The Arrival

Now the two of them went until they came to Bethlehem ... they came to Bethlehem at the beginning of barley harvest. And Naomi had a kinsman of her husband's, a man of great wealth, of the family of Elimelech; his name was Boaz.

Ruth 1:19-2:1

You will recall that at this point in the story of Ruth a momentous decision has been taken. Ruth, who was brought up in the land of Moab and in its religious customs and manners, has been given grace to throw in her lot with the people of God, and to follow Naomi to Bethlehem. Whenever the Gospel has a saving effect in the lives of men and women, it shows itself in a clear decision. We may rightly be very suspicious of decisionism, and the kind of evangelism and the kind of preaching that presses for, and even pressurises people into making an immediate decision. There are many people who have gone forward in evangelistic campaigns and who have signed a card and who have made their decision on a particular night that they were going to follow Jesus who went away, and who never followed him in reality at all. No preacher, of course, can allow people to leave with the impression that there is no urgency to the claims of the Gospel; but neither dare we leave them imagining that a decision to 'come forward' is always the same as genuine conversion.

There is, however, no true conversion, no genuine conversion, without a decision. God's grace moves a man's heart and mind and will. The man or the woman or the boy or the girl, who is the object of God's saving grace and in whose life God has done a glorious work, makes a decision that changes the whole course of their life, just as Ruth did at this particular point. And even although Naomi's words seemed to encourage her to go back to Moab, there was nothing that could prevent her from following her mother-in-law. And so we read these great words of Ruth 1:18, that when "Naomi saw that Ruth was steadfastly minded to go with her, she left speaking unto her." There's a time to speak and there's a time to be silent. There's a time to counsel and a time to advise. There's a time to verbalize the great issues of the Gospel, but there's a time when we realise the issue is between a man and his God, between a woman and her God, when our words will be of little consequence and will be perhaps a barrier rather than a help. And so Naomi has the wisdom to leave Ruth to the grace of God and to the hands of God, and to the guidance and to the leading of God. Ruth made her decision and it was not on whim, not in a moment, she was steadfastly minded and so we read "they two went until they came to Bethlehem".

Now the scene changes. At 1:22, Naomi and Ruth return to the Bethlehem that was left behind in verse one. The Bethlehem that had been subject to the ravages of famine at the beginning of the chapter is now ablaze with the work of the harvest, and the fields that had been barren when Naomi saw them, perhaps a dozen years before, are now shimmering, and waving with the corn that is so plentiful under the blessing of God. And when Naomi and Ruth come to the gate of Bethlehem, suddenly all the city is 'moved' about them. Perhaps the meaning is that the women of the city whose husbands were out working in the fields of the harvest saw this other woman coming; she looked vaguely familiar, yet if it was Naomi, she was a shadow of her former self, and the years had taken their toll. She'd gone out in the bloom of health, she'd gone out, to use her own words, full, but now she's coming back after having been through the mill, after having gone through 'fire and water'. She went to Moab, where she had stood by the graves of her late husband and her late sons. And now she's back, back in her home country, back in her home territory, and she looks as if a century has taken its toll on her physical frame, on her body. They are not even sure if it's her. "Is this Naomi?" they are asking.

Of course, they don't recognise her companion at all, they don't know Ruth. But they seem to recognise the features of this woman who was once so attractive in her physique, and once so active with them around Bethlehem's streets and around Bethlehem's fields, now looking altogether different. You cannot, however, come through the affliction and the pain and the difficulties that Naomi has come through, without being affected by them. That is why she says to them, "Call me not Naomi. Call me Mara." The name Naomi means "pleasantness". The name Mara means "bitterness". And that was how she felt; there had been a genuine transformation. She felt, after all that had taken place in her life, that the sweetness had gone, and that bitterness had replaced it. From the plains and the paths of pleasantness, and from the ways of peace, she had travelled to the barren lands of bitterness. "I went out full," she says, "and the Lord emptied me. Don't call me Naomi when God's hand has been so heavy against me." And with these words she comes back into Bethlehem, in the beginning of barley harvest.

