Running On Empty - Ruth 1:19-22 - February 3, 2013
Series: From Heartache to Hope – The Redemption of Ruth - #3
As some of you will know, I have a sister. She lives in Calgary, and has a growing family of her own, so we don’t see each other very often – certainly not as often as we would like. It also turns out that we don’t talk to each other all that much either – not for a lack of wanting to, but more due to the realities of two very busy lives. Yet every now and then, one of us will give the other a call, and we will talk for a while, and we’ll spend some time catching up with one another. And so it was that I gave her a call a couple of weeks ago on her birthday. And as we talked it suddenly struck me that my little sister was 39 years old! Now I’m not sure how that all happened, where all the intervening years went, I just have to accept the fact that it’s true! Not that that’s all that remarkable in itself, it’s more that I have to wrestle with the reality that if she is 39, it means I’m already over that 40 year mark myself!
When I was 20, 40 seemed ancient. Now that I’m there it doesn’t seem all that old after all - but the reality of the passing years cannot be denied. To have another 40 or 50 years wouldn’t be all that unusual in our society but it is by no means guaranteed. And with that realization I’ve found that I’ve been spending some time reflecting on my life, and how it’s turned out so far. I can think back upon the dreams for my life that I had in my youth, and I can safely say that very few of them have survived the passage of the years. And maybe you can relate to that as well - there are shattered dreams, and broken hopes, and unmet expectations that litter the years of our lives.
Now that doesn’t necessarily mean that life hasn’t been good. It also doesn’t mean that new dreams haven’t been reached for and attained. And it doesn’t mean that we need to live with sorrow in the present at our regrets in the past either. But it does mean that there have been times of sorrow and sadness, times of deep questioning and searching, times of hurt and anger and maybe even bitterness or despair, that have left their mark upon our lives.
I think Naomi could probably relate to some of that. Life certainly had not turned out like she had hoped it would. In point of fact, her life, in many ways, had been hard, full of shattered dreams and disappointments, not to mention heartache and loss. Bit by bit everything she had held on to and put her happiness and joy in had been lost to her. The famine led them to leave their home in Bethlehem, to part with family and friends and all things familiar, and to go to a foreign land where God was not known. It was in that land of Moab that her husband would pass away leaving Naomi to raise their two sons alone.
Things looked up as they in turn grew into men, met the young women who would become their wives, and got married. This was a chance for Naomi to live again – to enjoy getting to know her daughters-in-law, to anticipate the arrival of grandchildren, to know that her own children would care for her in her old age.
Yet all those dreams are shattered as her sons meet their own end in the land of Moab just as their father had. Once again, Naomi is left, in many ways alone, and without hope for the future. Life goes on, but she’s running on empty. There seems to be nothing left to give and nothing left to live for. And maybe you can relate because you’ve been there too; maybe you are even in that place today. Life in Moab, while it once seemed to promise so much, has, in the end, become very bitter for Naomi. She has hit the bottom, reached the lowest of the lows, and it’s when she’s in that deep dark night of the soul that she decides to head home, to return to Judah, the place of praise. It’s from out of that dark empty space that she begins the journey back to God, but she doesn’t walk that road alone; Ruth will walk it with her, and that’s where we pick up their story this morning, Ruth, chapter 1, beginning in verse 19 …
“So the two women went on until they came to Bethlehem. When they arrived in Bethlehem, the whole town was stirred because of them, and the women exclaimed, “Can this be Naomi?” “Don’t call me Naomi,” she told them. “Call me Mara, because the Almighty has made my life very bitter. I went away full, but the LORD has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi? The LORD has afflicted me; the Almighty has brought misfortune upon me.” So Naomi returned from Moab accompanied by Ruth the Moabitess, her daughter-in-law, arriving in Bethlehem as the barley harvest was beginning.” (Ruth 1:19–22, NIV84)
The journey back would have been difficult for two women travelling alone. It would take them some 7-10 days of solid travel just to reach their destination. Along the way they would have to cross the Jordan River and ascend from the plains of Moab some 2000 feet in height to reach Bethlehem. The truth is that when we’ve been in Moab, the road back home is not always easy. There will be obstacles, there may be opposition from those closest to us, you may wonder along the way if it is worth it, you may be tempted to stop short, but it’s a journey that you need to complete if you’re ever to return home to that place of praise; to renewed fellowship with God.
And so Naomi and Ruth come to Bethlehem. Now the townsfolk have never met Ruth, but they knew Naomi from many years back. Some of the women in town recognize her – at least they think they do – the woman they see bears a passing resemblance to the Naomi they remember so well – but there have been definite changes – so many so that they’re not sure.
