Turn with me, if you would, to
Hebrews chapter 2. This morning, before we read,
and I'll introduce Aaron, a couple announcements first. There is
a directory typed out, and there's three copies put on the back
table in the vestibule. If you'll just check one of those
copies to verify your information, make sure we have it right. We
needed to update the church directory. So please look back there and
just verify your information. If you need any corrections,
just write them right on there so that we can update that. Our
pastor and a lot of our congregation are out this morning. They were
at Isaac and Claire's wedding yesterday, which I saw some pictures
on Facebook. We're just thrilled about that
and happy for them. And I understand a really good
service. They're having a good time. A
number of our congregation are also traveling today, so we'll
keep them in prayer, traveling mercies. I'm excited to introduce
Aaron. For those of you that don't know
him, Aaron Greenleaf is here with us this morning. He'll conduct
both messages this morning. We're thrilled to have you. We pray frequently that the Lord
raise up young men that know the gospel, that know Christ,
and are gifted to declare his name. So in that regard, you're
an answer to prayer, that you've been raised up to declare Christ. And that's what we're here for
this morning, to worship him. So we're, we're glad to have
you with us and we look forward to the message God's laid on
your heart. Hebrews chapter two. Therefore, we ought to give the
more earnest heed to the things which we have heard, lest at
any time we should let them slip. For if the word spoken by angels
was steadfast and every transgression and disobedience received a just
recompense of reward, how shall we escape if we neglect so great
salvation? Which at the first began to be
spoken by the Lord and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him.
God also bearing the witness both with signs and wonders and
with diverse miracles and gifts of the Holy Ghost according to
his own will. For unto the angels hath he not put in subjection
the world to come, whereof we speak. But one in a certain place
testified, saying, What is man, that thou art mindful of him,
or the son of man, that thou visitest him? Thou hast made
him a little lower than the angels. Thou crannest him with glory
and honor, and didst set him over the works of thy hands.
Thou hast put all things in subjection under his feet. For in that he
put all in subjection under him. He left nothing. that is not
put under him. But now we see not yet all things
put under him, but we see Jesus, who is made a little lower than
the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory
and honor, that he, by the grace of God, should taste death for
every man, for every son. For it became him, for whom are
all things and by whom are all things, and bringing many sons
unto glory to make the captor of their salvation perfect through
sufferings. For both he hath sanctified,
and they who are sanctified are all of one. For which cause he
is not ashamed to call them brethren, saying, I will declare thy name
unto my brethren in the midst of the church while I sing praise
unto thee. And again, I will put my trust in him. And again,
behold I and the children which God hath given me. For as much
then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself
likewise took part of the same. and through death he might destroy
him that hath power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver
them who, through fear of death, were all their lifetime subject
to bondage. For verily he took not on him
the nature of angels, but he took on him the seed of Abraham.
Wherefore, in all things, it behooved him to be made like
unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high
priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for
the sins of the people. For in that he himself hath suffered
being tempted, he is able to succor them that are tempted.
Amen. Let's pray. Our Most High Heavenly Father,
we pray that you send your Spirit to be with us during this time,
that we meet not in vain, but that your name be glorified,
and that we truly worship your name in spirit and in truth. Father, we pray that you let
us see Christ in his mercy, that you edify
the saints and call sinners unto repentance. That we again see
that sacrifice of Christ fully satisfied the law, fully satisfied
the your holy and just and right demands, that we as sinners in
ourselves have the right in Christ to come boldly before the throne
and beg mercy. And Father, we do. Let this day
be glorifying to you and honoring to your name. We pray for those
of our congregation that are traveling, that you be with them,
give them traveling mercies according to your will. We pray for those
of our congregation that are sick and suffering, going through
trial, that you comfort them as only you can. And again, we
pray that you be with us during this time. Bless the message.
