Sermon Tone Analysis

! Definition of a “bad day!”

!!

You know you are having a bad day....when....

* You turn on the news and they are showing escape routes out of the city.

* Your birthday cake collapses from the weight of the candles.

* Your twin sister forgot your birthday.

* Your horn goes off accidentally and remains stuck as you follow a motorcycle gang on the expressway.

* You put both contacts in one eye.

* Your income tax check bounces.

!! But what if you are having a bad life?

* Your name is Elimelech, meaning “my God is Sovereign!”

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Yet, you are facing famine and wondering how to support your family.

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* You live in Bethlehem, “the place of Bread”

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Yet there is a scarcity of wheat to make bread in “the place of bread.”

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* Your name is “Naomi” which means “joy!”

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But you claim the name of “Bitter”

"The Strong One has dealt me a bitter blow.

I left here full of life, and God has brought me back with nothing but the clothes on my back."

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* Her husband had died.

* Her two sons had died.

* Leaving her with two daughters-in-law and no conceivable support for her life.

*That is the deep disappointment with which Naomi returned to Bethlehem!*

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Yet there is one postive sign: her name was "Ruth!"

* Naomi had tried to discourage the wives of her two sons, Ruth and Orpah.

She had been very clear that there was no hope in returning with her.

They could better go back to their Moabite homes and seek another husband.

There were two strikes against them:

* They were women.

Women had no protection or provision if they did not have male presence in their lives.

* They were from Moab....and could readily be taken advantage of by men, and scorned by women.

* Ruth rejects her discouragement with these words: "But Ruth replied, /“Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you.

Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay.

Your people will be my people and your God my God.

17 Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried.

May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if anything but death separates you and me.”/

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*Ruth the faithfull one!

Her name means "friendship!"*

*So where was God in all of this?*

*"Why!?"*

The doubt, anger, frustration of /"Bitter"/ (Naomi) is not only understandable, it is common in our lives also.

!

The Journey back to God!

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The first words of *hope* in Naomi's story are these: So Naomi returned from Moab accompanied by Ruth the Moabitess, her daughter-in-law, arriving in Bethlehem as the barley harvest was beginning.

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!! The journey back to God begins with Ruth's initiative.....

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Since it was barley harvest Ruth asks about this gleaning thing... that is "Would it be OK if I go and pick up the left-overs?"

Israel did not keep their fields dutch clean.

God's law encouraged left overs.

When they harvested they were required to leave some grain behind for the poor, widows, and fatherless.

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* She comes to the field of Boaz!

* Boaz is a wealthy land owner.

* His people are busy with the harvest when Boaz comes on the scene.

* He greets his people with /a warm greeting of the Lord's good will./

* He inquires about this young woman gleaning in his field.

* When he discovers that she is Ruth, the daughter-in-law of Naomi, he asks her to conintue coming until the harvest is finished.

He also tells her:

* "Go with the young women who are my harvesters."

* "I've given my servants instructions that they are to see that no harm comes to you."

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*Boaz gives Protection*

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* "When you need a drink help, yourself!"

* At the lunch break, Boaz said to her, “Come over here; eat some bread.

Dip it in the wine.”

So she joined the harvesters.

Boaz passed the roasted grain to her.

She ate her fill and even had some left over.

/The Message/ (Ru 2:14).

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*Boaz gives provision!!*

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*The two things necessary for women to live well in ancient Israel!*

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*Who is this unmarried man Boaz?

Why is still not married?

Why is he so kind?*

But the story moves on.....

!! The journey back to God continues with Naomi's gratitude and a plan.

* *Naomi is grateful:*

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Naomi said to her daughter-in-law, “Why, God bless that man!

God hasn’t quite walked out on us after all!

He still loves us, in bad times as well as good!”

     Naomi went on, “That man, Ruth, is one of our circle of covenant redeemers, a close relative of ours!” /The Message / (Ru 2:20).

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* *Naomi has a plan:*

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One day her mother-in-law Naomi said to Ruth, “My dear daughter, isn’t it about time I arranged a good home for you so you can have a happy life?

And isn’t Boaz our close relative, the one with whose young women you’ve been working?

Maybe it’s time to make our move.

Tonight is the night of Boaz’s barley harvest at the threshing floor.

3–4     “Take a bath.

Put on some perfume.

Get all dressed up and go to the threshing floor.

But don’t let him know you’re there until the party is well under way and he’s had plenty of food and drink.

When you see him slipping off to sleep, watch where he lies down and then go there.

Lie at his feet *to let him know that you are available to him for marriage.*

Then wait and see what he says.

He’ll tell you what to do.”

/The Message/ (Ru 3:1-4).

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* I wouldn't suggest that you try this today.

*But* for that day it was an understood way for a woman to say to a man "I am available."

And for Ruth and Naomi they trusted in the goodness of Boaz, and also the goodness of God's way of providing a way of salvation for their situation.

Boaz was one of two who could provide relief from their desperate situation--

* No one to provide!

* No one to protect!

!! The journey back to God continues with Boaz

* Boaz is grateful for Ruth's desire to be his wife.

* acceptance of his role as the covenant redeemer

* Boaz goes to the city square and negotiates a understanding with the one who had more rights than he did as a covenant redeemer.

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Then Boaz added, “You realize, don’t you, that when you buy the field from Naomi, you also get Ruth the Moabite, the widow of our dead relative, along with the redeemer responsibility to have children with her to carry on the family inheritance.”