Tag: hope

At the end of the book of Ruth, many things that once were wrong and sad appear to be set right. A family line that has nearly failed has been restored, redeemed by a kind man provided by God. A dedicated young lady, a foreigner to Israel, has become part of the nation in truth.

But Ruth is far more than a sweet little love story. The book of Ruth is about a very strange blessing on a very strange family tree. Consider what is said to Boaz just after the legal issues surrounding his marriage to Ruth are finalized.

Ruth 4:12 – and may your house be like the house of Perez, whom Tamar bore to Judah, because of the offspring that the Lord will give you by this young woman.”

How strange is it to see the names Perez and Tamar in a line of blessing? If you do not know the ugly story of Genesis 38, you will miss how odd this blessing really is.

Judah had found a Canaanite wife for his eldest Son. Her name was Tamar. Tamar’s first husband died. His younger brother then married Tamar, and he died too. And Judah was unwilling to allow Tamar to marry his third son and perpetuate the family line.

Tamar took matters into her own hands. She vailed herself like a prostitute, and placed herself in Judah’s path. Thus, Tamar became pregnant by her father-in-law, Judah. And she had twins. In an odd little miraculous turn of events, Perez was born first, and God showed his sovereignty as he built the family line of Judah.

But nothing about that story is nice. It really is an ugly story of the Lord using human scoundrels to accomplish his will. And this is the story that the elders of Jerusalem use to pronounce a blessing on Boaz.

Of course, one way that this story and Genesis 38 look alike is the fact that both bring into the family of God’s promised one a lady from a foreign nation. God uses this to remind us that his plan is to build for himself a people from every nation. There is, in the kingdom of God, now no room for division based on ethnicity, skin color, or line of descent.

But the blessing is also a hint at what God is doing in a larger way. You see, the book ends with a genealogy, the family line of ten generations. And that is a clue to the whole purpose of the book of Ruth. Yes, it is a beautiful story. Yes, it shows us the glory of redemption. Yes, it shows us kindness in the middle of very dark days. Yes, it shows us the way that God welcomes people into his family who could be rejected. But the story of the book is the fact that God moves to keep alive a very particular line, the line of promise.

You see, the genealogy at the end of Ruth shows the ten generations that lead to the birth of King David. We get to see how the tribe of Judah, the tribe that carries the promise of the Messiah to come, gets to the person of King David, the King from whose family line the Messiah will come. Every step in this book is about God preserving the promise to send the Savior.

So, when we think of this book, we need to remember that it hints to us of the fact that, though humanity is fallen, and though we twist things quite badly, God has also always been at work bringing about his eternal plan for his glory. God promised the coming of Jesus. God used scoundrels like Judah and questionable ladies like Tamar to accomplish something we could never have foreseen. God raised up godly men like Boaz during the dark days of the Judges to bring about a glorious rescue of a family line. God welcomed a Moabite woman, a strong lady from a people who were often enemies of the Lord, into his chosen family line, and she became great grandmother to the greatest king of Israel other than Christ himself.

When we see the odd blessing at the end of Ruth, we see the fact that God is sovereign over us. We see that God uses people, sinful people whom he has rescued, to serve him in glorious ways. We find hope that our own lives may be used by God to accomplish great things, even if we have never been great people. We see redemption, mercy, grace, and sovereignty. We see signs that point us to Jesus, and we find hope.

We live in a hard world. We know people who seem as though their hearts are far too hardened against the Lord ever to be saved. And we assume that the situation we face will always remain the same. In that assumption, we declare, perhaps silently, that God cannot change a certain set of circumstances.

In truth, we do not have a guarantee of what God will or will not change. WE do not know who will turn from hating God toward salvation. We do not know what changes may come to bring about the repentance of a family, a city, a state, or a nation. But we should not let ourselves fall into the folly of believing that there are any of these that the Lord cannot change.

As an example, consider the completely impossible circumstances that faced Gideon in the book of Judges. Gideon started with an army of 32,000 men, and the Lord whittled that number down to 300. That 300 faced an established army of 135,000. This is an impossible task. No way can anything be done to change this circumstance, right?

Judges 7:9-14 – 9 That same night the Lord said to him, “Arise, go down against the camp, for I have given it into your hand. 10 But if you are afraid to go down, go down to the camp with Purah your servant. 11 And you shall hear what they say, and afterward your hands shall be strengthened to go down against the camp.” Then he went down with Purah his servant to the outposts of the armed men who were in the camp. 12 And the Midianites and the Amalekites and all the people of the East lay along the valley like locusts in abundance, and their camels were without number, as the sand that is on the seashore in abundance. 13 When Gideon came, behold, a man was telling a dream to his comrade. And he said, “Behold, I dreamed a dream, and behold, a cake of barley bread tumbled into the camp of Midian and came to the tent and struck it so that it fell and turned it upside down, so that the tent lay flat.” 14 And his comrade answered, “This is no other than the sword of Gideon the son of Joash, a man of Israel; God has given into his hand Midian and all the camp.”

The night the battle was to begin, God sent Gideon down into the camp of his enemies. Gideon was still afraid and could not imagine how the Lord could give victory to his tiny little band of men facing such an army. But what Gideon found out was that the Midianites were having bad dreams, dangerously bad dreams. The people in the camp were having dreams that were telling them that the Lord was going to give victory to Gideon and the Israelites. The Midianites were terrified.

Thus, we get the story of Gideon and the army winning a victory that would not have happened had they faced the enemy on an open battle field. Gideon and his men are placed around the perimeter of the enemy camp. At one signal, they blow trumpets, shatter pottery, and reveal torches. The Midianites wake up from nightmares to hear loud sounds and see bright lights from every side. The sleepy and frightened men grab swords and start swinging at anything that moves. And just like that, the Lord gives victory to Israel, as the Midianites cut one another down in the battle.

The point that I think we should grasp today is that, when we assume that we know what God can or cannot do, will or will not do, as it regards things we think are impossible, we need to stop and think again. The Lord can do things we cannot imagine. The Lord can impact human hearts in ways that we might not see until the change is made.

Get practical here. You know somebody you want to hear the gospel. But you assume they are so harsh against the faith that they will never hear or never respond well. But what do you not know? You do not know what God may be doing in their hearts. You do not know what God may be doing behind the scenes to prepare them for the gospel. Perhaps they are hurting in their soul in a way that you cannot see. Maybe they have been having frightening thoughts of falling under the judgment of God, even if they have not told anybody about their secret fears. Maybe they have had bad dreams of being crushed by a barley loaf. I do not know what may be going on, but we must not assume that God is not at work in ways we cannot see.

So, the point is that we need to trust the Lord and know that he can make changes in lives that we cannot see. So we need to pray, be faithful, and share the gospel. WE need to recognize that God changes hearts, not us. We just need to be faithful, trust God, and stop assuming what he cannot do.