And friends, you will find that your sojourn in Moab has left a mark on your soul, on your heart, one that you would, if you could do it all again, choose to forgo. And yet having been marred by the experience, the need is to find healing, to have the wounds bound up, to have that which is broken, mended and made whole, and that is only possible as that journey back to God is completed.
Scripture tells us that the whole town is stirred up by their arrival. Naomi has come home! But where is her husband? Where are her sons? Who is this young woman that she is travelling with? The answers become clearer to them as Naomi responds. “Don’t call me Naomi,” she says, “for “Naomi” is a name that means “pleasant,” and my life has been anything but pleasant. Instead call me, “Mara,” for “Mara” means “bitter,” and the Almighty has made my life very bitter.” When we choose to turn away from God, and go to live in Moab, the chances are that that which seems so sweet at the time, will come to be bitter with the passing of the years. It certainly has touched Naomi’s life in such a way.
The name she chooses for God is very revealing of her theology – theology is just the way she thinks of and understands God. You have a theology that’s at play in your life as well. As you seek to live out your faith, your theology shapes how you understand, not just God’s character, but His plans and His purposes, and the way He interacts with the world in which we live.
Naomi’s theology goes deep. Her understanding of God is not shallow, nor superficial. She has a big view of God! And it’s important that God’s people have a big view of God today as well. If we don’t, we will miss out on what God is doing, what He is seeking to accomplish in and through our lives. We will fail to see His hand at work in the moments of each day, and our faith, and our witness, will be the poorer for it.
Job, and Naomi, both have a big view of God. They were willing to accept both good, and hardship, from the hand of the Lord. A weak faith, a shallow theology, only accepts good. How deep is your theology? How big is your view of God? Can you say, as Job did in the most difficult moments of his life, “The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised.” (Job 1:21b, NIV) If we cannot, our view of God is not big enough; our theology is misinformed. We need to get deep into God’s word, to wrestle through the difficult truths, and to see God in the midst of them, that we emerge on the other end with a transformed theology, and a richer, truer, understanding of who God is.
Naomi refers to God as the “Almighty.” It’s a word that conveys the ideas of power and authority, but in Hebrew the connotations are even richer than that. To the Hebrews it is a word that carries the idea of an all-consuming power that cannot be resisted. It conveys both the idea of a power that is able to injure, but also one that is able to protect; a power that is all sufficient in its strength, and irresistible in its expression. Naomi does not see herself as a victim of misfortune alone, or of circumstances, nor of sad coincidence. In Naomi’s theology, all of life is in God’s hands. He cannot be separated from the moments of each day and cannot be kept in compartments of our own making. If God decides to send bitterness into her life, than it is bitterness that she will know!
“I went away full,” she says, “but the Lord has brought me back empty.” When Naomi left Bethlehem so long ago she had pretty much everything that she had longed for – a husband, and sons, and bright dreams for the future. When she comes home, some ten years later, it’s all been lost to her. But notice the words that she has chosen to use to describe her life.
She does not say, “God sent me out from Bethlehem,” nor does she say, “I went to the place where God called me to go.” She does not say, “I went with God’s blessing,” nor does she say, that “God went with me,” she simply says, “I went away full.” She, and her family, made a choice, when the going got tough, to turn away from God and to find satisfaction and peace and hope in the land of Moab. As best we can tell, they went without God’s blessing. What they did, they did on their own.
And that is ever the danger for us as well – that we will go where the Lord has not led, that we will walk through doors that the Lord has not opened, that we will lose sight of God, and run to the world in our times of need, or even in our times of plenty. Our temptation is always to ask God to bless that which we are doing, when the prayer of our hearts would be better poured out, that we would be doing that which God is choosing to bless. Do you see the difference? The one starts in our own hearts – with our own desires, our own longings, our own fears, and our own plans – hearts which God’s own word tells us are “deceitful above all things” (Jeremiah 17:9, NIV) - the other finds its beginning in God. The one so often leads to bitterness and emptiness, and fruitlessness, while the other often leads to something so much more than we could ever ask or imagine!
So before you take that new job, before you ask that girl to marry you, before you respond “yes,” or “no,” seek the heart of God! Consider whether the plans you are making with your life are pleasing in God’s sight, or just pleasing to your own hearts. Are the things that you are giving yourself to, spending yourself in, are they in line with God’s purposes? Do they have any kingdom value in them? In what way do they honor God? How will your decisions bring you, and your family, into a deeper, closer, more vibrant relationship with Him? Consider whether those same choices will draw you closer to God, or, if you will, one day say, as Naomi said, “I went away full, but the Lord has brought me back empty.”
