Good morning, everybody. Thank
you all for having me back and my family. Thanks to Mark and
Regina. It's no easy task. We're down
one, too. We only brought three children
with us, so to keep them housed and fed can be a chore, and we're
thankful for you. Thank you for the meal following,
too. Get this clock going. If you will, this morning, turn
with me to the Book of Ruth. The Book of Ruth. You got Joshua,
Judges, Ruth, and then 1 and 2 Samuel and the Kings. The Book
of Ruth. Brother Paul Mahan had in his
bulletin last week, he's going to be preaching from Ruth. They
put down the Book of Boaz. And he had a correction email
that come out. And I wrote him, I said, no, that's right. This
is the Book of Boaz. It just concerns Ruth, and we're
Ruth. I told him my message is what? Does grace do? What does grace
do? There's a whole lot of people
walk up and down the streets of this world that talk about
grace. Well, Lord's grace is to us. And we just, you know,
leaned on the Lord's grace. And what's that mean? Grace does
something. What's it do? That's what we
want to see, don't we? It's a lot of people agree that
there's amazing grace, but do we find grace amazing? I hope
we can. I hope we can. I learned this
from another preacher friend of mine. I won't tell you my
text today, because you might get scared and get up and walk
out, or just drift on to sleep. But stay with me, and I pray
this will be a blessing to you. It was to me. Here in Ruth, I
want to give you the characters up front. If you want to take
notes, you can write these down, but I'll try to remind you throughout.
This takes place in Moab. The word Moab means child of
incest. Remember, that was the offspring
of Lot and his daughters. Emelech. The god of kings, lowercase
kings. That represents Adam. That's
what we're going to see in Imalek. Naomi is pleasant. It means agreeableness. But it also means grace. Naomi's
name means grace. And then you got Mahalon. That
means made sick. Sickness. Chileon. These are
Imalek's sons. Judgment. Destruction. Could
you imagine naming your children? Look at this precious baby. What
am I going to name this child? Destruction. Who would do such
a thing? This happened, and this is for
us. Let's learn from it. Chileans instruction, orpha,
stiff-necked. Ruth means an added acquaintance. That means an added friend, a
gained friend. And Boaz. I looked up Boaz a
lot of different ways. And it's a name of a pillar there
in the temple, but the temple ain't come yet. And so it says
it's a name of unused meaning, of unused source. This is something
that's never been uttered. This is something nobody's ever
heard of, was Boaz. Let's look as we can here in
Ruth 1, be on the lookout for the Lord Jesus Christ. That's
Boaz. But look for who he is and what
he did. He's been gracious to a people
from before time. Father set his love on the people
before there ever was a world and was gracious to us, been
merciful to us. Let's look for that. Here in
Ruth 1 verse 1. Now it came to pass in the days
when the judges ruled that there was a famine in the land. Famine
came. God sent famine. That's who sent
it. And a certain man of Bethlehem, Judah, Bethlehem, Judah means
the house of bread, went to sojourn in the country of Moab, he and
his wife and his two sons. And the name of the man was Emelech. And the name of his wife, Naomi,
Grace, In the name of his two sons, Mahlon, sickness, and Chileon,
judgment, destruction. Ephratoths of Bethlehem, Judah.
Of Bethlehem, Ephrathah. This is where Christ was born.
And they came into the country of Moab, and they continued there. They came down from this house
of bread, and they went to the booming economy of Moab during
a famine, and they kept on continuing there. Emelech, this is a picture
of our natural father, Adam. And what he did, he willingly
came down. You know, Naomi, it doesn't say
Naomi and those boys were kicking and screaming. We don't want
to go to Moab. No, they willingly went with him, didn't they? And
when we come down to this land of Moab that we're living in
right now, don't we just continue on? We see sin and it disgusts
us, and then we wake up next day and keep on going. We just
willingly continue, don't we? Verse three. And Emelech, Naomi's
husband, died. And she was left and her two
sons. And they took them wives of the women of Moab. It came,
the name of the woman was Orpha, stiff-necked. And the name of
the other was Ruth, an added friend. And they dwelled there
about ten years. And Mahalon and Chileon died.
Also both of them. Sickness and judgment are put
away. Sickness and judgment's gone.
