If you will, turn with me to
the book of Ruth. The book of Ruth. I'm going to do this morning
kind of an overview of the book of Ruth, using chapters 1 through
4. And that's a lot to read, so
I'm just going to read you the end of the book, and you'll know
how the war comes out. Ruth chapter 4. Then went Boaz up to the gate. That's where the old timers did
all their business, was at the gate of the city. And sat him
down there, and behold, the kinsmen of whom Boaz spake came by, unto
whom he said, Ho, such one, turn aside, sit down right here. And
he turned aside and sat down. And he took ten men of the elders
of the city and he said, set ye down here. And they sat down. And he said unto the kinsman,
Naomi that is come again out of the country of Moab selleth
a parcel of land which was our brother Elimelech's. 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,
then tell me that I may know, for there is none to redeem it
beside thee, and I am after thee. And he said, I will redeem it. Then said Boaz, what day thou
buyest the field? of the hand of Naomi. 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." In other words,
you have to marry Ruth. And the kinsman said, I cannot
redeem it for myself, lest I mar my own inheritance. Redeem thou
my right to thyself, for I cannot redeem it. Now this was the manner
and form of time in Israel concerning redeeming and concerning changing. For to confirm all things a man
plucked off his shoe and gave it to his neighbor. And this
was a testimony in Israel. Therefore the kinsman said unto
Boaz, buy it for thee. So he drew off his shoe. And
Boaz said unto the elders and unto all the people, Ye are witnesses
this day, that I have bought all that was Elimelech's, and
all that was Chileon's, and all that was Mahon's of the hand
of Naomi. Moreover, Ruth the Moabitess,
the wife of Malon, have I purchased to be my wife, 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 his place
ye are witnesses this day." And all the people that were in the
gate and the elders said, we are witnesses. The Lord make
that woman that is come into thine house like Rachel and like
Leah, which two did build the house of Israel, and do thou
worthily in Ephrathah, which is another name for Bethlehem.
And let thy house be like unto the house of Phares, whom Tamar
bare unto Judah, of the seed which the Lord shall give thee
of this young woman. Boaz took Ruth, and she was his
wife. When he went in unto her, the
Lord gave her conception, and she bare a son. And the woman
said unto Naomi, Blessed be the Lord, which hath not left thee
this day without a kinsman, that his name may be famous in Israel. And he shall be unto thee a restorer
of life, and a nurturer of thine old age. For thy daughter-in-law,
which loveth thee, which is better to thee than seven sons, hath
bore him. And who was this one that he
bore? David's grandfather. David's
grandfather, Obe. May the Lord add his blessing
to the reading of his work. to get opportunity this afternoon. I hope you'll go back and read
the book of Ruth. Most of you are familiar with
it. But I invite you to turn back
with me to that book. Ruth was a Gentile by birth,
used in the genealogies of Christ to show us that Christ sprang
from both Jews and Gentiles. He was a representative of all
his elect, whatever they were. The author of the book is totally
unknown, but most believe it was written by Samuel. The subject of the book is the
kinsman-redeemer. That's what it's all about. The
Kinsman Redeemer. And it's a book of redemption. That's what makes it so special. The history given is about a Jewish man and a Jewish woman
leaving God's people Seeing a better opportunity in
the world than to rest in God's care for His people. I've seen it so many times in
my life. I'd love to stay, but I need
the money and there's a job. Isn't that why they left? Hard
times fell. They said, well, we'll go to
Moab. A lot of work in Moab. We'll go
down there. A lot of food in Moab. We'll
go down there. They ain't hurting like we are.
We'll go down there. We'll go down there. Lemuelek was a man, and Naomi
was his wife. They had two sons, Malon and
Chileon. And then he uses the word here
at the very beginning, Ephrathites. Ephrata was just another name
for Bethlehem. Bethlehem, Ephrata, says in the
scriptures. And also that word means a family
of worth and esteem. These were not poor folks. They
had land. They were reputable men and women.
