All right. If you have a Bible, go ahead and turn with me to Ruth chapter 3. If you're going to use one of the Bibles that we have underneath the chair in front of you, it's on page 284. Ruth chapter 3, we're going to continue with our sermon series through this beautiful, wonderful story this morning. Here now, God's holy, true, and life-giving word. Ruth chapter 3, starting in verse 1.
Then they owe me her mother-in-law said to her, my daughter, should I not seek rest for you that it may be well with you? Is not Boa as our relative with whose young women you were? See, he is winnowing barley tonight at the threshing floor. Wash therefore and annoy yourself and put on your cloak and go down to the threshing floor, but do not make yourself known to the man until he has finished eating and drinking. But when he lies down, observe the place where he lies, then go uncover his feet and lie down, and he will tell you what to do, and she replied, all that you say I will do. So she went down to the threshing floor and did just as her mother-in-law had commanded. And when Boa as had eaten and drunk and his heart was merry, he went to lie down at the end of the heap of grain. Then she came softly and uncovered his feet and lay down. At midnight, the man was startled and turned over and behold a woman lay at his feet. He said, who are you? And she answered, I am Ruth, your servant, spread your wings over your servant, for you are a redeemer. And he said, may you be blessed by the Lord, my daughter. You have made this last kindness greater than the first in that you have not gone after young men, whether rich or poor. And now, my daughter, do not fear, I will do for you all that you ask, for all my fellow-tonsmen know that you are a worthy woman. And now it is true that I am a redeemer, yet there is a redeemer nearer than I, remain tonight. And in the morning, if he will redeem you, good, let him do it. But if he is not willing to redeem you, then as the Lord lives, I will redeem you. Lie down until the morning. So she lay at his feet until morning, but arose before one could recognize another. And he said, let it not be known that the woman came to the threshing floor. And he said, bring the garment you are wearing and hold it out. So she held it and he measured out six measures of barley and put it on her. Then she went into the city and when she came to her mother-in-law, she said, how did you fare my daughter? And she told her all that the man had done for her, saying these six measures of barley he gave to me, for he said to me, you must not go back empty-handed to your mother-in-law. She replied, wait, my daughter, until you learn how the matter turns out, for the man will not rest, but will settle the matter today. This is the Word of the Lord. Let's pray together. Heavenly Father, we do thank you so much for your grace and mercy and kindness and faithfulness to us in Christ. We thank you that you speak to us, even now, in and through your word and by your Holy Spirit and most of all in the person and work of your son, our Lord Jesus. So we pray, Lord, that you would help us now to see your glory, your faithfulness in this passage, help us celebrate what we have in Christ and we do pray, Lord, that you would use this time now in your word to shape us and mold us and equip us, strengthen us and embolden us to continue the mission that you've given to us, which is to make disciples of all nations. And so we pray in Jesus' name, amen. One of the things about life, I think that we can all resonate with, is the amount of waiting that we experience. We're almost always waiting for something. Sometimes it's a good waiting. We might be waiting for Christmas to come since every store has all their Christmas stuff out already. Sometimes we're waiting for things that are just kind of annoying to go away. I know my wife is waiting for me to shave this beard, but there are these times when we are waiting for resolution to a very difficult situation. When we're waiting for God to do something, waiting on God because there's some sort of circumstance or situation that we just can't handle or we don't know what to do about it, there's a lot of that waiting to in our lives. Even now, some of us might be waiting on God, waiting for Him to help us with some sort of situation and bring resolution. Maybe some of us might be waiting on God to help us with a particular parenting issue. We all know how hard parenting can be. Maybe some of us are waiting for God to bring resolution to a situation in which there's been a relationship that's been damaged. We're waiting on Him, waiting for that relationship to be repaired. Maybe some of us are waiting on God, waiting for a situation at work to be resolved. There's any number of reasons we might be waiting. And the question we want to ask ourselves is, does our faith in Christ impact how we wait? How does Christ in our lives impact the way that we wait? And if the question is does our relationship with Christ impact how we wait, the answer is absolutely. Absolutely. As we seek to wait on God with our eyes on Christ, it completely shapes and impacts how we wait on God, particularly when we look at what God reveals about Himself in this passage. Because when we're waiting on God, often we're wondering what should I do? And one of the things that's beautiful and powerful that God reveals in this passage is this. God often carries out His divine plan through our human actions. God often carries out His divine plan for a given situation through our human actions. Now let's pause