It's dead. Both of them. And the woman,
Naomi, Grace was left. Sickness is gone. Death's gone. What's left? Grace is left. Of
her two sons and her husband. The only original one left is
grace. Verse six. Then she arose with her daughters-in-law
that she might return from the country of Moab for she had heard. She heard in the land and the
country of Moab how the Lord had visited his people in Giving
them bread. Grace is going to declare something
grace does. It declares that Christ was victorious. Grace
declares to sinners that our sin sickness is dead forever.
It declares to sinners, the Lord's being gracious in doing this,
judgment's put away. There's therefore now no condemnation.
Them that are in Christ. Destruction's put away. And the
Father's provided all of this for his people in his Son, the
living bread. That's what Naomi had heard.
That's what some of you've heard. That's what I've heard. And it's
God's grace for us. And when we tell others, I've
learned these things now, I will instruct everyone. Lord's grace
is to me. And the fact that I could tell
somebody, it's the weirdest thing to have somebody thank you after
you preach. For me, it's just awkward. It's the Lord's grace
if you are blessed by it, right? that's his it's his his his doing
his unmerited favor and as it pleases him to bless his people
he's the payment he's the reward and he's the cake and we get
to eat it too it's a precious thing you think everyone had
heard that there was bread in jerusalem there in bethlehem
bethlehem means the house of bread you think anyone had ever
heard that there was bread in the house of bread Why, that's
the name of it. We're just silly, ain't we? Born
of Adam, born of ourselves, and willingly, we're just ignorant.
Where can we find bread? Well, the house of bread may
be a good place to start. Where could we find salvation?
Salvations of the Lord go to Him. Seems just blatantly obvious,
doesn't it? Brother Todd was preaching that
the other day about requirements of a bishop, and
he said, you know, you find somebody that's been on drugs real bad,
or they murdered some people, been in prison, and they come
to some kind of religion, they say, oh, put them in a pulpit.
They got a good, they got a good testimony, don't they? Well,
they've been married before. Oh, hold on. We can't do that. That's silly, isn't it? Things
that we think, things that I think. Life is in the Savior. Life's
in that bread and salvation's of the Lord and it's his house.
It's his house of bread. Some have believed that report,
haven't they? Naomi did. How? Says she heard. She heard. So then faith come
by hearing and hearing by the word of God, by his testimony,
by his declaration. Look here in verse seven. Wherefore
she went forth out of the place where she was and her two daughters
law with her. And when they went on their way,
they returned to the land of Judah. And Naomi said unto her
two daughters-in-law, Go, return each of her mother's house. You
go back to your mommy's house. The Lord deal kindly with you,
and ye have dealt with the dead and me. The Lord be with you,
same as you have been with us, but you go back to where you
live. Grace is saying this. What? How could that be? Grace
would say, you go ahead and go back home to where you was if
you can, if you can. Grace doesn't chase people in
a parking lot and belittle them and coerce them into coming back,
does it? Grace doesn't use trickery to
do these things. It says there's bread in the
house of the Lord. If you're hungry, come on. There has to
be a need. There has to be a hunger there,
doesn't it? How could that be right? Does that sound crazy? What did the Lord say? Thousands left what seemed to
be a booming ministry, didn't it? And there's 12 left. And
I said, you might offend these folks, Lord. And he said, you
going to leave too? Are you going to go also? I said,
Lord, to whom shall we go? Your life. We have to be with
you. Look here in verse 9. The Lord
grant you that you may find rest. each of you in the house of her
husband. Then she kissed them, and they
lifted up their voice. Both of them did. They lifted
up their voice and wept. And they said unto her, surely
we will return with thee, with unto thee, unto thy people. The free in Ruth and the stiff-necked
in Orpah, both of them had the same outward profession, didn't
they? Sounded the same, looked the same. Both of them cried,
but one had saving faith. If someone's sane, they want
to go to heaven and not hell. That'd make good sense, wouldn't
it? Anybody does. I'd rather have a good day than
have a bad day, wouldn't you? If we're sane. Some people might
even shed some tears over it, over sadness. Esau shed tears. He wept bitterly. Judas, he shed
tears. But when they find out, those
with a false profession, when they find out that all that there
is in that house of bread ain't just a full belly, All that's
there is Christ. That's all we got. Just a person? Yeah, we got a person. They have
no interest. That false profession says, you
know what, I'm good. I'll just go back to Moab. And
that's what Orpah did, didn't it? Saving faith, it clings to
Christ. It clings to the one who is gracious.