They were well known. Both of his two relatives, Olymmelech's
two relatives, Boaz and the other one whose name is not mentioned,
they were both wealthy landowners, men of means. But they left. And Henry brought
a message on this one time, and he made much of Naomi and Limelech
leaving, and Naomi so proud, sitting up on that wagon, you
know, and they're going to Moab. All kinds of expectations out
there, the world offers this and that, and boy, they were
just filled with expectation, and away they went. When they
got there, it wasn't like they thought it was. Limelech died. He died. And they struggled on
for 10 years, and both boys died. And now she had not only herself
to try to take care of, but she had two daughter-in-laws to take
care of. Things wasn't what they seemed
to be. And then after that, she decided
she heard something. She heard something. Boy, ain't you glad you heard
something? Oh, my soul. He could have just left me in
my way. But he sent somebody with some
truth. And here's what he told them.
There's bread back home. The Lord has visited Bethlehem. And there's bread. There's bread. So she said, I'm going home.
She called her daughter-in-law's tour, and she said, I've got
to go home. I've heard there's bread back
there, and I'm going home. I'm going home. There's nothing
for me here. The world has nothing to offer. And you're free to
go. You want to go home, go. And the officer said, OK, I'm
going. She went back to her home, but
Ruth said, no, I ain't going. I ain't going. She decided to go home, and Ruth
went with her. She said, I ain't leaving you.
And then upon their return, Ruth asked to glean in the fields
where God's providence had led them. Turned out to be a field
of a near kinsman, Boaz. And Boaz looked on Ruth with
favor, and in time he marries her and redeems his brother's
house to himself, raises up seed to his name. And she begat Obed,
and Obed was David's grandfather, Jesse's daddy. Now the Lord willing, I want
us to see seven things, seven lessons in the book of Ruth.
The story of the book of Ruth, the main reason that it's preserved
in scripture is redemption. Redemption. The buying back of
everything that was lost. And then some. She not only got to keep what
was hers in the beginning, but she got to have everything that
was his. When we're married to Christ,
We become heirs of God, joint heirs with Christ. Everything
that He is, is ours. We can't imagine, can we? Just
can't imagine. Nothing to compare it to. And then the first lesson I want
us to see is the high cost of disobedience to God. When God
raises up a church in a certain place, This is where he intends
to center his ministry. Now let that go home. We used to have a term when I
was just a child, and nuclear war become a reality,
and the Cuban crisis had come about, and all of a sudden that's
all you heard on the news was bomb shelters and nuclear bombs
and that type of thing. And the term that was used more
than any other was ground zero. Everything was measured beginning
at ground zero and it went out. 50 miles, 100 miles, 1,000 miles,
everything was measured from ground zero. When God puts a
church in a place, it's ground zero. Right there. If anything's
going to happen, it's going to happen from there. That's where
it's going to happen. You don't believe me, you read
the scriptures. God's church in a local sense
is where God grants his presence. where he declares his gospel
and where he trains his preachers. If there's going to be a preacher,
he ain't going to go call him out of the woods somewhere, he's
going to call him out of that congregation. And he's going
to train him, he's going to learn to pastor by sitting under a
pastor. How'd you learn to be a daddy?
You sit under your daddy. That's right. That's what preachers
are. People say, well, the Lord spoke
to me in my closet and he called me to preach, and so I just went
out on my own and started selling it to your grandma. I ain't buying
it. I ain't buying it. It's not of God. God's church,
in a local sense, is where God grants His presence. You want
to know where God is? Where two or more gather together
in His name. He said, there will I be. You
don't go looking for Him out on the river, or out in the woods
somewhere, or up on a mountain somewhere. He's where God's people
gather at, that's where He's at. And it's perfectly clear to me
in the book of Revelation, the Revelation of Jesus Christ, that
He directed His Word to seven churches. Not thousands of churches everywhere
or any church anywhere, but seven specific churches. And these are given to show us
that this is the pattern he intends to use as he ministers to this
world, not seven. The seven churches were established
in the world at that time. was put there to show us the
completion. This is how God's going to do
this. This is how He's going to do
it. He's going to establish exactly as many churches as needs to
be established. Number seven means completion.
