Listen to this comment I heard the other day. “We’ve adopted such an attitude of “risk avoidance” that I’m afraid we may well miss the next great advancement. We’re so afraid of failure that we may not pursue that next step.” This quote was from 1997 and was made on a TV show about “stealth technology”. As I channeled surfed Wednesday night and heard this I realized the truth of it applies too much more than just aircraft technology. And may be even truer for us today, after the horror of September 11th.
One thing the attacks did was to heighten our desire to be safe. If we wanted to hide from the big bad world before we sure did after New York. We want to get back to the place where we feel a sense of comfort and security. But to do this will take massive changes that we have to not only accept but welcome if we want to feel safe. Not just long lines at airports but perhaps face recognition software in stores and along highways or even universal identity cards carried by everyone one all the time.
We have good reason to be afraid. But healthy fear can grow into a dream crushing force when left unchallenged. Fears can rise up in us and frustrate, attack and eat away at our goals and dreams till we finally give up on dreams altogether. Instead of dealing with the Fear Factor we toss away the dreams which may well be God given. We determine we won’t be disappointed by such dreams and so we toss out the goal of becoming more like Jesus along with the rest of our dreams
Ruth’s Fear
Let me suggest that the real answer isn’t in getting rid of our dreams but in dealing with our fear. Frank Herbert, the author of Dune has a mantra called the Shai-Hulud and goes.
I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it is gone past me I will turn to see fear’s path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain
Such self-talk may help characters in a book and it might not hurt us either but I believe that fears must be dealt with in the power and with the presence of God. And that’s what we see happening here with Ruth.
Ruth had every reason to be afraid. She was widowed. Her extended family which she had married into was self-destructing. With no male relatives to care for them they had to fend for themselves. What’s more extended family wasn’t local one but came from Judah, a nation that wasn’t always friendly toward Moab.
This is where Ruth is living emotionally as Naomi announces that she’s going to return to her own people. Suddenly this woman who she’s lived with for the past 10 years is going away. Naomi doesn’t want to burden them and so encourages them to return to their families. In the Ancient Near East women usually didn’t return home because they were seen as belonging to their husband’s family.
Naomi isn’t being mean but genuinely hopes that God, her God, will give them another husband and find “rest”. That’s word doesn’t mean not having to work but to find a place of safety and security much like we seek.
Ruth’s Faith
Naomi’s faith was not lost on her daughters-in-law over the years. But when push comes to shove Orpha leaves and returns home “to her gods”; but Ruth clings to Naomi and refuses to depart. I believe Ruth not only loved Naomi but had come to the God whom Naomi worshipped.
Ruth’s fears were substantial but her faith was grand enough to allow her to risk the uncertainty of the future they face as they leave and travel to Bethlehem. Now it is Ruth, not Naomi, who is the alien and stranger. Ruth-the foreigner--is now the one who is dependent on any of Naomi’s family who might be willing to take them in.
Ruth’s faith allows her to risk everything in order to be with someone she loves. She left her life behind. Everything that was familiar; family, friends, her home, and even her spiritual connection with her past. All of this is summarized in that declaration of faith she makes to Naomi—your people will be my people, your God will be my God. And this she does without knowing what awaits her. Somehow, deep in her heart of hearts, I believe she knew Naomi’s God would not abandon them.
Does this happen today? Jim Elliot, Wycliffe translator, Nate Saint, and three others flew to the Amazon jungle. January 1956 to begin trying to reach the Auca tribe. Jim had begun praying for them years before and the landing was one of the final steps to sharing the gospel with these people. Five days after landing, the report reached Elizabeth Elliot and Marge Saint, another missionary’s wife, that the Indians had attacked and killed the missionaries. Listen to what Jim Elliot had written in his journal in 1949, "He is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose."
Facing death for Christ’s sake cannot be easy but imagine those young widows left behind. Elizabeth Elliot and Marge Saint two could have fled to the comfort and safety; and found a place of “rest”. They could have said, “I’ve given enough, I’m done.” Instead they continued the brave work of their husbands. In a Back to the Bible broadcast in 1998 Elizabeth Elliot says, “After my husband was killed. I said to the Lord, ‘If there’s anything You ever want me to do about the Aucas, I’m available,’ thinking that it was rather an absurd prayer to pray. Because, after all, I was a widow with a baby ten months old at the time, through an amazing series of circumstances, that I could never have designed or imagined… it turned out that in 1958, I was living in a little house with no walls and no floors and no furniture, in a place called Tiwaenu in Auca territory. My daughter Valerie was then three years old, and she was also there living in that little house with me. Next-door was Rachel Saint, the sister of Nate Saint, the pilot who had been killed along with the other men.” They didn’t just pray for the tribe but moved into the village of those who killed their husbands.