That's what saving faith does. We may have family and friends
and joy being around them and people we like. Or we may have
someone that tries to talk us into coming to church with them
or those things. And I was a child, I was just
made to. I didn't ask my children if they'd
like to come to church today. I said, get dressed, we're going to church.
But that motivation ain't enough. That ain't it. There's gotta
be a hunger and a thirst and a desire for bread. Christ the
living bread. Our text says there in verse
14, And they lifted up their voice
and wept again. And Orpah kissed her mother-in-law.
She said, I love you. Oh, it sounded so good. That
really caught me the last couple of years. When John said that
in 1 John, he said, there'll be those that say that we love
the Lord, but they don't love their brethren. That means there's
a human standing there looking somebody in the eye saying, I
believe this. I love you. But they don't. Orpah said, I love you. And oh,
tears were crying and snot was flying. And then she went home.
Ruth cried too, but what would Ruth do? Cling to her. She clave
unto her mother, to her mother-in-law. She clung to him. Orpah gave
good lip service, a tear or two, but grace is what was needed. She left grace for something
else. Ruth clung to grace. Ruth, that friend that was added,
clave to her and wouldn't let go. We're gonna have to be there. Verse 15. And she said, behold,
thy sister-in-law has gone back to her people and unto her gods. Return thou after thy sister-in-law. Orpah, you've known her for 10
years. Y'all been family. She just left. Go with her. Go
with her. To whom shall we go? To whom? As your pastor said before, we're
saved against our will with our full consent. We're made willing
in the day of God's power. Willing. We don't grit our teeth
and say, well, that's an accurate gospel that we agree to, we give
mental assent to. Yes, I don't want to hear nothing
else. You don't want to hear nothing
else. That's what we need. We're hungry. When a true sinner's
joined to the Lord Jesus Christ, it's by grace, and that's the
grace of God. And when that takes place, there's
unity. There's contentment. We'll see in a minute. Happy
comes from happenstance. That means every now and then.
Us doing cartwheels and being bubbly all day long ain't normal.
But contentment, being satisfied, just being thankful and in agreement
that that's what the Lord's done for us. Verse 16. And Ruth said,
entreat me not to leave thee. Had added friends, said don't
tell me to go. Or to return from following after
thee. For whither thou goest, I'll go. And whither thou lodgest,
I will lodge. And thy people shall be my people,
and thy God, my God. Where you die, I'm gonna die.
And where you're buried, I'm gonna be buried. And the Lord
do so to me, and more so, if aught but death part thee and
me. Till death do us part, is what
Ruth said. Unity, we're married together. Good, bad, or ugly, we're in
this for the long haul. commitment, isn't it? Verse 18,
when she saw that there was, she was steadfast, when Naomi
said, well, this one's just here. She ain't going to leave. She was steadfastly minded to
go with her. Then she left speaking unto her. She quit bugging her
to leave. She said, all right, well, I
guess you're here now. That pushing back on her had stopped. Brother
Mahan said, This message of Ruth, this isn't just four chapters.
This book of Ruth's not just four chapters about a devoted
pagan girl who really stuck with her mother-in-law. That's not
what this is about. That's what happened to take
place, but that's not what the message is here. Many people,
they walk away from this verse about Ruth saying, wherever you
go, I go. Wherever you die, I'm going to die. And I said, boy,
look at her commitment. And they have high thoughts of
Ruth, of what good things Ruth did. But to truly understand
this, we have to see what Christ has done. That's what we have
to see. Or we just got a good story.
That's all we got. Naomi didn't try to run her off
anymore. She said, if you're here, you're
serious. If you want to leave, leave. I ain't chasing you out
the parking lot. If you ever need, you'll come eat. That's
fine. That's been established now. Once that's took place,
once we see this commitment, that there's a new attitude,
a new life that's been created, there's going to be some walking.