Bless Aaron according to your will. We pray this thankfully
in Christ's name, for his sake. Amen. Morning, everybody. It's good
to be with you this morning. If you would, turn in your Bibles
to the book of Leviticus, chapter 25. Leviticus, chapter 25. I'd like
to speak to you this morning out of the book of Ruth. And
we're going to kind of touch on the entire book of Ruth. Don't
worry, I'm not going to preach any longer than normal, hopefully.
But I'd like to talk about the entire book and look at some
of the high points. One of the things about the book of Ruth,
though, you can have no understanding about the book of Ruth unless
you understand an old Levitical law. It's the law of the kinsman
redeemer. It's right here in Leviticus
chapter 25. So look over here and look at verse 25. Leviticus 25, 25 says, if thy
brother be waxen poor and has sold away some of his position,
and if any of his kin come to redeem it, then shall he redeem
that which his brother sold. And if the man have none to redeem
it, and himself be able to redeem it, then let him count the years
of the sale thereof, and restore the overplus unto the man to
whom he sold it, that he may return it unto his possession."
So here's how this works. If you were a Jew back in the
days of the Levitical law, if you had become so indebted that
you had to sell off all your possessions, you had to sell
everything you had, maybe you even had to sell yourself into
slavery and you'd become completely and utterly destitute and poverty
stricken, if you had a near kinsman, someone who was in a close familial
relationship, someone who had the wealth and the power to redeem
you, and someone who was willing to redeem you, if you met those
three requirements, he could buy back everything you lost
and restore you to the way you were before. This is the law
of the kinsman redeemer. Now what I find interesting here
is that the scripture prescribes a way for a man to redeem himself.
It says, well, if this poor destitute person who is so indebted that
he had to sell everything he had, maybe even sell himself
into slavery, if this poor destitute person who has nothing can somehow
or another come up with money to buy back everything he had
and pay usury, interest on all of it, then he can redeem himself.
Now, question. How in the world would a poor,
poverty-stricken, destitute person come up with any money to redeem
himself? Answer is he can't. And this
is given to very simple teaching. You can't redeem yourself. And
I can't redeem myself. I cannot meet God's requirement.
I have to have a kinsman redeem it. I have to have someone come
and redeem me. And that's what the book of Ruth
is all about. So if you would, turn over to
Ruth chapter 1. I'm going to give you a short disclaimer.
I'm going to spend a lot of time in chapters 1 and 2, and we're
going to fly through chapters 3 and 4. So if we hit 25 minutes
and I'm still in chapter 2, it's OK. So here's how the book of Ruth
begins. There's some major players. There's a man named Elimelech.
And Elimelech is a very wealthy man. And he lives in this town
called Bethlehem. It's in Judah. And he has a wife.
Her name is Naomi. He has two sons, Malon and Chileon.
And in Bethlehem, a famine hits the land. There's a recession.
And Elimelech, this very powerful and wealthy man, he sells off
everything he has. And he packs up his family, his
wife and his two kids, and they move down to a pagan country
called Moab. And so they're down in Moab,
and in Moab, his sons take on daughters of the Moabite people,
Orpah and Ruth. And so it's not too long that
they're in Moab, Elimelech dies. Now, a little while after that,
his sons, they die. And so you're left with Naomi,
his wife, Orpah, and Ruth. All three of them are now widows.
Now, if you know anything about this time period, being a widow
was a very, very bad thing. It was for this reason. If you're
a widow, that means you have no source of income. Your husband
was your source of income, which means if you were a widow, you're
destitute. You have nothing. And that's where we pick up with
Naomi and Ruth and Orpah. They're widows. They're destitute.
They have absolutely nothing. They've lost everything. And
Ruth hears, or I'm sorry, Naomi hears that the famine is over
in Bethlehem. The Lord's granted bread. He
granted a harvest. And so she says, I'm going back.
