THE AWESOME NATURE OF HOPE

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In Christ, Mark

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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

Her mother-in-law asked her, "Where did you glean today? Where did you work? Blessed be the man who took notice of you!"

Then Ruth told her mother-in-law about the one at whose place she had been working. "The name of the man I worked with today is Boaz," she said.

"The Lord bless him!" Naomi said to her daughter-in-law. "He has not stopped showing his kindness to the living and the dead." She added, "That man is our close relative; he is one of our kinsman-redeemers."

Then Ruth the Moabitess said, "He even said to me, 'Stay with my workers until they finish harvesting all my grain.'"

Naomi said to Ruth her daughter-in-law, "It will be good for you, my daughter, to go with his girls, because in someone else's field you might be harmed."

So Ruth stayed close to the servant girls of Boaz to glean until the barley and wheat harvests were finished. And she lived with her mother-in-law.

Ruth 2:19-23

This ends our reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

Have you ever had a time in your life when you felt hopeless? A time when you felt oppressed by despair and sorrow? A time when things seemed so much more dark than light?

I know I have.

After learning about my first wife’s affair with my next door neighbor many years ago, I remember how devastated I was to learn that I had been deceived by someone I loved and trusted so very much. My family broke apart and I was left alone…single for the first time in 10 years...without my two girls. The isolation was maddening…my pain and sadness was worse.

For years, I wondered what I might have done to deserve my circumstances and I had trouble finding answers. I equally had trouble finding relief from my desolate, downtrodden spirit. Indeed, I felt little hope in my life then.

I can’t help but think Naomi must have felt the same way. Losing a husband was bad enough, particularly because widows weren’t particularly taken care of well in Old Testament society. Without their provider and supporter, they were often left to fend for themselves. Truly, tough times usually followed a woman after their husband’s death and Naomi knew this. But at least she had two sons who could now take care of her and soften the blow.

But then, we know what happened. Both of those sons died, not only leaving Naomi without immediate family but her two Moabite daughters-in-law widowed as well. And so fast forwarding to their arrival and subsequent attempt to settle in Bethlehem, hope had to seem very far off for Naomi and Ruth but little did they know that God was working in the background of things. Hope was right around the corner for them…and in a place they least expected it.

It happens like this sometimes in our lives as well. Just when we see things as dark and hopeless, God shines His light on us, often through a person that He sends to rescue us…a redeemer. For me, ironically, this redeemer was named Grace.

You see several years after my divorce, I was volunteering in an elementary school, tutoring two third grade classes. I had done this faithfully for around four months when one day I happened to run into the Assistant Principal on my way out of the building. I had spoken to her a few times before but it was always business-like conversation, so much so that I didn’t even know her first name. She was always Ms. White to me.

Well, that day the conversation was different because we talked about what we were going to do during the upcoming weekend. She told me she was going to the movies and, with all the courage I could muster (I wasn’t very good at being single, I’m afraid), I asked her if she was going alone. As I expected, she had a date and at first my hopes were dashed but then she added this about the man she was seeing:

“He doesn’t know what direction he’s going in.”

And with that, her name was called over the school announcing system and she  excused herself, leaving me wondering what she meant by what was said. Despite the confusion in her cryptic words, I have to admit feeling a spark of hope…something I hadn’t felt for a long, long time.

Going back to our scripture passage, we find Ruth returning to Naomi with all the wheat she had gleaned and the mother-in-law immediately marveled at the amount she brought as it was obviously more than one would see from a typical, gleaning outing. As we see, Naomi couldn’t contain her curiosity, asking Ruth:

“Where did you glean today? Where did you work? Blessed be the man who took notice of you!"

To which Ruth replied:

“The name of the man I worked with today is Boaz.”

Well, the name Boaz hadn’t resonated with Ruth as she was a foreigner in Bethlehem but as we see, Naomi instantly knew him and what he meant to their situation…and we can sense how she felt a spark of instant hope at that moment…something she hadn’t felt for a long time. God was moving powerfully in her situation and was doing so through the interactions between Boaz and Ruth.

Given the report from Ruth, we find Naomi exclaiming:

“The Lord bless him!...He has not stopped showing his kindness to the living and the dead….That man is our close relative; he is one of our kinsman-redeemers."

Here, we find Naomi fully understanding that the Lord was at work in the matter. He had made the way for Ruth to end up in Boaz’s field because he would end up being the one who would redeem Naomi and Ruth. God put him into their lives for a reason…to rescue, deliver, save, and, ultimately bring hope.

“He doesn’t know what direction he wants to go in.”

Going back to that fateful day at the elementary school 34 years ago, these words started to echo in my head over the weekend after talking with Ms. White. Although I didn’t really know what they meant, the Lord was working through them to set His plan in motion.

For I ended up taking a chance and sending flowers to Ms. White, asking her to go to dinner with me. I was in the Navy then and getting set to go to sea for seven weeks, an underway period which was serving as a work up for a deployment to South America starting in the late spring. And so as you can see, the window of opportunity was very narrow if there would be any chance that Ms. White and I were going to see each other regularly on a personal level.

And so the flowers were delivered the day before I was set to be back in the school and during that final visit prior to going to sea, I ran into Ms. White and learned that she was accepting my date invitation. We went to dinner the next night.

During that time together, it was obvious to us both that we had so much in common and there was potential for a relationship but not until Ms. White had laid down some ground rules. For I remember her words as clear as day today as she said:

“If we’re going to have a relationship, God has to be first in everything.”

I also remember how my heart was racing about a million miles an hour because I hadn’t been walking with the Lord in my life for well over 12 years.

Remember how I had wondered why things had happened in my first marriage for it to end the way it did. Walking without God for the duration of that time was really the root cause for as I learned, nothing good comes out of doing that.

Well, told her that I agreed with her spiritual ground rules and was committed to make the Lord first in our relationship. From that point forward, I dedicated myself to getting right with Him in my life and Grace and I would marry by the end of the year after that first dinner date.

That was 33 years ago now as we march toward anniversary number 34 in December and it has been absolutely incredible how the Lord has moved in and through all those years we’ve been blessed to share together. Over that time, the Lord has shown me the many gifts He has placed within to use to His glory and uses me in ministry every day to help others come to know Him…just as He used Grace (Ms. White) to reach me over three decades ago.

In the end translation, Grace was used as an instrument of my redemption…the one the Lord sent to rescue me, draw me back to Him, and help deliver me from despair to hope. In the Ruth story, God used Boaz to do the same thing for Naomi and Ruth…and the good news is that He is still using people each and every day to do the same thing. Who knows…maybe He’ll use you next.

My friends, we truly serve a Lord who is in the redeeming business. For He so loved the world that He gave up His Son Jesus to be crucified on the cross of Calvary to rescue us from the despair of sin and destruction in Hell and deliver us to the hope of a new, eternal life. This ensured that anyone who places their belief in Jesus need never fear death for it becomes the door to an everlasting life free from the afflictions of this present worldly existence. Through Christ, we have a hope that is secure and irremovable by anyone or anything.

So as I close this message, we have seen the awesome nature of hope through the actions of Jesus…of Boaz…of my “amazing” Grace, actions that were all part of God’s redemptive plan, actions that bring the awesome blessing of hope…not a worldly hope that is fleeting but rather a divine, holy hope that endures not just in the here and now but in the here after.

Today and every day, let us rejoice and give thanks for all the Lord has done, is doing, and is yet to do in our lives to move us from tough times into better days, providing deliverance into a hope that can only come from Him.

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it. Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.