Remember, they're physically in Moab. They're not in Bethlehem. And how are we going to get to
Bethlehem? Well, it's going to start with one step, and you're going to
put your left foot in front of the right foot, and you're going
to keep walking. And I thought, you know, they
may walk a long way out in the heat and out in that famine before
they ever even get out of Moab, before they get into Israel and
they start getting into Bethlehem. That's going to be a long journey.
How could that take place? How could we suffer? Such a thing. Grace would have to be with us.
Ruth didn't walk there by herself. She walked with Naomi, didn't
she? She walked with grace. Goodness and mercy shall follow. That's what Spurgeon said. Goodness
goes before us. And as we walk through this sinful
life, mercy follows behind and covers it up. And grace walks
with us the whole way. That's what happens. Verse 19.
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? I said, that's the one
that left. Naomi used to be here, and we
knew her well, and she left, and boy, she don't look the same.
Some of y'all knew me when I was, I look a little bit rougher than
I used to, don't I, Shelby? It's hard to believe I ain't
as handsome, I used to be more handsome than I am now, but it's so. They
said, is that Naomi? She'd walked a long way. She'd
been through a hard famine. She'd been down there in a bad
place, lost her husband, lost both her sons, and come back
with some Moabitess, some son of sin, some son of incest. Verse
22, so Naomi returned and Ruth the Moabitess, her daughter-in-law,
with her, which returned out of the country of Moab. And they
came to Bethlehem in the beginning of the barley harvest. They got
there, and today's the first day. We're hungry. We're going
to starve to death. I don't have a man to lead me.
Ruth didn't have a husband no more. What are we going to do?
Well, let's go back to the house of bread. The day they showed
up, they said, today's the first harvest. We're bringing in the
barley right now. Look at that. Like it's never
happened before. Like it's brand new the first time. Some of you
all have heard the gospel as long as I've been alive. Have
you ever heard the gospel proclaimed like you've never heard it ever?
How amazing this is. That's another unbelievable thing,
too. We had real good food yesterday. And I was like, this is just
great. You know, I liked the meal last week, too, and yesterday
morning, and I'm probably going to like the meal here a little
bit. I'm getting hungry. This is good food. It's like it's
the first time. It's amazing. It says in Lamentations
3, the Lord's mercies It's of the Lord's mercies we're not
consumed, because His compassions fail not. It's because of His
mercies we're not consumed, and because of His compassion we
fail not. They're new every morning. Which one's new every morning,
mercies or compassion? Yes. Both. Great is thy faithfulness. Great is His faithfulness. All
of this redemption, all this life, all this mercy, it's centered
on one man, and that's Boaz. Look here in chapter 2, verse
1. You'll see a picture here that the Old Testament law, this
is what was given, this kinsman redeemer. And that kinsman redeemer,
if somebody had died, if a lady's husband had died, for someone
to redeem that person or that namesake of their kinsman, they
had to be related. That was the first thing. For
a kinsman, you have to be kin. Kinsman had to be related. And
that kinsman redeemer had to be able to redeem. They had to
have the means to do it. And then they didn't grit their
teeth and do it. They had to be willing. You had to want to. You had to
want to. That's what Boaz was. Look here
in Ruth 2, verse 1. And Naomi had a kinsman of her
husband's, a mighty man of wealth, of the family of Lemuel. And
his name was Boaz. He's kin. He's a mighty man of
wealth. But love's what made him willing.
Not because he had to. Not because he's forced to. Love
made him willing. I would say we look at rest this
Tuesday, but I'm 20 minutes in, and I'll go real fast. If I talk
fast, you listen fast, and we'll be happy, okay? Here's what Grace
does. I'm gonna do the whole book.
But I'll go a lot quicker than I did the first chapter. Grace
does something. tells you that your whole life,
when you finally meet Christ, and He's revealed. He's been
there all the time, hasn't He? Grace reveals to me, and it has
to you. You've been leaning in His field
the whole time. All the rebellion I had from
birth, being conceived in my mother's womb, being conceived
in sin, speaking lies from birth, when the Lord revealed Himself
to me, I said, this whole time, He's been taking care of me.
This whole time, I've been eating good and didn't know it, thinking
I was doing it. Just like Gomer, right? Look
at what my lovers did. Boy, they're feeding me good.