I'm going to go back to my people. You girls, you need to go back
to your people. You're not Jews. You're not of
my people. You need to go back to your people. I'm going to
go back to my people. I've got nothing for you. I've
got no other sons for you. Go home. Now, pick up here and
look at verse 14. And they lifted up their voice
and wept again, and Orpah kissed her mother-in-law. But Ruth clave
unto her. And she said, Behold, thy sister-in-law
is gone back unto her people and unto her gods. Return now
after thy sister-in-law." Now, in verse 16 here, this is probably
the most well-known verse in all the book of Ruth. And what
Ruth says here, she says as a representative of every believer. This is our
thoughts concerning the Lord Jesus Christ. This is also our
confession of union, our need of union with the Lord Jesus
Christ. Pick up in verse 16. And Ruth said, entreat me not
to leave thee, or to return from falling after thee. For whither
thou goest, I will go. And where thou lodgest, I will
lodge. Thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God. Where thou diest, will I die,
and there will I be buried. The Lord do so to me, and more
also, if aught but death part thee and me." Now first, these
are our thoughts concerning the Lord Jesus Christ. It's an issue
of location. In this life, where do you want
to be? I want to be wherever he's at.
Wherever the Lord Jesus Christ is at, that's exactly where I
want to be at. And we have one place we know. We know that the
Lord is omnipresent. He is everywhere all at once.
But there's a particular place where he promises his special
presence. It's here. He says, where two or three are
gathered together in my name, there I am in the midst of them.
And that's where geographically I want to be in this life. I
want to be wherever the gospel is preached. I want to be with the Lord's
people, and I want to identify with the Lord's people. In this
generation of special interest groups, and who are you with,
and who's your people, I can tell you who my people are. You believe on
Christ? Is he your Savior? You're my people. That's it.
What Ruth does here, though, she does as a representative
of every believer. Ruth claimed Naomi. She grabbed hold of her
and she would not let her go. In this thing, when the Lord
saves a man, he causes him to cleave on to Christ, to hold
on to him, to cast all his cares upon him, and to trust him with
every aspect of his salvation. Lock, stock, and barrel, I need
you to take care of all of it and don't leave any of it up
to me. We cleave to the Lord Jesus Christ. but there is also
a letting go. The grip becomes on Christ, but
there's a letting go of ourself. Philippians 3.3 says, for we
are the circumcision which worship God in the spirit and rejoice
in Christ Jesus and have no confidence in the flesh. That grip on ourselves,
on any hopes of garnering favor with God based on something I've
done, a meritorious salvation based on me, we lose the grip
on that hands-free. want nothing to do with it, and
we cleave to Christ. Now when Ruth says this, she
says, and treat me not to leave me. Don't let me go. I think I understand what she's
talking about. My confidence and your confidence,
I know, it's not in the strength of my grip. We're talking about
faith here, right? If you have faith, it is God-given. You didn't muster that yourself.
That is a gift, a gift given in regeneration. If you have
faith, that is God-given. But my confidence is not in my
faith. Here's about as far as I can go with my faith. I believe.
Help thou my unbelief. My confidence is not in how tightly
I'm holding on to the Lord Jesus Christ. My confidence is in Him
and how tightly He holds on to me. My confidence is in His grip,
not my grip. Because as much as I may try
to wander away, He's the one who reaches back and grabs me
and says, no, you're not going anywhere. Now these are our thoughts
concerning the Lord Jesus Christ. This is also our confession of
union, or the need of union. She says, where you go, that's
where I have to go. Where you die, this is non-negotiable. I have to die there. Where has
the Lord Jesus Christ been? He was born of a woman. He was
born under the law. He came to this earth. He became a man,
the God-man. And he lived a perfectly holy and righteous life for 33
years, and for 33 years, He honored God's holy law. He walked the
paths of righteousness. You know where I have to have
been? In him. United to him, one with him,
so that when he walked those paths of righteousness and he
kept God's holy law perfectly, I kept God's holy law perfectly,
because I was in him. Where he died, he died on a cross, bearing
the sins of his people, which became his sins. under the wrath
of God, suffering and dying. That's where I had to die. That's
where my sins had to be punished on that cross. That's the only
way I can be saved. I died there, too. One in Him. Now, at this point, Naomi and
Ruth are going to head back to Bethlehem, pick up in verse 19.