there and make sure we know. We're not talking about salvation. Okay. Now talking about salvation, God brings about our salvation, brought our salvation about 100% by Himself in Christ on the cross. We have nothing to do with our salvation, except for receiving it by faith. I'm not talking about salvation. I'm talking about these day-to-day week-to-week month-to-month situations in which we're longing for God to bring about some sort of resolution. It's in these situations where we're waiting on God for help with a situation that we want to realize and remember and believe what God reveals in this passage that He often carries out His plan for us in those situations through our human actions. And as we see that's revealed in this passage through what Naomi does, what Ruth does, what Boaz does, it helps us to realize that when we're waiting on God, it's actually meant to be a very active time for us. That when we are waiting on God, it's not meant to be passive but quite active. As we see what He reveals here, that He often works out His divine plan for us through our human actions. And so what we're going to see that by looking at the way He works through the actions of these three people, Naomi, Ruth, and Boaz. We're going to see that God's going to work through Naomi's wisdom as she makes a plan for their situation. We're going to see how God works through Ruth's courage, enables her to take action on that plan. And then third, we're going to see how God works through Boaz's integrity and that beautiful ability we have to do what's right, trusting God. And in doing so, we're going to see that God is working through the human actions of each of these individuals and simultaneously getting out His plan. And that's going to teach us to rely on God and apply these very same things as we wait on God ourselves. So let's learn how to wait actively. And let's first look at Naomi's wisdom. And we're going to see God's going to carry out His plan here in part through Naomi's wisdom. And the point is that God does carry out elements of His divine plan through human wisdom. Look at verses one through six. And notice what's happening here. Naomi now is very much concerned with what's going to happen to Ruth, right? They're both widows. They've come back to Bethlehem. Their lives were in shambles. There've been some glimpses of hope now. And Ruth has met Boaz and now Naomi's going to tell her what she thinks should happen. And Naomi's top concern is that Ruth gets married. We see that in verse one when Naomi says, should I not seek rest for you? The Hebrew word there is a word that is always correlated with marriage. So Naomi is saying to Ruth, she wants to make sure that Ruth gets married. Ruth is this widow. She wants her to get remarried. And so out of that love that she has for her daughter-in-law, she hatches this plan, right? And it's a good one. It's a good plan. But notice that it's a well-thought-out plan. She's taking all of the information that she knows about Boaz and about this time of year and where he's going to be and when and how Ruth could go and meet him again and talk to him and potentially move things forward. And actually what's happening is Naomi is using wisdom. She's using her own wisdom given to her by God to come up with this plan to move things forward towards resolution. One commentator says that we can say that God works in just that kind of ingenuity, which is another word for wisdom. And so what you see then is as Naomi's coming up with this plan for Ruth, she's utilizing wisdom. She's using wisdom. And then God is really behind the scenes working through that. And a lot of times we struggle to believe God would actually give us wisdom. Sometimes we're not sure he will really give us some sort of plan. But this is one of the places in the Bible that we see that he does. He gives us wisdom so that we can put together a plan for the situation that we're hoping to see resolved. Do we believe that God does really give us wisdom so that we can formulate a plan for going forward? And he does. We see God works through human wisdom.
Most of us are probably familiar with the KKK. You know about what it was. You know it was an evil, horrible, wicked organization that had its goal set on suppressing black Americans through intimidation and terrorism. What you might not know is how the KKK lost its power. I mean they're not really around anymore. Are they praise God? Well, what happened? Well, one of the things about the KKK was they were able to intimidate and terrorize black Americans because they were in secret. Their power came from the fact that nobody knew who they were in society. They didn't tell people who they were. They operated in secret. They had secret codes. They had secret meetings. They had secret ways of identifying each other in public so they could know who's who without exposing themselves. And so how do you deal with an organization like that? Plenty of Americans, many Americans, most Americans wanted to do something to destroy this evil organization but what could you do? Didn't know who was who. And also there were rumors and many rumors were true that there were even law enforcement involved in the KKK. What do you do? Well, interestingly enough, a man named Stetson Kennedy and some others used wisdom to devise a plan. And they used wisdom to realize that it was their secrecy that enabled them to remain in power and able to terrorize and intimidate people. So what they did is they infiltrated the KKK by becoming members, praying that they would never be asked to