The whole time it's Hosea feeding her, wasn't it? Look here in
chapter 2, verse 3. And she went and came and gleaned
in the field after the reapers, and her hat was to light on a
part of the field belonging to Boaz. who was of the kindred
of Elimelech. Ruth, it says here, it was her
happenstance. She just so happened to land
in the field of Boaz, her kinsman-redeemer. That's what most people think.
And I read that, and you know what I think? The Lord's the
greatest story teller there ever was. You talk about, and think
of the grace of that. It's not just this is a story
that we need to study and we need to really dig deep in the
words. The Lord's telling us a story to make us fall in love
with him. or to tell us of his love again. That's precious,
isn't it? And he's using words we can understand.
Maybe a little sarcasm in there. She just happened to show up,
and we know exactly how she happened to show up. He lured her into
the wilderness, didn't he, and hedged her about. Look at verse
8. It says, Then said Boaz to Ruth, Hearest not thou, my daughter? Go not to glean in another field.
Neither go from hence, but abide here fast by my maids. You don't
go anywhere else. You found bread, you found your
kinsman redeemer, you stay right here, right here with me. Well,
I'm going to go visit, we may go visit other fields of Boaz.
We may go to another one of his paddocks, but we don't need to
find another man to take care of us. We've got the man, don't
we? Verse nine, let thine eyes be on the field that they do
reap, and go thou after them. Have I not charged the young
men that they should not touch thee? And when thou art a thirst,
go to the vessels and drink of that which the young men have
drawn. If you come to my field, you're hungry, you glean what
you want to. I'll have handfuls of purpose out for you. You're
thirsty, we've already got water drawn up. I've sent the young
men out to gather water. That's what Moses said, you know.
Do I have to fetch water for you? Yeah, that's your job. That's my job. If you're thirsty,
maybe we'll look at that Tuesday. If someone's truly thirsty, that's
all I gotta do. I didn't make the water. I didn't even make
the pots it's in. I just say, here. It's good water. I've drunk it. You drink it.
You drink it. And that's what Boaz is telling
her. He said, You drank what you want. Eat what you want.
Verse 10. Then she fell on her face and bowed herself to the
ground. This is what that added friend
that's from a horrible land, from a terrible family. She bowed
herself to the ground and said unto him, Why have I found grace
in thine eyes, that thou shalt take knowledge of me, seeing
I am a stranger? Why? If someone finds Christ precious,
do you ask yourself that? Why me? This is too good to be
true. Why in the world would the Lord
save a wretch like me? Now, we sing country songs about
why not me? That's our nature, isn't it?
Of course it'd be me. No, when that humility's been
put in, that new creation's been put in us, why would Christ be
so gracious to a worm? Why would he thank on someone
so low as me? And grace confirms that the Lord
is gracious to us. Look here in verse 20, Ruth 2,
verse 20. And Naomi said to her daughter,
grace is speaking to Ruth, that added friend. Naomi said to her
daughter-in-law, blessed be he of the Lord who hath not left
off his kindness to the living and to the dead. And Naomi said
unto her, the man is near of kin unto us, one of our next
kinsmen. This is the Lord's doing. Praise
the Lord for these things. She said, there's grace all around.
Grace tells us that there's grace that goes before. Grace tells
us that grace is what's going on while the Lord's being gracious
to us. And grace tells us there's grace for the grace that hasn't
graciously come to pass yet. It's all around us. I know it
felt just so sad and so down, and there was just nothing I
could have to say to encourage it. And I was like, get you a
pencil and piece of paper out and just start writing down the
good things the Lord's done for you. That we ought to thank him
for broccoli. Right? We got clean air and clean
water and plenty of food to eat, and I'm not being stung by bees
right now. Write that down. And all of a
sudden, maybe it'll be a good exercise. We'll start thanking
him for stuff. and realizing he does more for us than we could
ever imagine, doesn't he? His grace is abundant. Do you
find that amazing? We've sang amazing grace, but
is that grace found to be amazing? To me, to you. Grace guides us to be with those
that experience the same grace. Look here in verse 22. And Naomi
said unto Ruth, her daughter-in-law, it's good, my daughter, that
thou go out with his maidens, that they may meet thee not in
any other field. It's good that you're with those
that's experienced grace. Do you find it good to be with
your brethren? I'm glad to be here. I look forward to eat and
talk with you. We can talk about hunting. We
can talk about what type of pickup truck you drive. And then I tell
you, it'll bleed in naturally. Bill shot a deer last week, and
his son did too. And look at the deer the Lord
provide us. Ain't we thankful for that? everything we need
he's given us. It's amazing. That's what Grace
is telling us. You stay with his maidens, with
the Lord's maidens, the King's daughters. And don't you go to
any other field. Grace seeks to give us rest.