Let's see what happens. So they, too, went until they
came to Bethlehem. And it came to pass when they were come to
Bethlehem that all the city was moved about them. And they said,
is this Naomi? And she said unto them, call
me not Naomi. That means pleasant. Call me Mara, bitter. But the
Almighty hath dealt very bitterly with me. I went out full, and
the Lord hath brought me home again empty. Why then call you
me Naomi, seeing the Lord hath testified against me, and the
Almighty hath afflicted me? So Naomi returned, and Ruth Amobitus,
her daughter-in-law, with her, which returned out of the country
of Moab, and they came to Bethlehem. in the beginning of barley harvest.
Now I want you to think about this picture here for a second.
When Naomi leaves Bethlehem for the first time, she is young,
she is beautiful, and she is wealthy. You think about it.
She's got long, dark, thick, beautiful hair. Her skin is clean
and young and supple. She's wearing the finest raiment.
She's rich. She looks beautiful. And that's how she leaves Bethlehem,
right? But now she's coming back. And she's wandering down this
road with Ruth, and people say, Is that Naomi? It looks like
Naomi, but it's just a shell of Naomi. That long dark hair,
it's fading now. That skin is dirty. It's wrinkled.
She left wearing only the finest garments. Now she's in rags.
It's Naomi, but it's a shell of Naomi. Now what's the type
here? What's the picture? God created Adam in his image.
You think about Adam when he placed Adam in Eden, that garden.
How powerful and how capable and how intelligent Adam must
have been, just an upright and innocent being, a being that
could walk around naked with other people there and experience
absolutely no shame because there was no sin. There was no sinful
thoughts, there was no sinful actions, there was absolutely
no sin. Adam could stand face to face with his God and have
no fear of wrath, have no fear of punishment because there was
no sin, there was no reason to fear punishment. An amazing creature,
made in the likeness of God. And Adam had one rule, one law. Don't eat of that tree. You can
eat of all the rest of them. I provided everything for you.
Don't eat of that one. When you do, you're going to die. Adam
disobeyed God. And when he did, he fell. All
those beautiful and wonderful characteristics fell with him.
And he took on that sinful, evil, wretched nature that he has passed
down to you and me, that lame nature. Now, I want to talk about
this nature for a second. Paul says this. Romans 5.12 says,
wherefore, as by one man, sin entered into the world. That's
Adam. Adam sinned. We fell on Adam. We're born with
this wicked, evil nature because of Adam's sin. And death by sin. And so death passed upon all
men, but wait, for that all have sinned. Now, Adam was our federal
head. He was our first father. He was
our representative. Just as every believer shares an eternal union
with the Lord Jesus Christ, Every man born of a woman, excluding
the Lord Jesus Christ, shares a union with Adam. And when Adam
was in that garden, when Adam disobeyed God, I disobeyed God. You can take his name out of
there. You can name him Aaron. You can name him Jonathan. You can
name him any name you want. It was me who ate that fruit. It
was me who disobeyed God. So when I'm born in this fallen,
evil state, you know whose fault that is? That's my fault. There are no victims in this.
Absolutely not. And Romans 5.12 tells us one
other thing, too. The consequences of sin. It says it's death. It's
not just talking about a physical death. The reason I'm going to
die, it's simple. It's because I'm a sinner. One
day I'm going to die physically. It's because I'm a sinner. But
this is more to this. It speaks of that nature. That
nature we're born with is a dead nature. Now, what does that look
like? What does that sound like? Look at verse 21 again. Naomi
sums it up like this. She said, I went out full. And
the Lord hath brought me home again empty. Now that word empty
is very interesting. Had a lot of translations, a
lot of words that accompany it, but there were three that caught
my attention. Here's the first one. It means vain. It means
sinfully selfish. And this is the way we were born
in this world. Sinfully selfish, constantly wanting to get glory
for ourselves. And completely and utterly willing
to rob God of His glory to get it. The reason that the natural
man is so comfortable with this thing of salvation by works,
a meritorious salvation based on what he does. He loves it
and he's so comfortable with it for this reason. If salvation
is some way based on him and him doing something, that means
there's some glory for the man in it. It's destined to failure. It has never worked. And yet
men love it because if there's a chance, that means there's
some glory in it for me because we have that vain, sinfully selfish
nature. It means vain. It means poor.
