Part 2 - On the Road to Bethlehem
Building the Future
3 part series… on the way to Bethlehem…
Mark spiritual encounter points as we prepare out hearts for the entrance of Jesus in powerful ways into our lives as we approach this Christmas!
Ruth Chapter 1
15-19
15 "Look," said Naomi, "your sister-in-law is going back to her people and her gods. Go back with her." 16 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." 18 When Naomi realized that Ruth was determined to go with her, she stopped urging her.
19 So the two women went on until they came to Bethlehem. When they arrived in Bethlehem…
Lord help us on our way to Bethlehem…
• the Bethlehem and beyond story…
This is the second time Bethlehem appears prominently in the Bible. 1000 years before Christ…
The first time we talked about last week in Burying our Past as we saw it associated with a burial place before a birthing place at Christmas time… Before we find it to be a birthplace of new things, but it is first a burial place of old things…
Now when we bury our past… sometimes the devil tries to bring that back up… and old adage says… “when the devil starts reminding you about your past… start reminding him about his future.” For what God has done… if He has healed and removed the sin of your past we need to let it go… and begin looking to the future God has for you.
Talk a moment about Character… the only thing you can control is you…
• if your not married…
• if you want a better job…
• if you want a better life…
o Start with you…
Back to God’s plan to your life… bury the past of who you had been… and now build the future that God has for you…
The Bethlehem and beyond story is that it is a love story…
• which is were we find the story of Ruth…
• a love story that a family member can have for another family member…
o Naomi… home in Bethlehem, married… two sons… but there was famine… and moved to Moab… and her sons married Moabite girls…
o Ruth was one of those two… and during that time Naomi’s husband and two sons die…
o Then food returns to Bethlehem… (which literally means house of bread)… Naomi decides to go back to Bethlehem… on the way back her two daughter in laws follow her… and Naomi turns to them and says…
You need to stay in Moab… you have a future here with your own people…
One takes her up on it…
But Ruth replies in verse 16: 16 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.
I will go were you go… God forbid anything but death would separate us…
A love story, about family…
But also a romantic love story…
• in Bethlehem… Ruth finds the love of her life Boaz…
• the rest of the book of Ruth is an amazing love story of how Ruth and Boaz meet, fall in love…
But it doesn’t stop there…
• it becomes a royal story…
• the real purpose of why this love story is given to us happens in the later words of Ruth…
• Chapter 4:17
• 17 The women living there said, "Naomi has a son." And they named him Obed. He was the father of Jesse, the father of David.
• That is why the book is written… David becomes one of the most famous and most powerful King’s in all of their history…
A love story that becomes a royal story… where King David grows up… chosen by God… to become King of Israel… and God tells David that your thrown will become a Royal Thrown… prophesy of the Christ or messiah that would be to come…
• Bethlehem and beyond story… is about God putting together the pieces
• Story of God how through Bethlehem begins to build an incredible story, that begins with a love story, that becomes a love story… where a 1000 years later two relatives of King David, and ultimately Ruth and Boaz… where Mary and Joseph had to come back to Bethlehem…
• How did all this happen… the love of Ruth for her family, and the love story of Ruth and Boaz… from that a family line that brings the greatest gift of all time. In essence the Christmas story comes and starts 1000 years earlier all the way back to Ruth when she goes to Bethlehem… a love story…that becomes a royal story of a king being born… that becomes the greatest story ever told…
In the shepherd fields… outside of Bethlehem we read about the Shepherds approached by angels…
Luke 2:8
8 And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. 9 An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. 10 But the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.
The greatest story… the champion of peace and a bridge to the fullness of what God wants for your life… God uses this amazing place called Bethlehem to put it all together…
On the way to Bethlehem we not only encounter a God that helps us bury our past, like Rachel, but a God that helps us build our future…
In fact Jesus says before He dies… night before He is crucified…
John 14:1-3 - 1 Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me. 2 In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.
The incredible future of this baby in Bethlehem… is still preparing and building for you and me…
On the way to Bethlehem we are reminded that there is a future God is building… and He wants to build a hope a future for our lives.
The 2 future building challenges…
that God wants us to walk away with this morning; that we learn from Bethlehem.
1. Make commitments that you intend to keep.
I used to always want to know the future… now I am old enough to know better…
If God would of shown me 20 years ago what I would be doing today I would have been scared to death.
SO how does God prepare us for our future…
Jesus always taught, if you are faithful with a few things, I will give you more.
Great things and futures are built on simple commitments often we make to small things, made right now!
This is how our future is built. Commitments we make and intend to keep, that call us to action… not passiveness.. Commitments that call us into action with whatever he puts into our hands today.
Do we realize… The Christmas story… first found it’s origin 1000 years earlier with a commitment that Ruth makes to her mother in law to go with her to Bethlehem. That simple commitment she made…upon which God builds an entire future.
God use our commitments to build the future of where we are going. Commitments that get us off of our seats… and into action… these shape us for the future God is making…
The impact of commitment…
A chicken and a pig were walking past a church building one day when they noticed the Sunday morning sermon posted on the outside bulletin board, "Helping the Poor." They walked away when the chicken suddenly came across with a suggestion. "Brother pig, why don’t we give all the poor people a nice breakfast of ham and eggs?" The pig thought a moment and replied, "That’s all right for you to say because for you it is only a contribution, but for me, it’s total commitment!"
Or the commitment of a bulldog…
Bulldog Commitment - A bulldog’s nose is slanted backward so that he can still breathe while he holds on!