It doesn't stop there. It keeps getting better. Look
at chapter 3, verse 1. Then Naomi, her mother-in-law,
said unto her, My daughter, Shall I not seek rest for thee, that
it may be well with thee? How's grace going to give us
rest? Well, grace don't give us rest,
but it sure does direct us, it points us to where peace is found,
to where rest is found. Look at verse two, Ruth 3 verse
two. And now it is not boas of our
kindred, now not as boas of our kindred, with whose maidens thou
wast. Behold, he winneth barley tonight
in the threshing floor. Wash thyself, therefore, and
anoint thee. Put on thy raiment upon thee, and get thee down
to the floor. Every one of y'all woke up this
morning, and you got ready, and you combed your hair, brushed
your teeth, and all those things. You got prepared, like David shaved his
face and anointed his head. And we come down, don't we? Come
down to his floor. But make not thyself known unto
the man. Don't make a big example of yourself. Don't ring the bell
and say, I'm here. Everybody look at me. Don't make
thyself known until he shall have done eating and drinking.
Wait till he's done. We wait on the Lord. And it shall
be when he lies down that thou shalt mark the place where he
shall lie and thou shalt go in and uncover his feet and lay
down. Lay thee down and he will tell
thee what thou should do. You get down. Where? All the
way down to the Redeemer's feet. People say that's terrible. That's submission. Why would
we? No, no, that's grace talking. That's a good place to be. Be
brought down to the Redeemer's feet and just wait on him. Just
wait on him. Who's going to make all the decisions?
Wait on him. Don't you see everything he's
done for us already? Them handfuls of purpose he's laid out, the
vessels of water he's laid out. Just wait on him. Get by his
feet. That's where Mary was, wasn't
it? She found the good thing. Where?
At his feet. At his feet, get down. Clean up now, smell as
good as you can, and get down to his feet. Boaz came in from
supper and went to lay down, and he was startled by Ruth being
there. But Ruth's only response to that
was to beg for mercy. Look at chapter 3, verse 9. And
he said, Who art thou? And she answered, I am Ruth,
thine handmaid. I ain't nobody but a servant.
Nobody. Spread therefore thy skirt over
thine handmaid. for there art near kinsmen."
She said, you just spread your robe over me. I was going to
ask Rex if he knew what I was preaching from this morning. That robe of righteousness. What
do you want? I want covered in Christ's righteousness.
Like Philemon, at the end of that's a subscript, Onesimus
wrote it. It's about the hand of Onesimus to Philemon, that
runaway slave. What do you got to say to yourself,
Onesimus? You read what Paul wrote. You read the words of
Christ is what you read. I need that covering is what
I need. Cover me with your robe. There's no earthly picture of
where Boaz was startled. There's no earthly picture that
just perfectly portrays everything, but we're given these tokens.
The Lord gives us Ruth, and he's gave us Hosea, and he's gave
us all these different things, and these parables throughout,
and he's spoken parables to us, and that's gracious. He went
to farmers and talked to them about seed. He went to shepherds
and talked to them about sheep. He went to fishermen. Cast your
hook. Don't even bait it. You don't
need no fancy lures. Just put it over. I'll put a fish on that
hook for you. Don't you worry about it. He speaks to us where
we are, meets us. Verse 12, chapter 3, verse 12.
And now it's true that I am thy near kinsman. How be it? There
is a kinsman nearer than I. There's another kinsman. Got
first claim on you. Tarry this night, and it shall
be in the morning, that if he will perform unto thee the part
of a kinsman, well, that's fine enough. Let him do the kinsman
part, but if he will not do the part of a kinsman to thee, then
will I do the part of the kinsman to thee, as the Lord liveth.