It means it has no buying power. There is nothing about that nature,
the way we are born in this world, that God finds favorable. That
he looks down and he says, that's good, that's respectable, I love
that, it's poor, it is bankrupt of any buying power with God.
And the last word was very interesting, it was ineffective. It was an
ineffective nature. Those demands, there are spiritual
demands that are placed on you and me in this life. You must
believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. No one can believe for you, you
must believe. You must be brought to repentance. Your mind must
be changed. You must love the Lord Jesus Christ. You must love
his people. And you know what? You can't. Not by nature. Not the way we're born in this
world. That nature is ineffective. It cannot meet those demands. All right. Ruth chapter 2. So Naomi and Ruth head back to
Bethlehem. And they're poor. And Ruth decides
that she is going to glean in a field. Now, this was according
to the law at that time. What the law said was if you
were a rich man and you had fields and you were going to have a
harvest, you would let your reapers go through the field. And as
they would reap the barley, they'd pick it up in sheaves and move
it to a central loading point. When they did that, by virtue
of what they were doing, some would fall on the ground. Here
was the law. Don't pick it up. You leave that,
that portion you left on the ground, that's for the poor.
They're going to come and glean behind you, and they're going
to collect that, and that's going to be their food. And that's what Ruth
is going to do. Now look at verse one. And Naomi
had a kinsman of her husband's, a mighty man of wealth, of a
family of Elimelech, and his name was Boaz. Now we should get very excited
because we've talked a lot, a lot of characters in this story,
but we finally come to the main character. The book of Ruth is
not about Ruth. It's about Boaz because Boaz
is the type of Lord Jesus Christ. He is the kinsman redeemer. And
here's the beautiful part. Ruth doesn't even know it. Now,
we talked a minute about the kinsman redeemer and the law
concerning that. There were three considerations with the kinsman
redeemer. Three considerations. Number
one, he had to have the right to redeem. What that means was
he had to be of a very close familial relationship to the
person he was redeeming. He had to be bone to their bone
and flesh to their flesh. Two, he had to be able. He couldn't
just walk up. to the person who currently had
the property, or whatever it was, and say, well, give it to
him back. No, he had to make it all right. He had to deal
justly with everyone. He had to have the buying power,
the power to buy it all back. Three, he had to be willing.
The people who were in that poverty-stricken state, that was their problem.
They had got themselves in that mess, and the Kinsman Redeemer
was under absolutely no obligation to redeem them. So it had to
be those three things. He had to have the right, he
had to have the ability, and he had to be willing. Now, this
is going to be the most important part of what I'm about to tell
you. The Lord Jesus Christ is the kinsman redeemer for all
his people, and he checks all three boxes. Now, first, does
he have the right to redeem his people? Is he of close enough
familial relationship to redeem his people? Well, I'll tell you
what. Jonathan just read it. I was excited he did. Hebrews
2.11 says this, for both he that sanctifyeth and they who are
sanctified are all of one. For which cause? He is not ashamed
to call us brethren. How close is that familiar relationship
between the Lord Jesus Christ and his people? You want to know
how close? For one. For one. Now here's the first
illustration. Brethren, for whom he did foreknow, Then he also
did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his son, that
he might be the firstborn among many brethren." The father looked
at Christ, and he said, I'm going to have a bunch more just like
him. That's how close that relationship is. He's the older brother. We're
the younger, and we're conformed to his image. But it gets closer.
The scripture gives closer relationships. How about the head and the body?