I want to suggest that in this great transition that takes Naomi and Ruth into the land of Bethlehem and into the fields of barley, we have an overview of Naomi's whole experience of grace. I want to look at Naomi's past, and then at her present, and then at her future. It's all here, and in these verses, at the close of Chapter One and at the beginning of Chapter Two, we have a miniature commentary on the whole of Naomi's life, and indeed on the life of the man or woman who has experienced the grace of God in the Gospel.

A Look At the Past

I want us to look first of all, at this woman's past. We've traced a great deal of these details that the Book of Ruth tells us about Naomi: how she went out with her husband Elimelech looking for plenty in the land of Moab and finding there only the bitterness of sin and of death. The lust that brought them away from the land of privilege and blessing to the land of idolatry and godlessness, conceived; and when lust conceives it brings forth sin, and sin brings forth death. And at these gravesides in Moab, Naomi had learned this invariable rule of Biblical ethics: that the further you stray from God, the nearer to death you come. She has discovered that the wages of sin can only be death, and the gift of God that the people were enjoying in Bethlehem was life.

Life or death: that is the Gospel choice . It's brought before us at every stage of Biblical revelation. Moses says to the people, "I've set before you life and death, blessing and cursing, choose life that you may live" (Deuteronomy 30:19). Jesus Christ says to us in the New Testament "I am come that you might have life" (John 10: 10). In Jesus there is life, and His life is the light of men (John 1:4). But Jesus tells us that men love darkness rather than light, because their deeds are evil (John 3:19). The teaching of the Bible is the teaching of the two ways; and the great issue of the Gospel is whether we will walk the way of light and life, or the way of darkness and death. The same choice, the same contrast runs throughout the pages of Scripture, and presses itself upon us in the preaching of the Gospel. Are we going to close in with Christ and have the life and the blessing that are in Him, or are we not?

There were many people at this particular time that traded their opportunities in the land of blessing and privilege and promise, for the empty dreams and broken promises of Moab. Many people were looking for what Naomi searched for and what Elimelech searched for when they turned their backs on the house of bread in the land of covenant blessing. In actual fact, Moab is where the real famine was, and Naomi learned that to her bitter cost.

That is the condemnation under which this sinful world of ours is labouring. Perhaps you are labouring under it too. Maybe you have strayed far away from God, far away from his people, far away from his fields that are full? Maybe, in spite of all the privileges and all the blessings that God has given to you in the Gospel, you find yourself far, far away from that God, far away from that Christ, and far away from the pleasure and the fulness that his people enjoy. The story of Naomi is the story of the whole Bible; it's the story of the Gospel of the grace of God, that those who were far off, are brought near by the blood of Christ (Ephesians 2:13). Naomi strayed far from God, far from covenant blessings, from covenant promises, from covenant opportunities, and she found bitterness in her soul as a result. It is invariably the case that the more distance you put between yourself and the blessings and the privileges of the covenant, the more it will be that pleasantness will give way to bitterness in your life and soul. The Gospel is calling us to come to the God of the covenant, not to stray away from him.

But Naomi had not only strayed from the God of the covenant, she'd been 'emptied' by the God of the covenant. When you look through the Bible and at the ways in which God deals with men and women, this one great issue stands out time and time again. In order for a man to enjoy the blessing of God, he needs to be emptied. He needs to be emptied of himself and of all his natural self-importance and his natural pride. That is what drives the wedge between himself and his God. Naomi says to us as she looks at her past and looks at the way by which the Lord took her, she says "God emptied me. I left Bethlehem with a fullness, and I am coming back with absolutely nothing." And she is to learn that only by having been emptied can she enjoy God's blessing in the fields of barley harvest. The emptiness in her soul is going to be the way to a greater discovery and experience of God's blessing and nearness.