Lie down until the morning." Well, before this honeymoon kicks
off, the law must be satisfied. That's the first one that had
the bondage to us that we're bound to. And if we're going
to be redeemed, if we're going to be justified, if we're going
to be glorified, that law must be satisfied and dealt with first. Who's going to handle that law?
It ain't Ruth. Who's going to take care of this
law? It ain't us, is it? We aren't the ones that do it.
We can't deal with the law. So how's it going to happen? How's
this marriage, this redemption from Boaz going to be legal?
How's it going to be holy? How's it going to be right and
proper? It has to be above par, doesn't it? That was the question
that was asking Job, the oldest book in the Bible, a couple of
times. How can a man be just before God? How can a man born
a woman be made clean to the very holy God that we willfully
was at war with. How could that be? Grace tells
us when we say how. Naomi speaks to us. Grace tells
us, wait on the Lord. That's scary. It's between Boaz
and the law. Boaz says, I'll take care of
it. This ain't life and death, this is eternal life and death.
Wildly important. And Grace says, be still, be
still. Look here in chapter 3, verse 18. Then said she, Naomi,
Grace, sit still, my daughter, speaking to that added friend,
until thou knowest how the matter will fall, for the man will not
be in rest until he hath finished the thing this day. He ain't
going to sleep. He ain't going to sleep till
he gets the job done. This is before Christ was on that cross
and said, it's finished. Job's done. There ain't nothing
else to be done. It's all done. It's complete.
It's finished. But he ain't going to sleep until that happens.
I thought of Psalm 121. Behold, he that keepeth Israel
shall neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord's thy keeper. The Lord
is thy shade upon thy right hand. He said, you ain't going to get
sunburned. The sun ain't going to spot you by day, and you ain't
going to get moonburned either. It ain't going to spot you by
night. You ever been moonburned? You've just been worried to death
over something and you're up all night and all you see is
the moon and it's like it's just burning you because you just
wish you'd go to sleep. The Lord said, I ain't going
to bother you. He ain't going to rest until
it's taken care of. Now chapter four, Ruth chapter four, verse one. Then went Boaz up to the gate
and set him down there and behold, the kinsman of whom Boaz spake
came by and to whom he said, oh, such a one, turn aside, sit
down here. And he turned aside and sat down.
And he took 10 men of the elders of the city and said, set ye
down here. And they sat down. Laws come
in with 10 witnesses there. 10 elders are there. And he said
unto the kinsman, Naomi that has come out again out of the
country of Moab, she's selling a parcel of land, which is our
brother Elimelech. Remember Adam is who Emelech
pictures. And this is his offspring. And
this dirt This sin-cursed land that we own, that's all of ours,
has to be dealt with. And I thought to advertise thee,
saying, Buy it before the inhabitants, and before the elders of my people.
If thou wilt redeem it, redeem it. But if thou wilt not redeem
it, tell me, that I may know. For there is none to redeem besides
thee, and I after thee. And here's what the law said.
Now we're just talking about a piece of land, right? That's what he brought
up. And the law says, I'll redeem it. I'll declare what this is. I can bring in the house prayer.
I'll be the way. That's what I got to take care
of. I'll do that. Verse five. Then said Boaz, what day thou
buyest the field of the hand of Naomi? You're thinking of
just a legal transaction, but it goes more than that. Thou
must buy it also of Ruth the Moabitess, the wife of the dead
to raise up the name of the dead upon his inheritance. This isn't
just legal land transaction that you so eagerly to agree to law.
You got to give life. You want to take this bride,
this added friend, and produce offspring for Elimile, for that
name, and bring life out of that relationship. Wait a minute,
the law says. First off, I didn't know about
this woman that's Moabite. That's a lawbreaker. That's a child
of incest. That's a horrible thing from
birth. I thought we was talking about
land. That had nothing to do with that. And I can't bring forth
life. That's not what my inheritance
is for nobody. I just declare what's right and what's wrong.
I can't give life. That's what Paul told us in Galatians
3, wasn't it? When he wrote to the church at
Galatia. He said, if there had been a law given which could
give life, verily righteousness would have come by the law. If
that was possible, that's the way it worked. He said, but the
scripture hath concluded everybody's under sin. We're all Moabites.