He is the head. The church is the body. Now think
about that for a second. How close that is. That means
you can't love the head without loving the body. That head can't
go anywhere that the body doesn't follow. There is never a time
that the head purposes and the body does not react. It is that
close of a relationship. Now I want you to think about
this for a second. Everything that is done for the elect in
salvation, it is done because of the believer's union with
the Lord Jesus Christ. Everything. Now I want you to
consider this for a moment. God does not love all men. He loves
His elect. He loves these. He does not love
them. Why? Why does He love His elect?
Why is that? Because they share an eternal
union with the Lord Jesus Christ. All the Father's love, all His
favor, all His love, it is in one man. Understand that. It
is in the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the one He is pleased with.
He is the one He loves. And you know what? When He loves
Christ, He loves the body too. He loves everyone that is eternally
united to Him. Why did the Father choose the
elect? He chose to save some, He chose to pass by others. Just
not intervene, just leave them alone and let them do what they
want to do by nature. But He chose to save some. Right?
Why did He choose these people? Why these? It's very simple.
He chose Christ. He says, He's my elect. When
He chose Christ, He chose everybody who was in Him. Why did Christ
die only for His elect? Because He was dying for Himself.
That oneness, when He went to His cross, He went as an us. He bore our sins in His body.
He was dying for His brethren. Why does the Spirit call only
the elect, irresistibly and invincibly? Because they are one with Christ.
Why are they preserved all the way to the end? It's very simple,
because they share that eternal union with the Lord Jesus Christ.
Everything is done because of this close familial relationship. Now I ask you, does the Lord
Jesus Christ have the right to redeem His people? We're one
with Him. He absolutely does. Second, he
had to be willing. Lord Jesus Christ is willing
to save his people. You see that in two ways. Number one, in the
covenant of grace. In the covenant of grace, the father looked at
his son. He said, here's what you're going to do. These people
who are yours, they're mine. You're going to live for them.
You're going to die for them. Everything that I require of
them, I'm not looking at them for, I'm going to look to you
for. Lock, stock and barrel is going to rest at your feet, rise
or fall with you. And I'm not going to look to
them for any of it. And he said, I will. I'll take them on lock,
stock, and barrel. I'll keep the law. I'll put that
sin away. I'll do it all. I'll be their sanctification,
too. I'll be their holiness. You look to me for every aspect
of it. I'm willing. Give to me. You also see his
willingness and his call. Matthew 11, 28 says, come unto
me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give
you rest. I want you to consider something
for a second. If I haven't been emphatic about
this enough as it is, I want you to understand something.
God does not love all men. He loves His elect. He loves Christ
and everyone in Him. Christ did not die for all men.
If He did, all men would be saved, because the Lord Jesus Christ
is incapable of failure. He cannot. Everyone He died for
must be saved. There's one group of people that
are going to be saved, and they must be saved, and those are God's
elect. And you know what? The door of salvation is wide
open for any sinner in need of mercy. Now, I'm going to give
you a scripture to support that. John 6, 37 says, all that the
Father giveth me shall come to me. Now, that's the sovereignty
of God in salvation. Everyone the Father gave me in
divine election, who I've redeemed, the Spirit is going to call,
and they're going to come running. They've got no other choice,
and they want no other choice. It's called irresistible, invincible
grace. That's the sovereignty of God. Here's the promise. All
that the Father giveth me shall come to me, and him that cometh
to me, I will in no wise cast out. Every sinner in need of mercy
who comes to Christ, he's never put one out. Why does a man come
to Christ? Why does a man cleave to Christ?
Does he come about that naturally? No, the fact that a man comes
to Christ and he believes on him It is simply the evidence
of his election. He has the right, he's absolutely
willing, and he's able. Hebrews 7.25 says, wherefore,
he is able also to save them to the uttermost. That means
completely. That means with absolutely no
help, without any contribution from anyone else, he is able
to save them to the uttermost that come to God by him, seeing
he ever liveth to make intercession. Now, quickly, look at verse 5
and 6 of Ruth 2. Let's see what Boaz has to say.
