness that Ruth had experienced in her life, was the emptiness once caused by unbelief. Once she had known only the empty promises of Moab's idols. Idols she worked so hard to serve, believing that her hopes for a better future depended on her efforts to appease them. That of course wasn't possible, so she had lived all her life listening to her nagging conscience and the guilt-ridden voice of regret. Nothing she did could silence them. But then, that wonderful God of free and faithful grace came to her, a foreigner and enemy of his people. He used the words and actions of a refugee family to fill Ruth's heart with faith, with forgiveness and with fellowship of the best kind, the fellowship that comes from hearts united by God's promise of a Savior. By the grace of God, Ruth was now waiting for the One to come. She waited with a heart that had been filled by the faith that only God can grow. Yes, trouble had come to her life, but she knew that she could count on the same God who had rescued her from hell to see her safely through the troubles of life. God had satisfied her desires with good things and her faith convinced her that he would keep doing so. Ruth would not turn away from Naomi. She couldn't because Naomi and her people had the words of eternal life. Ruth was no longer a Moabite-not spiritually. God had made Ruth a part of his family and more.

If you are at all familiar with the Book of Ruth, then you know that after she moved to Bethlehem, God blessed her in ways she could have never imagined. What Naomi thought to be impossible, God accomplished, giving Ruth a believing husband named Boaz with whom Ruth could share her life and her faith. God further blessed this happy couple with a son named Obed, a fact of no small significance because St. Matthew tells us, that Obed became "the father of Jesse,6 and Jesse the father of King David" (Matthew 1:5,6); and of course you know great David's greater Son-Jesus. God made Ruth a part of the Savior's family by faith and then God made Jesus a part of Ruth's family by birth.

Dear Christian, all this God did for you. With regards to the family of God, you were once a foreigner like Ruth. More than that, you were an enemy of God and his people. So was I. All sinners are by nature. But God changed that. In his great love he found you hiding in sin's darkness. He called to you through his gospel, and brought you to faith in his Son Jesus, your Savior from sin. Paul says in Ephesians 2:13,19, "Now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ....Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God's people and members of God's household..."

God had always planned to save all sinners of every nation from their sin. God not only proclaimed this good news, but to demonstrate his love, he gave us a Savior who while being born to God's people, Israel, is nevertheless a Savior with Gentile blood coursing through his veins. What a wonderful way to show that Jesus had come to save both the Jew and the Gentile. He came to make both peoples one with God and therefore one with each other by shedding his holy blood to pay for the sins of all. God has filled your heart with faith to believe this.

By the grace of God you are now a member of God's family, but that doesn't mean your life here on earth has become carefree. Like Ruth of old, this moment in time might find you experiencing great loneliness or emptiness. Maybe you've lost a loved one or your closest friend has moved away. Maybe you are recently divorced, or out of work. Maybe good health has deserted you. Whatever your problem may be, perhaps your prospects for a happy future here on earth seem dim. Maybe this trouble has shaken your faith to its very core so that you've come to doubt God's love for you. I can't tell you why this has happened. Only God knows the exact reason as to why he has allowed such troubles into your life. But while keeping the reason to himself he does promise to make this trouble serve your good (Romans 8:28). He does promise to lift you up in due time (1 Peter 5:6). You can wait for him, for his deliverance filled with faith, knowing that the God of all mercy who has rescued you from hell will deliver you from every trouble at the time and in the way of his choosing. But best of all you can know that God will ultimately deliver you from all trouble when he comes to take you to himself in heaven.

You can wait for the One to come filled with faith; and you can wait for the One to come filled with love, as Ruth did. In spite of her great troubles, Ruth told Naomi, "Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the LORD deal with me, be it ever so severely, if anything but death separates you and me" (Ruth 1:17). Ruth pledge to show her love and thanks to God for his grace by loving one of God's people-Naomi. Ruth went with Naomi back to Bethlehem. Ruth found work in the fields of Boaz. She supported Naomi; she fed Naomi, and when God blessed Ruth with a new family, she made Naomi a part of it. What a powerful love God worked in Ruth's heart! He can do the same for all of us.

When troubles come our way, it is so easy to become self-focused and self-centered. We tend to withdraw from others, becoming lost in self-pity. But this is not the life to which our LORD has called us. He has not made us islands in the faith, but has brought us together into a family that we call the church. By supplying all our needs through Jesus, God has freed us from the need to be selfish. He has freed us to love one another and encourage one another with words and actions. Look around you and see the members of your family. Some of them are related to you by blood, but all are related by the faith God has given us in Christ. What can we be doing for each other? Is there some word of comfort we can speak, some act of love that we can perform? As we take the time to know each other better, opportunities to serve and love one another become more evident.

But what if we fail each other? What if a moment of selfishness or carelessness comes between us? Is our relationship forever ruined? How could it be? The forgiveness God grants us in Christ made us members of one family. So as we confess our sins to God and each other, as we receive and share his forgiveness, our hearts will be united again and again as together we wait for the One to come. To this end may God use his gospel in Word and sacrament to increase our faith in him and our love for one another, until Jesus comes. Amen.