Their risk bore fruit and the legacy continues today as Nate’s son runs a ministry to help tribes from becoming dependent on outsiders. A few years ago the Auca’s built an ultra light aircraft so that they could help other tribes in the area . The fruit is further seen in the comments of one of those involved in the attack, Gikita, who told Elizabeth Elliot "God says now you are forgiven. And I know I’m forgiven for all these spearings. I’m going to meet Nate Saint in heaven someday. And we’ll just wrap our arms around each other and be happy.” (for more information you may check out the web sites below) http://www.urbana.org/u96ramfiles/s28am_elliot_30.ram or http://www.geocities.com/joesiu/philly/currentstudents_audiovideo.htm What all those touched by this horror share is a sense of freedom that comes from faithfully following Jesus through the dark places of our fear.
Ruth’s Freedom
Ruth’s faith caused her to also reap a sense of freedom as she sought to provide for her mother-in-law. The risk Ruth took because of her faith let her see what God had in store for these two widows. And what Ruth finds is not only a place with a future for her but a source of healing for Naomi as well. Ruth’s marriage to Boaz and the birth of their child, Obed, becomes a “restorer of life and sustainer of her in her old age,” Naomi is told. Beyond this, unseen and unlooked for, Ruth becomes a part of King David and Jesus’ blood line.
Application
God has chosen special people to live lives of faith and risk like Ruth and the Jim Elliot’s of the world. And those people are His people. Our Bible describes those who “pleased” God as people who risked it all for God. They prayed in a den of lions and traveled to unknown countries. They preached before kings and walked on a stormy sea. They stood their ground while stoned to death. They fought giants and cared for God’s prophets with their last meal. Some seven weeks ago we started this adventure by looking at Hebrews 11 which gives us other examples of such risk takers for Christ’s sake.
It shouldn’t surprise us that God calls all of His people to live with a “Ruth-like risky-ness” after all it’s the type of life Jesus lived for us. We see this in the events that led up to Jesus’ triumphant entry in Jerusalem which we celebrate on Palm Sunday. Jesus is telling his closest friends what’s going to be happening in Matthew 16. He lays out for them what it means for Him to risk it all for God’s sake. And Peter’s fear takes over and he tries to quash Jesus’ dream and purpose. Only moments before this same man had confessed Jesus was truly God’s Messiah—the Christ. What got into Peter? His Fear Factor took hold and he tried to run to that place where he could be comfortable, safe and secure.
Peter moves from confession to concern over what can only be seen as a real depressing view of the future. But Jesus moves Peter one step further and that is to a place of correction. He lays it out pretty clear in vv. 24-25, “If anyone will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whoever will save their life shall lose it and whoever will lose their life for my sake shall find it.” I’ve heard well meaning pastors tell their members that to pick up one’s cross means living with an unbelieving husband or a nag of a wife. It doesn’t. Children who never grow up or parents who won’t let go; living with horrible diseases or suffering the untimely death of a loved one are horribly hard to live through but that’s not what Jesus meant when he said “take up his cross”.
It means to grab hold of that which will kill us and follow Jesus to the place of death so that we can die with him. The cross allows us to live as if we’ve been condemned to death for Jesus’ sake. Is it no wonder that Jesus said in Matthew 7:21, "Not every one who says to me, `Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.”
Do you want to know why we’re so hesitant to risk something for Jesus? At the simplest, foundational, most basic level we really don’t believe Him or what He says.
· We don’t believe He loves us. If we believed he suffered the horror of crucifixion because WE PUT HIM ON THE CROSS we’d do anything to live up to the love He showed us.
· We don’t believe God’s has our best in mind. In Jeremiah God tells us, “I know my plans for you” And God’s plans are plans to bless and heal. Instead we insist on living the same old way and blaming God when things don’t get better.
· We don’t believe what God says about the future. Matthew 25 Jesus separates those who will enter into the Kingdom from those who won’t the criteria is how we risk ourselves by touching the hungry, thirsty, stranger, naked, and imprisoned.
Pages 66-67 in the adult journal give some ideas of what risking for God may look like. Let me give you another from a letter I received this week from Loves and Fishes. Let me read you a portion of what the manager, Beth Beadling writes, “We continue to have an urgent need for Meals-On-Wheels drivers and kitchen helpers. We hoping to find new volunteers who are willing to drive a route once a week here in the local neighborhood.” That’s one example of how we can risk our time to feed the hungry. We can invite in the stranger by joining in the opportunity to go to Bandon Oregon in August for a week. You’ll get to sleep on the floor, meet new people and teach a bunch of kids about Jesus. There will be opportunities to risk getting to know the outcasts in our neighborhood as William Temple House-North opens up in a couple of month.
It’s not difficult to find areas in which we can risk ourselves for Jesus’ sake. The difficult part is in the clinging to Jesus and refusing to let go when he starts to move a different direction. Are you afraid? Then let your fear spark in you the flame of faith so that you will enjoy the freedom that comes from following our faithful Lord.