Mother Theresa…
We don’t do great things… we do small things, but with great love…
God is asking you and me today… just like Ruth who lost her husband, her father in law… still made a commitment to follow through with Naomi and committed to that relationship…
2. We make commitments to the roles we keep…
a. All the roles that I keep…
i. I am a son to a wonderful mom…
ii. A brother to sisters I don’t see often…
iii. A father to 3 crazy and wonderful kids…
iv. Husband to a beautiful and wonderful wife…
v. A pastor to you, this church…
vi. A child of God, a servant of Him… a warrior for Him…
vii. I am a friend to many and acquaintances to even more…
All of these rolls define the kind of commitments God asks you to keep..
And not only the roles we fill… but all of these roles give us necessary responsibilities…
And we wonder… God why am I here in Danville Illinois… God’s called me to do something but I am here??? working in the factory here, the construction crew there…
God where is my future… what am I doing.
God says, whatever you are doing… whatever you job is… it should be the best of what that place, or that job could be. Don’t be so concerned with the future you don’t commit to what you’re doing right now. Don’t sit around complaining about it…
You get to your future by being responsible with whatever He has already laid in your hands!!!
Add value to where you are…
Add value to every person you meet…
Make it habit… no matter… What you do and where you go… should be better after you leave then what it was when you came there…
You never read a book without thinking who could I pass this onto to better their lives…
You think through the process that says I am here to add value, to invest into those around me…
Don’t be so frustrated about your future not being here… for it arrives one day at a time… day by day… by being faithful to the commitments I intend to keep…
All of this is a part of a larger principle…
“Go deep before you go wide!”
Ruth had no way of creating the future where her great, great, great, etc… would be the son of God…
It came because she was faithful with the commitments God had asked her to keep. And go deep with what is already in front of us.
John Wesley…
“If we will take care of the depth of our lives, God will take care of the breadth of our influence!”
God brings breadth of influence… you can only control right here… your heart!!!
We must do what is in front of us well… clearly give ourselves to what we need to commit to now, and the roles we play… this is how we honor God…
Am I keeping my commitments… being a great dad, a great son, a great husband… a great student, a great worker…
Whatever it is I will be faithful with what is in my hands… and do it unto God… believing He is building my future one day at a time.
Make it your goal… to keep my commitments… be faithful with what is in your hands…
A runner and his daughter:
• A daughter asked her father, who ran on a consistent basis… After one cold morning like today… the daughter asked…
• Dad, do you determine how far you will run each time, or do you go as far as you feel like it?
• I find if I am running and think about how I am feeling, rather than the goal that day, I usually quit long before the goal…
• Honey, that is a great life lesson… in life if we keep our eye not on how we feel, where am I ... how far we have to go for our future… we just keep our eye on the goal… I have commitment I have covenanted to commit… and I need to do those to the best with what I have…
Don’t keep you eye on how you feel, but keep it on the goal… how futures are built…
One final challenge… Not only does Bethlehem challenge us to keep our commitments… But this…
3. Don’t ever write yourself off with God…
Many of us… when the dream seems bigger than what we are right now… we size ourselves up… and say how could that be… ???
Look at David in the middle of our story on the road to Bethlehem…
1 Samuel 16
4 So Samuel did as the LORD instructed him. When he arrived at Bethlehem, the leaders of the town became afraid. "What’s wrong?" they asked. "Do you come in peace?" 5 "Yes," Samuel replied. "I have come to sacrifice to the LORD. Purify yourselves and come with me to the sacrifice." Then Samuel performed the purification rite for Jesse and his sons and invited them, too.
6 When they arrived, Samuel took one look at Eliab and thought, "Surely this is the LORD’s anointed!" 7 But the LORD said to Samuel, "Don’t judge by his appearance or height, for I have rejected him. The LORD doesn’t make decisions the way you do! People judge by outward appearance, but the LORD looks at a person’s thoughts and intentions."
Man Looks at the outward… but the Lord looks at the heart.
The world is full of people who have already put you into a box.
Sized up who you are, will be, how intelligent you are, capable you are…
It’s Different with God…
8 Then Jesse told his son Abinadab to step forward and walk in front of Samuel. But Samuel said, "This is not the one the LORD has chosen." 9 Next Jesse summoned Shammah, but Samuel said, "Neither is this the one the LORD has chosen." 10 In the same way all seven of Jesse’s sons were presented to Samuel. But Samuel said to Jesse, "The LORD has not chosen any of these." 11 Then Samuel asked, "Are these all the sons you have?"
Do you have any extra kids lying around?
Well yah, the youngest… David… he is out shepherding around Bethlehem… It is not a mistake that when Christ is birthed (the one who would sit on David’s thrown) that one of the first to know about it is simple shepherds outside of the city…
For this is the kind of God we serve that turns shepherds into Kings… this is the God we serve…
12 So Jesse sent for him. He was ruddy and handsome, with pleasant eyes. And the LORD said, "This is the one; anoint him." 13 So as David stood there among his brothers, Samuel took the olive oil he had brought and poured it on David’s head. And the Spirit of the LORD came mightily upon him from that day on.
Samuel anoints him… and God’s power came upon him.
After Jesus died… and sends out the disciples to go to preach… he tells them not to do anything without first going and waiting for the spirit to come upon you… in that room were common fishermen, housewives, mothers like mary the mother of jesus, criminals like Matthew the tax collector… waited for God’s spirit to fall…
WHEN YOU SAY YES TO GOD…
WILLING TO LET HIM SIZE UP YOUR FUTURE…
WILLING TO COME INTO THIS SEASON OF YOUR LIFE AND ASK… How am I doing with my core commitments in life… how am I as a husband, student, worker…
How hungry are we to say God… I am willing, even though every one else may have sized me up… I am willing for you to break my boxes… and have your spirit empower me in my life…
Altar call… (possibly have everyone stand…)