And yet even in those words we find a ray of hope. Naomi, and family, went out on their own, but it is the Lord who brought her back. Naomi recognizes this! The last decade may have been a harsh teacher, but Naomi has learned. She has discovered that while they may have forsaken God, God had not forsaken them! He may have disciplined them, and disciplined them harshly even, but it comes from a heart of love, a desire that they would turn once again to God and to find life in Him.
“God has brought me back empty,” she says. But the point still remains that God has brought her back none-the-less! Back to what? Back to the House of Bread, in the place of Praise. Back to her people; back to His people. He has done in her life, that which turned her heart back to Him, in order that He might bring her, to a place of healing, and life, and renewed hope.
The apostle Paul writes these words, as he asks, “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? … No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:35–39, NIV84)
Folks, if God had not done, all that God had done, in Naomi’s life, she never would have left Moab. She never would have come home. But God’s love for her had not failed, and she had not been forgotten. And like parents, who must do the hard things in the life of their children, that those children may know a good and godly life, so too does God seek to do those things in our lives that, are ultimately for our own good as well. God may empty our hands in order to fill them with something so much better.
Naomi can’t see it just yet, but that’s exactly what God is going to do for her. Though she acknowledges that it is God who has brought her home, she is still wrapped up in her bitterness. Bitterness skews our perspective. It colors our perception of the world around us. She says that “the Lord has afflicted,” her and that the “Almighty has brought misfortune upon,” her. And yes, the Lord’s hand has been in it. He is the “Almighty,” and while she has experienced the discipline side of His irresistible power, she cannot yet see how that same power is at work now to protect her, to bring healing to a shattered heart, and fullness to emptied hands.
She looks into the future and sees nothing but darkness. That’s because bitterness and sorrow have skewed her perception of reality. That tends to happen to us as well when we find ourselves in that long, dark night of the soul. But in reality, things are not as dark as Naomi has imagined them to be.
How can we say that? Because God is still at work! Last week we heard how God had visited His people and ended the famine. This week we’ve heard how God has brought Naomi home to the place of praise and plenty. He could have brought her back at any time of the year but He did not. He chose to have her come home at the one time of year when she would have hope for survival. He brought her back at the beginning of the barley harvest which meant that there would be both food and work available, so that she and Ruth could survive, and not just survive, but prosper!
And even more importantly, God did not bring her back alone. Ruth, a stranger to the ways of God, but a daughter-in-law of amazing character, has come home with her. And from this point on, the story will be less about Naomi, more about Ruth and how God will deal with her. And yet it’s through this young woman that God will richly bless Naomi as well.
This is “hesed” – that’s a Hebrew word that means “loving kindness.” It’s what Naomi prayed that God would show to her daughter’s-in-law as she planned to return to Judah all alone. In verse 8 she says to them, “Go back, each of you, to your mother’s home. May the LORD show kindness to you, as you have shown to your dead and to me.” (Ruth 1:8, NIV84) And it’s this “hesed” – this loving kindness – that both Naomi and Ruth are going to experience at God’s own hands.
Friends, when we find ourselves in that long, dark night of the soul, may we have eyes to see, the hesed of God – His loving kindness at work - even in the darkest moments of our lives. And though we may have lost much, and though we may feel that we are returning, and running, on empty, may we have the clarity to see, and to know, that we have not been forsaken by God. May we have eyes to see that which Naomi did not – the goodness and provision and love, of God.
Do not ever believe the lie, that the sins, and shame and darkness of your past, in any way, shape or form, mean that there is no hope for your future. Maybe you went to Moab, for just a little while, as Elimelech and Naomi did, but now it’s been years and you’re wondering if you can ever come home? The answer is “Yes!”
And maybe you’re plagued with guilt and shame about choices you have made in the past and you’re wondering if God could ever love you, forgive you, grant to you a future with Him? Again, the answer is “Yes!”
And maybe you’re crying out, as Naomi did, that you went out full, but that God has brought you back empty. And you’re wondering if there is any point in going on, any hope that things could ever possibly get better. In Christ, the answer is a resounding, “Yes!”
And chances are, that if God has brought you back feeling empty, that you are not truly empty after all. Ask Him to open your eyes to His hesed – His loving kindness – being shown to you. And it might just be that you discover that there is a “Ruth” in your life, and a “barley harvest” just around the corner, that will be the source of God’s rich blessing to you! For God, who is the Almighty, is willing, and able, to turn even His deepest judgments, into greater joys.
Let’s pray …