carry out any violent acts and praise God. They weren't. But what they did is they became part of the KKK. They learned all of the secrets. They learned the secret handshakes, the secret ways they would greet each other in public. And then they used the medium of radio to broadcast those secrets all over the country. And millions of radio listeners were hearing now here's how the KKK does what they do. And suddenly the secrets are out and they weren't able to communicate in secret anymore and they just lose all their power. What a wise and amazing plan. One author says that this idea by Stetson Kennedy and others is the greatest single contributor to the weakening of the Ku Klux Klan. And now we can say, okay, so was that just a great idea by Stetson Kennedy? Or did God carry out his plan to weaken to damage destroy the KKK through the wisdom he provided for Stetson Kennedy and others? And the answer is God was at work. God was involved in that. Just like every time we seek to use wisdom to address a situation, something we're waiting on God for. He's at work. He's at work in our wisdom. And he gives us wisdom. He tells us that he will give us wisdom. He wants us to have the ability to put together a plan for how we can address these things we're waiting for. James 1 verse 5 says, if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God who gives generously to all without reproach. And it will be given to him. Daniel 2.21 says, God gives wisdom to the wise. So he's showing us here. And when we look at the wisdom he gave to Naomi, that's part of how we wait on him. We trust that he gives us wisdom so that we can utilize it to move forward to be active in our waiting. And he's not giving us wisdom. He's not saying that wisdom. You have to have wisdom so that he will love us or accept us. That's not what we're saying. But rather he wants wisdom for us. He wants us to have it to utilize it as we seek to wait on him and put together a plan for what we can do. And a lot of situations there's nothing we can do. But many times there are things we can do. And God wants us to utilize wisdom to determine what those things are. So the first part of waiting on God is realizing he gives us wisdom and we can make a plan. Put together a plan. The second thing then is to have courage. Look at verses 6 through 9. And let's talk about what we see in Ruth here. The second thing we see is that God carries out elements of his divine plan through human courage. God carries out elements of his plan for us in these moments through human courage. And we see that embodied here in Ruth. Her courage is absolutely pivotal to this portion of the story, this part of God's plan for them moving forward. She shows tremendous courage here. Just think about the risks that she was taking going through the night when it's dark and finding her way through all of the drunk farmers to find her way to Boaz. She is a foreigner, she's a widow, she is very vulnerable in this moment, but she is demonstrating absolutely incredible courage. She's accepted the wise plan of Naomi and now she's exhibiting this courage even to the point where she's going to approach Boaz. And they're pretty sure Boaz is a good guy, but they weren't 100% sure yet. And not only does she take all these risks in traveling by night and putting herself out there in this way, but then she also proposes to Boaz. Like this is one of the coolest things in this chapter is what Ruth says is basically a proposal to Boaz. If you look at verse 9, she says, spread your wings over your servant. And that is her basically saying, marry me. It's remarkable. How courageous that would be. I mean, think about this. Like, you know, this day and age, we're not too shocked if a woman asks a man to marry him, but in this time period, this is absolute outright boldness, just complete courage. When you think courage, Ruth is our hero, this is amazing. And then she adds, by the way, this is really amazing. She adds, for you are a Redeemer. You are a Redeemer. She is wanting to make sure that actually she's putting Naomi's needs above her own. That's what's so amazing. Her courage is fueled by this loyalty that she has to Naomi. If she would just go and acquire a husband, that'd be good for her, but she asks Boaz not only to marry her, but to be her Redeemer, Kinsman Redeemer, because they had a situation set up in Israel. So if there was a widow, a relative of that widow could marry the widow and provide family and protection and inheritance and things like that. And so she's not just saying, Boaz, marry me. She's saying, be the Kinsman Redeemer for our family. She's looking out for Naomi. And so it is really remarkable the way that she is demonstrating this courage because of her loyalty to Naomi. And the beautiful thing to realize is that it is God that gave her this courage. God gave her courage in this moment to follow through on this plan. Because through her courage, he was moving forward his plan. He may be behind the scenes, but he is absolutely in control. And what that does is that teaches us that God wants us to be courageous as well. He calls us to courage. Not because he only approves of courageous people. He approves of us in Christ. He calls us to be courageous because he works through it. He does what he wants to do through our courage. And it leads you and I to then realize God wants me to be courageous because he's going to do something through it. He's going to utilize me as I seek to have this courage. You know, when the German Army took over in France in June of 