We're all from aliens. We're from a land, we don't belong
here. We're trespassing. We're all
under sin. That, the reason for that is
the promise by faith of Jesus Christ, not our faith in him.
His faithfulness, his roba righteousness might be given to them that believe.
Just given, graciously given. Here you go, have it. Look here
in chapter four, verse six. The kinsman said, I cannot redeem
it for myself, lest I mourn my own inheritance. Redeem thou
my right to the, to thyself, for I cannot redeem it. Boaz,
remember that was the name that's never been uttered. This is no
one's ever heard before. And he says, Boaz, you redeem
it. You redeem it. There's a transaction
at this gate with these 10 elders. and the work's been completed.
What's that gate? That's a cross at Calvary. This is physically
where this come to fruition. This is where that took place.
This is where it happened. Look here in verse nine. And
Boaz said to the elders and unto all the people, your witnesses
this day, you saw it. Who are they witnesses to? That
I have, Mrs. Cross speaking, I have bought
all that was on Lemelix. I've paid everything. and all
that was Chileans and Mahalans of the hand of Naomi. Everything
that comes from the hand of grace I paid for and your witnesses. That's what the elders declare.
That's the elders declare in this day too, isn't it? What
Christ has done, what he's done. It says, moreover, verse 10,
moreover Ruth, my cat wasn't good enough. Moreover, Ruth the
Moabitess, that pagan rebel, the wife of Mahalon, the wife
of sin sickness, I have purchased to be my wife, I bought her,
to raise up the name of the dead upon his inheritance, that the
name of the dead be not cut off from among his brethren, and
from the gate of this place, ye are witnesses this day." Who
was that first husband of Naomi? That was the first Adam, wasn't
it? What's this declared? The second Adam. The fall of
the first and the redemption of the second. And all the people
that were in the gate, all those that's gathered at the cross,
all come to the feet of Christ. And the elder said, we're witnesses.
Witnesses. What are we witness? Well, we're
out witnessing. That means you're knocking on doors and you're
doing this and that. No. What are you doing in a court of law?
Just tell what you saw. You don't tell what you didn't
see. You just tell the truth. Well, it's like that blind man
that was healed. His first testimony said, well, there's a man named
Jesus. And he came and he put mud in my eyes. He did this and he did
that. And then I could see. And then as he kept going on, they
kept asking him again and again and again and again, it kept
getting shorter and shorter and shorter and shorter. And he said, I was
blind. Now see. That's what happened. I don't
know about you, but I knew I didn't see nothing. And now I can see.
Just witnesses, just tell them what you told them. Tell them
what you saw. And Lord gave Boaz and Ruth. This picture of Christ
in this picture, this added friend gave her a son through Boaz and
Naomi. Grace is the very one. She rejoiced
in that son, and she nourished it. She nourished it. Look in
chapter four, verse 16. And Naomi, grace, took the child,
this offspring, this offspring of the bride. That's what every
generation of believers. Grace comes and laid it in her bosom,
and she became nurse to it. The Lord sends grace to nourish
us and keep us and feed us with that sincere milk of the word
throughout our lives. And that boy's name was Obed.
Who's this all leading to? Verse 21. And Sam beget Boaz,
and Boaz beget Obed, and Obed beget Jesse, and Jesse beget
David. There's our David. Every bit
of this is a picture of our rebellion, our willing rebellion of the
Lord's grace coming to us and just taking us and hedging us
about and putting us by happenstance, right? right in that field, and
feeding us, and covering us in His robe of righteousness, and
blessing us, and defending us, and upholding the law for us,
and then giving life through that. I want my children to know
this gospel. I want your children to know
this gospel. What's going to happen in 100 years if we're
still here? The same message is going to be preached. And
what's going to be the end state? Here's our King David. That's the beginning
of it. That's the continuance of it.
And that's the culmination of it. That's all of him. I hope
that was a blessing to you. I hope I didn't go too long either.
Where do you stop? I started writing on that and
I thought, well, I'll do a little bit of chapter 2 and a little
bit of chapter 3. Well, I'll just keep on going. I guess we're
close. But it's always precious. Thank you for having us. And
I pray for you all and pray for me and my family. Lord willing,
we'll see you Tuesday and after service this morning. So thank
you. Brother Rick.