Also means perfection. Perfection. Nothing's going to
work if God don't do it. He'll just blow up. I've only
been here 15 years and I've seen churches split three times down
Spring Hill. It indicates a complete number,
a perfect number, and a number chosen and brought to pass according
to God's sovereign will. When you look on our little map
that we got, our messages go out and so on. It shows every
established church of which we're aware. I realize there could
be some that we're not aware of, but not very many in this
day of communication that we in. And the whole center part
of this country looks like a vacuum. There's nothing there. There's
nothing there. God puts His churches where he
intends to save folks. And he trains his pastors and
evangelists and he sends them out from there. And then believers
are commanded. Are you a believer? You're commanded
of God. You're not asked. This is not
an option. He commands you, forsake not
the assembling of yourselves together. Don't do it. Don't do it. Don't even consider
it to be an option. Unless you're just too sick to
get in the car and be here, be here. That's the commandment
of God. It's for your good. He wouldn't
have commanded it if it wasn't for your good. And especially in the day of
Elimelech and Naomi, they were warned not to mingle their lives
or marry heathens because of their idolatry. and because of
their influence on them. And I don't know if you know
it or not, but this world is filled with heathens. There's
believers and heathens, that's all there is. Now I realize some
of them are sophisticated and they're much more trained in
language and things than I am, far above my head in science
and other things, but they're heathens. They're heathens. They're idolaters,
adulterers. This world is filled with pagan
religion. Well, at least they go to church
somewhere. Oh, I hope you don't feel that way. My soul. It's filled with heathens. They're idolaters, adulterers.
It's filled with pagan religion. To worship God in any other way
than how he's revealed is paganism. Might as well build a totem pole
and dance around it. Same thing. To hope in anything
other than his Redeemer and Christ is paganism. You hoping in a trip down an
aisle? You hoping in a prayer next to a bench? You hoping in
something some man told you to repeat? Read to you off a card? Say this. Okay, you're safe.
You hoping in there? To hope in anything other than
Christ is paganism. And to practice any kind of means
and rule other than the rule and government established by
God is paganism. The promise of God's presence
is where his saints gather and where his words preached. And
to leave or neglect the assembling of ourselves together is to ask
for trouble. And trouble is what's going to
happen. Trouble. This world is not a place of
hope, it's the very opposite. And they no doubt found some
temporary relief down in Moab, I don't doubt it. I've done this. I've went places. Pulled up roots, went here, went
there. But I've never blessed a God anywhere except in his
church. Not ever. It was always it wound up a disaster,
always. Naomi and Lemuelet no doubt found
some temporary relief for their trouble, but it ended in disaster. But the worst disaster of all
is if there hadn't been any disaster, if they just found what they
were looking for in Moab. To leave God's people and find
satisfaction in the world what the Bible calls reprobation,
dead while you live. What you trying to say, preacher?
I'm trying to tell you that unbelief and rebellion is costly. It's
costly. And the second lesson in the
book of Ruth is the wonder of God's mysterious providence. You know, things happen in our
lives, and I've often told you this, it's like dumping a thousand-piece
puzzle out on the floor, and you reach down and get one piece.
Tell me what the whole picture is. You can't do it. Can't do
it. Well, it looks like eyes of a
horse. Might be, I don't know, but you ain't gonna tell me what
that picture is. And that's the way these events are in our lives.
We just pick up one little event and we try to make something
out of it. Well, you can't make anything out of that. You've
got to go into the Word of God. Then these things begin to make
some sense. These hard times and difficulties,
they begin to make sense. My soul, I was ministering to
this congregation down at the old church, and I told you one
night, I said, one of these days, you're going to go to the doctor. And when he comes back in, he's
going to be doing this. That week I took my wife to the
doctor and he left and he come back doing that very thing, shaking
his head. He said, you got one year to
live. Huh? God's amazing providence. Everything
that goes on is not good in itself, but it all works together for
good. To them that love God, to them
who are the called according to His purpose. All of these
things. What happened with Naomi and
Ruth? What happened? In the providence
of God, Ruth become part of that family. She was a pagan. But
she become part of that family. And Naomi was loved of God because
she was redeemed. And in God's providence, he stripped
her of all hope and Moab. She finally threw her hands up
and said, there's nothing here for me. And I'll tell you something. I'll tell you when you're going
to go to God's church, wherever it is. I ain't saying this is
the only church in the country. But he has churches. And I'll
tell you when you're going to go find one. When he strips you
of all your hope in this world, when you've got nothing left,
Nothing left. You've exhausted yourself trying
to make things work, and they don't work. Now you're going
to go seek God. And that's exactly what happened
with Naomi. She said, I'm going home. Why
are you going down there? Those preachers don't have a
corner over here in Moab. Why are you going to go all the
way back to Bethlehem? She said, I heard they bred there,
and I'm hungry. You ever been hungry? Not just
ready to eat, I'm talking about hungry. She was hungry. And she said, I heard there's
bread. Got a lot of stuff here, but
they ain't got no bread. Christ said, I'm the bread. I'm
the bread. Oh, I tell you. Everything Elimelech
and Naomi did was wrong. What their two sons did was contrary
to the law of God, and yet God used these things for our good
and His glory. And why did He do that? Why did
He do these things? To show us that the coming of
Christ into this world is to save sinners. Save sinners. Not good, obedient, willing men,
but sinners made willing in the day of his power. Rebels conquered
by the grace of God. Listen to this over in John 6,
verse 37. I love these verses. Christ said,
all that the Father giveth me might come to me. I ain't what
he says. He said, all that the Father
giveth me are going to have a situation and they have to take advantage
of it. I know what it says. He said, all that the Father
giveth me shall come to me. And he tells you why a little
bit later on. Because they're taught of God.