1940, they allowed the French to set up governments in different area that were controlled by the Germans, but the French still got to sort of run the government. And much of France was under the leadership of a guy named Marshal Philippe Petain and he was cooperating with the German Army and then therefore rounding up Jews and putting them in concentration camps. And so as this is happening, there's a little town in France called Le Shambon and the people in this town decided that they were not going to cooperate. And in fact, the students of a little Protestant Christian school, a big, huge school of 18 students, they decided to write a letter to the German controlled government in France. And here's what these youth wrote. We have learned of the frightening scenes which took place three weeks ago in Paris where the French police on orders of the occupying power arrested in their homes all the Jewish families in Paris to hold them in Valdiv. We are afraid that the measures of deportation of the Jews will soon be applied in the southern zone. That's where they were. They go on. We feel obliged to tell you that there are among us a certain number of Jews, but we make no distinction between Jews and non-Jews. It is contrary to the gospel teaching. If our comrades, whose only fault is to be born in another religion, received the order to let themselves be deported or even examined, they would disobey the order received and we would try to hide them as best we could. And then they finished the letter with seven sweet words. We have Jews. You're not getting them. This is school children. That is courage. Life-changing courage. The enrollment at that little school went from 11 to 350 as Jewish families flocked to La Shambon, where they knew that they would be stood up for and they would be safe. Unbelievable courage. And we will step back now. Was it just that these kids were so courageous or was Almighty God working through them, working through their courage, their willingness to stand up for their fellow human beings, and for what's right. It's amazing. And in the same way, that's what we see happening here in Ruth. We see Ruth's courage, incredible courage, admirable courage, and all the while it's God working through her courage, working through her boldness to move his plan forward. This is why God calls us in Joshua 19 and other places to be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened. Do not be dismayed for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go. Why does God call us to courage? Because he wants it for us. He wants us to experience his sovereign work through our courage. He wants us to be used by him as he unfolds his glorious plan to continue to bring redemption. And so the way we apply that, then we realize that as we are waiting on God, first we want to utilize wisdom and we want to put together a plan, maybe getting wise counseling, what can I do? We put together that plan. Second, we choose to be courageous, trusting that God will embolden us. God will give us the strength. God will give us what we need. So when we're waiting on God, we're not passive, we're making a plan, and then we're taking action. And third, this might be one of the toughest parts, and we can operate with integrity. Let's talk about Boaz's integrity. Look at it versus 10 through 13. And here's the point. God carries out elements of his divine plan through human integrity. Human integrity. God is working when we are seeking to operate with integrity, according to the ways he would have us operate. Now let's be honest, when we read Ruth chapter 3, there's a little hesitancy because we're like, so what really happened that night there on the Threshing floor? There's some possible danger zones, you might say. It's late at night, it's just one man, one woman. Well, here's the good news. Bible scholars see that the author of Ruth very intentionally uses some language, particularly coming from Boaz's mouth to assure us that nothing inappropriate happened there. He uses some words that have absolutely zero sexual connotation. So we can actually know that nothing that shouldn't have happened there happened there that night. Okay, so that's good. But then the next thing to notice is, Ruth is basically proposing to Boaz, right? And we know that Boaz wants to marry her because we've seen the way he thinks about her. We've seen his admiration for her. He says she's a worthy woman. He is nuts about her, right? And you would imagine he wants to marry her. He's so thrilled about her kindness towards him, that she's not going to run after these young guys. She wants to marry him. Of course, he wants to marry her, but he wrestles with the fact that according to the way things work, he's second in line. There is a relative that's closer to Naomi and therefore has the right to redeem Naomi's family by marrying Ruth. Now if I'm Boaz, I'm like Ruth, let's not tell anybody about that weird rule. And we'll just kind of do our thing. Nobody, you know, we'll just get married. But Boaz looks at the love of his life and says, we've got to do the right thing. If the guy who's first in line doesn't want to redeem you, then I'm going to do it as the Lord lifts. He's so excited about it, but he said, but we're going to do the right thing. I'll tell you what, some of the most difficult moments for us, as we're waiting on God, is when we think there's a way we could maybe speed things up if we'll just