Then said Boaz unto his servant that was said over the reapers,
whose damsel is this? And the servant that was said over the
reapers answered and said, it is the Moabitish damsel that
came back with Naomi out of the country of Moab. Now, I want
you to think about this for a second. Here is Boaz, this great, strong
ruler, wealthy, powerful man, And he's looking out over his
field, and there's all these beggars leaning in his field. And he
looks out and he says, who's that? The servant says, it's
another beggar. There's hundreds of them out
here. He's like, no, that one. My affection is upon that one.
My love is upon that one. That one right there, who's that?
Folks, that's sovereign love. Irruth is leaning in his field.
She's not looking for Boaz. She didn't know a thing about
Boaz. Doesn't care a thing about Boaz. But Boaz finds her. Says,
that one. I want that one. Look at verse
15. Boaz is going to act on that
love. And when she was risen up to glean, Boaz commanded his
young men saying, let her glean even among the she's and reproach
her not and let fall also some of the handfuls of purpose for
her and leave them that she may glean them and rebuke her not. Boaz loved this girl. You know
what he's going to do because he loves her? He's going to provide everything
she needs, and he's going to do it on purpose. Everything
she needs is going to be right there in that field for her,
and he's going to do it on purpose. He looks at his servant and said,
you, when you're packing that grand alone, you drop some on
the ground and you do it on purpose just for her, with her name on
it. You want to feel small for a second. When the father was
pinning this creation in his mind, when he was architecting
all this together, When he was penning it out, he had the names
of his people written on that script, leaving handfuls of purpose
for us right along the way. He planned it all out. Everything
God does, he does on purpose. Now look what he tells Ruth.
Look at verse 8. Then said Boaz unto Ruth, hearest thou not my
daughter? Go not to glean in another field, neither go from
hence, but abide here fast by my maidens. Let them eyes be
on the field that they do reap, and go thou after them. Have
I not charged the young men that they shall not touch thee? And
without a thirst, go into the vessels and drink of that which
the young men have drawn." Here's what he's saying. Ruth, come
here. You see this? This is my field. All right?
Everything you need is right here in this field. All right?
You need food? It's right there on the ground.
I left it there for you on purpose. You need water? Go up there. It's
already drawn for you. You don't even have to lift the
bucket. You drink and it's never going to run dry. You need protection. I've charged everybody. Nobody's
going to touch you while you're in my field. Everything you need,
Ruth, is in my field. Now don't go to another field.
And this is Christ. This is Lord Jesus Christ. He
says, I'm everything. I'm everything. You stay right
here. I'm your wisdom. I'm your righteousness. I'm your
sanctification. I'm your redemption. I'm everything. All right. I
have everything you need. I've provided it all. There's
nothing you need to do. Now don't go to another field.
Don't go to the field of salvation by works. There's nothing to
eat there. There's no water there. There's no protection there.
There's nothing for you there. I'm everything you need. Don't leave." Now look at Ruth's response,
verse 10. Then she fell on her face and bowed herself to the
ground and said unto him, why have I found grace in thine eyes
that thou shouldest take knowledge of me, seeing I am a stranger. I think one of the most beautiful
things to watch in this life is to watch the Lord deal with
a person in real time. Because, at least in my experience,
a lot of times you hear someone who hears the gospel for the
first time, and the question comes up, why doesn't God love everybody?
Why doesn't he save everybody? That's not fair. That's not fair. He could have saved everybody.
Why didn't he do that? And these questions come up, well, why
not? Why not? And eventually, it works on them. It works on
them. Eventually, that question is not, But why not everybody?
It's why anybody? Why would he have mercy on any
of us? Look at how terrible we are. Look at what we did to his
son when he walked upon this earth. And then after a while,
that question becomes, why would he want anything to do with me?
I'm a stranger. Why would he want anything to
do with me? But folks, I tell you what, I've
gone over the time, gotten too deep into it. So I'm going to
stop here and maybe pick up another time.