They're taught of God. And every man that's taught of
God hears. What's he hear? He hears their
bread of Bethlehem. And that's where he goes. And
him that cometh to me, Christ said, I'll know why I was cast
out. For I come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the
will of him that sent me. And this is the will of him that
sent me, that of all which he hath given me, I should lose
nothing. I'm going to raise it up again at the last day. All
of them. All of them. And God's ultimate
purpose is to save a people for the glory of his name in Christ,
and in that final day there'll be a redemption, he said, of
the purchased possession. He redeemed us in his death,
justified us in his resurrection, but there's going to be a full
redemption in that day. It's going to be a redemption
of the purchased possession. We're going to be His. Just like
Ruth become one with Boaz, we're going to become one for eternity. It's going to be a redemption
of the purchased possession, and all of it's going to be to
the praise of His glory. We'll be one with Him forever.
And everything in God's providence is arranged to this end. Poor
old Ruth. I think to myself, man, my family
was steeped in Nazarene religion. Boy, it went back generations.
Went back generations. And I'd be one yet today, except
for God's providence and the calling of His grace. In Christ, listen to this. This is in Ephesians chapter
1, I think, verse 11. He said, in him also, talking
about in Christ, he's the steward of time, he's the steward of
all things. And in Christ we've obtained
an inheritance being predestinated according to the purpose of him
who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will.
that we might be to the praise of His glory who first trusted
in Christ. God trusted all things into the
hands of His Son. Who could foresee that the rebellion
of Elimelech and Naomi would result in the image, the very
lineage of the Messiah and the redemption of Naomi? Who could? God probably didn't arrange it.
He arranged it. You've been in and out of Pentecostal
churches. You've been in and out of free
will churches. Most of us have. How come you're
here today? God's providence. God's providence. If God didn't intervene, you'd
still be there. Where has God's providence discovered
you? Oh my. Have you heard like Naomi? Sitting there in the land of
Moab. No hope without God in the world. Sitting there. Has he sent you
word that there's bread? There's bread in the house of
God. Then Mike and Naomi, you need
to go where the bread is. And go there whether you benefit
or not, because you sure ain't got no hope in Moab. And nothing in Moab but a continual
curse of death. And then the third lesson in
Ruth is the lesson of God's eternal sovereign election. God shed
his heart and his love on Ruth and Naomi. Everybody else died, but not
them. Not them. God shed his love and
his provision on Ruth. No potential in her, no blood
ties to Israel, nothing to recommend her, but thanks be unto God.
Isn't that what Paul said of those Gentiles? Thanks be unto
God for you Thessalonians, because God has from the beginning chosen
you to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief in the
truth, whereunto he called you by our gospel. What did he call
us to do? To obtain the glory of the Lord
Jesus Christ. If God had not chosen us, we'd
never chosen Him. The scripture said, blessed is
that man whom thou choosest, and calls us to approach unto
thee that he may dwell in thy courts. And when he does, we'll
be satisfied with the goodness of his house. We'll be so satisfied,
so satisfied. How could I have ever left? That's
what you'll say. Our Lord turned to his disciples
and he said, will you go? Everybody else did. Hundreds
of them left. He said, that man's crazy. He's
talking about cannibalism, talking about eating his flesh and drinking
his blood. And they all walked away. He
turned to the few that were still there and he said, will you go
too? They said, where are we going
to go? You have the words of eternal life, where are we going
to go? And then, fourthly, we got the
lesson here, the blessedness of redemption in Christ. Not
only is redemption the subject of the book of Ruth, but it's
the very heart of the Word of God. This book is a book of redemption,
cover to cover. That's what it talks about. That's
the story. History is his story. And the key to redemption is
the Redeemer. You know, Paul and Henry said,
I don't think I could say that. He said, I love God and I love
his people, but I don't think I could say what Paul said about
himself being a curse from God for his kinsmen. But Paul was more than willing
to be a curse from Christ for his brethren, but his curse would
have been of no consequence. It wouldn't have bought anything. It wouldn't have purchased anything. Paul had nothing by which to
redeem. See, there was a redeemer there,
a nearer kinsman than him. which is a picture of the law.