break God's law and fast forward the tape a little. And so what we see then in Boaz is the way God is at work in Boaz choice to do the right thing. Boaz choice to operate with integrity. And what that does is it teaches us that when we have made a plan, when we have courage through our faith in Christ, as we carry out this plan that we think God is leading us to so that we can move towards resolution in these situations, we can believe that we can do the right thing at every point, at every turn that God will work through our integrity. And that gives us strength to do what's right. A lot of times when we are struggling to do the right things, especially when we're waiting, when we're really longing for some resolution in some situation, a lot of times what it is is we just don't really believe that if we operate just according to the ways God is calling us to operate in that moment that things will work out. It's a trust issue. Sometimes and by sometimes I mean all the times, it's hard to trust God, to trust that we can do things the way He's called us to do and things will work out. It's a trust issue. All of these are trust issues. You know, being from Minnesota, I have seen many times the first time somebody has walked out onto ice. Do you know what ice is in Florida? Have you heard of it? It's a great stuff up north. Ice, so the lakes freeze and then you can go out on the ice and you can go ice fishing or you can just be freezing either way. And the thing about ice is when the first time somebody walks out onto a frozen lake, it starts out with excitement and they begin to walk out and as they go farther and farther from the shore, something begins to happen. They begin to realize that they're getting farther and farther from the shore and every time their stance starts to widen a little bit because they kind of know that you better spread this weight out a little bit so that we don't break through the ice and sometimes they keep spreading to the point where they're basically laying down on the ice, terrified for their lives because they don't think this ice is going to hold them and then a truck drives by. And they're like, oh, so this does work. And they realize that all those inches of ice didn't get stronger, they actually are now able to trust that the ice will hold them and it's the same thing when it comes to our faith that we can operate the way God has called us to operate because the ice is thick enough. In other words because God's in control because God will bring about things as He sees fit. And so it's amazing because what that means is as we think about how we apply all these things is when we are waiting on God, one, we're not passive, we're actually very active and we can believe that God gives wisdom to us so that we can apply it in putting together a plan to do what we can in any given situation as we're waiting on God. Then that plan is probably going to require courage, right? But God shows us that He'll give us courage, He calls us to courage so that through our courage He can be at work in us and through us. And as we courageously seek to embark on the plan that we have, then there's that beautiful reminder that we can operate with integrity all the while, then leaving everything in God's hands, right? That's what happens next. There's wisdom and there's courage and there's integrity and then there's just waiting. Naomi says wait and see what happens. And you know this really makes sense when we look most of all at Christ, right? God's plan for us and God's infinite wisdom, His plan is that He would send His Son Christ to redeem us from our sin and from our guilt and from our shame. That was the plan. And so He has carried out this plan through Christ who is fully God and fully man and He has courageously carried out the plan going all the way to the cross on our behalf. And all the while Jesus operates with total integrity, right? He never sins, never not even close does He come to sinning. And it's actually that perfect righteousness that He accrues in His life that is handed to us, given to us for our records so that we're not only forgiven through faith in Jesus but we're also righteous in His sight that when God looks at us, He sees a full tank of righteousness as it were. And so really what's happening when God calls us to use wisdom to be courageous to operate with integrity is He's pointing us at Christ and teaching us to be a little more like Him that we would become a little more and a little more like the one who has redeemed us fully apart from our work. And so the question if to ask yourself is what are you waiting for? What is it that you've been waiting on God for? And could it be that God is wanting you to trust that He will give you wisdom and put a plan together? Could it be that God is calling you to trust Him be courageous and take action on that plan? Could it be that God is calling and equipping you to operate with integrity and do things as you know you should and then leave it in His hands and wait and watch the ways He works through and through what you have done, what we have done, but also apart from those things as well. That's how we wait and we wait with our eyes on Christ. Let's pray, Father. We thank you that you teach us how to wait on you and we pray that you through your Holy Spirit will with our eyes on Christ grow us in our wisdom grow us in our courage grow us in our integrity. Believing that you want these things for us you love to work through these things in us as you continue your plan for this world and may we be grateful that you not only love us but you would work in us and through us and make us more like our King. We pray in His name, Amen.