And he said, if you will redeem, redeem. And he said, OK, I'm
going to redeem. Well, you have to marry the sinner.
Oh, he said, I can't do that. Can't do that. It'll mar my inheritance. I can't do it. The law can't
redeem you, because the law is perfect, and
you ain't. So, he said, you redeem him. He said, I will. He can. And he's the only one that can.
He's a picture of Christ. One Abel and Willie Boaz could
redeem. He could not only pay the price,
but he didn't mar his inheritance. And he was one to which adjoined
to and made one with. become also an heir and have
full right to his name. All my women today, they're going
to get married, but they ain't going to change their name. I'd
send you walking. I would. I would. You wouldn't
take my name. You want to be married to me,
but you won't take my name. Can you imagine this heathen
woman who had nothing And he who had everything set his love
upon her and was ready to join her to him. And she said, well,
I want to keep my name. Hit the road. Huh? That's exactly right. Oh, she took his name. Took his
name. Glory is in his name. We're in error of and have full
right to his name. Oh, I love that in Jeremiah.
There's one chapter in there and he talks about his name shall
be the Lord our righteousness. And he goes on a few chapters
and then he tells you again, and her name shall be the Lord
our righteousness. We wear his name. His name. You and I are fully justified,
freely by his grace through the redemption that's in Christ Jesus,
whom God set forth as a propitiation. through faith in his blood, confidence
that his blood put away our sin. And he did this to declare his
righteousness for the remission of sins. His righteousness. God's righteous in the remission
of our sins. Christ paid it in full. And Boaz
come to the gate where all important business was concluded, and he
said, there was a kinsman nearer than me. They gave him the opportunity.
Here it is. Can the law redeem you? Go ahead. No, it can't do it. You're a
sinner. You're a sinner. By virtue of our marriage to
Christ, our union with Him, we're fully justified, and God is righteous
in the remission of our sins. Reconcile to God, he said, in
the body of his flesh through death, to present you half holy,
unblameable, unreprovable in the sight. And then we have a
lesson here in the means of salvation. What brought all this about?
What brought all this coming back about? She heard. Huh? Whosoever shall call upon the
name of the Lord shall be saved. But how are you going to call
on Him in whom you have not believed? And how are you going to believe
in Him of whom you have not heard? And how are you going to hear
without preaching? She heard. She heard over and
over and over. Even in the Old Testament, He
declares His means. And I don't know anything more
contested in our day than the necessity of gospel preaching. Listen to this. This is way back
in 2 Samuel. Chapter 14. He said, for we must needs die. And we're like water spilled
out on the ground which cannot be gathered up again. No hope
for us. Neither does God respect any
person. He's not going to look at you
and say, well, you know what? There's a little potential in
there. No. No, there ain't no potential
in there. We're like water spilled out on the ground. Gone. Yet
doth he devise means that his banished be not expelled from
him. What means? The preaching of
the gospel. The preaching of the gospel.
Now I'll tell you another means of God is His providence. You'll never hear if God don't
arrange it. There's millions in this world
who never hear the gospel. Please God, through the foolishness
of preaching, to save them that believe. And how shall you hear
without preaching? And preaching is how men and
women hear. Preaching is the revelation of
Christ. But it's of no consequence when
it comes in word only. It just goes in one ear and out
the other. It has to be attended by the Holy Spirit. Paul said,
I made an able minister of the New Testament, not of the letter,
but of the Spirit, because the letter killeth. I'll tell you
what the letter will do. You'll pick something up and
you'll read it and you'll get all the facts. You'll get them all
in a line, you know. I believe this, I believe that.
Boy, you can just spit it out. Toodle! Boom, boom, boom, boom,
boom. That's the letter. The letter
killeth. Now you put all your hope in
human reasoning. You read something, I understand
it, Really? You want to know why you understood
it? Because that's what it said. That's what Brother Mahan told
that mad deacon in that pre-world Baptist church. He said, you're
trying to preach election. He said, no, I'm just reading
Ephesians chapter 1. Is election what you got out
of it? Because that's what I got out of it. That's what it says.
But that ain't going to save you. You'll be saved when you understand
that all these blessings were of God by His grace according
as you were chosen in Christ. You're chosen in Christ because
in Christ He made full provision for you. There's provision there. The love of God's in Christ Jesus,
our Lord. Salvation's in Him. Life is in
Him. I am the way, the truth, and
the life. It's all in Him. The gospel is the revelation
of Christ, but the Spirit regenerates and He presses those truths home,
and then He gives you the full understanding of it. It's God who worketh in you,
both to will and to do of His good pleasure. And I'll tell
you something else, Naomi and Ruth didn't just hear, but when
they heard, they were moved into action. There's no such thing as inactive
faith. You hear me? No such thing. No such thing. We obey from the
heart that form of doctrine delivered us. Faith is active. An empty profession would have
been satisfied to live in Moab, and they'd just Converted from
freewillism to Calvinism. They just stayed in Moab. An empty profession would have
found some logical reason and then just stayed where it was.
There's always a logical reason to stay. But not faith. And that brings me to the sixth
thing, the character of faith. Faith has a commitment to Christ.
Look at this, Ruth 1, verse 16. Naomi said, you're going home
to your folks. And Ruth said, entreat me not
to leave thee, or to return from following after thee. For whither
thou goest, I'll go, and whither thou lodgest, I'll lodge, and
thy people be my people, and thy God my God. Where thou diest,
I'll die, and there will I be buried. And the Lord do so to
me, and more also, if aught but death part me from you." Faith is the fruit of life, and
it's active, and it reasons and hopes and repents and serves
and loves and gives. It's active. There's no such
thing as an inactive faith. James gives us an example in
active faith. You come along and here's a guy
naked. He's freezing to death. It's zero outside. And he comes
by and he says, well, Lord bless you. And he walks on. Hope the
Lord blesses you. That's not how faith acts. Faith
takes its coat off. Says, here, you need this worse
than I do. Faith sympathizes. It loves. It seeks. And I tell you what James said,
faith without works is dead. Dead. Faith believes God. And God tells
me I have life in Christ and I have life in Christ. And to
ignore or doubt God is nothing in the world but unbelief. And
the true character of faith is commitment to Christ. Our lives,
our possessions, our service, our attendance, and our love.
And James said, as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith
without works is dead. And then the last lesson, and
I hurry, the last lesson I see in Ruth is the reward of faith. Uh-oh. Preacher's gonna start
preaching reward. Well, this is the the glorious
part of it. Look here in Ruth chapter 2 verse
12. The Lord recompense thy work
and a full reward be given thee of the Lord God of Israel under
whose wings thou art come to trust. A reward? Though God gives us the gift
of faith, he does not believe for us. We believe. But we couldn't
believe if he didn't give us faith and enable us to believe.
But the same God who enables you to believe rewards you for
your faith. Isn't that something? And what's
our reward? You can't look in your mirror
and say this, but he's going to say this of all his sheep.
Well done, thy good and faithful servant. Huh? You talking about me? Yeah, I'm
talking about you. I'm talking about you. I'm talking
about this perfectly righteous man. Have you considered Job
a righteous man? How did he get righteous? Oh, God, what a salvation. We're
saved. It's a glorious work, a wonderful
means, a marvelous providence. I never get over it. A God-honoring
work that we've done. A God-honoring
work that He's enabled us to do and then rewarded us for it. What a marvel. Help us, our Lord,
objects of your kindness and love to take our place at your
feet and serve you as our Redeemer and Lord. Do you think Ruth served
Boaz? I bet he never had to wait for
supper. I bet he's sitting on the table. I bet his feet never
got dirty. He was sitting right there washing
his feet. Would we serve him? We will if we know him. If we
know him. Oh, God be pleased to do that
work in the hearts of everyone here today.