I come back to the Lord's great words in the New Testament to all these religious adults who flocked around him, interested in what he had to say, in the propositions and the theology that he taught. And he says to them, "Unless you become like little children, you cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven" (Matthew 18:3). Yet it is the most difficult thing in the world for a man to become like a child, and to be emptied of all these feelings of self-achievement and self-importance, to lose every vestige of the pride that is so inimical to his relationship with God. But before we can know God's blessing, we need to be emptied, emptied of our own self-importance, emptied of every feeling that we are anything before God. We carry round with us constantly this great sense of our own achievement, of what we've accomplished, and what we've done. And God is saying to us that if we are to enter into the fields of blessing, we must first shed that load, and get rid of all that excess baggage that's weighing us down and keeping us back.

So here is this great woman, who is going to go on to know so much and to enjoy so much and to experience so much, and she is telling us here: God, she says, had to empty me. I wonder if you can follow anything of that great experience of soul- emptying and of heart-emptying, so that nothing matters at last but what you are in Christ and not what you are in yourself? Do you know anything of what it is to be stripped of all your self-righteousness, to be reckoned as nothing before God? It is so difficult for a man in a state of nature to realise, that he is absolutely bankrupt and has absolutely nothing; it does not matter what our achievements are or how others look at us -- what matters at last is what we are before God. And every sinner that has crossed this threshold, into this great land of blessing and forgiveness has come through this door of self-emptying and self-abasement and self-awareness.

When we are born again, God makes everything new. He takes over. He has to demolish the old structure and reconstruct a new building. When a man is converted it is like a shop that is now under new management. But the old shop is of no use for the purposes of the new manager. He has got to demolish the old building and construct a new one that is suited to his purpose and fitted for his service. Naomi says now, "That's what God did for me."

So here is Naomi's testimony: she strayed from the God of the covenant, and has been emptied by the God of the covenant, but she also tells us that she has been led by the God of the covenant. "God brought me home again". That is her great testimony. The Lord took her home. The lostness of Moab has given way to the leading of God.

There are two names for God brought before us in these great verses. He is called the Lord, that is Jehovah, the sovereign God of the Covenant, and he is called the Almighty, the God who came to Abraham and said, "I am the Lord God Almighty. Walk before me and be perfect" (Genesis 17:1). The name Jehovah reminds us of our obligation to Him. The name Almighty reminds us of his grace to us. And here is Naomi singing the song of her God. "I know," she says, "that I strayed from the will of this sovereign Jehovah, but the Almighty broke into my experience. He didn't leave me where I was; I unmade myself but He found me and he took me, and although he brought bitter things into my life, he took me back, back to the land of covenant blessing."

Is that not the story of every man, woman and child who has ever found grace in the Gospel? "I once was lost, but now am found, was blind but now I see." There I was, says Naomi, on sin's road, in sin's company, in sin's territory, but grace found me and took me, and brought me home. And it is the story of every child of God who is able to say like Paul, "I am what I am, by the grace of God" (1 Corinthians 15:10). And all because the son of man came to seek and has saved that which was lost (Luke 19:10). Salvation came to the home of Zacchaeus, not because he sought the Lord (although he did), but because the Lord sought him. That Lord came right into his experience, and turned his world upside-down, and Zacchaeus goes on from that day saying, "I've got a Saviour, who found me, and who saved me, and who's keeping me every day of my life." Naomi's story is the same. "He found me, and he took me and now he's brought me home". And our Lord gives us in the Gospel the absolute guarantee of his leading and keeping as far as the salvation of our souls is concerned.

Naomi's Present

So here is Naomi, now entering Bethlehem. The fields that were once ravaged by famine are now full. The corn that was once not to be seen is now plentiful. God has visited his people and given them bread. And Naomi finds herself there, coming into the fields of Bethlehem, and into this place that is overflowing with the blessing of God, at the beginning of barley harvest. And she has her daughter-in-law with her. The Moabitess accompanies her. She is not returning home alone. She is returning home in the company of Ruth.

You know, I think there is something quite beautiful and quite magnificent here, and that is this great emphasis on the sovereignty of God in salvation. Do you see how this is emphasised in 1:22? This is Ruth, the Moabitess. And the God who looked after Naomi and guided kept her is the God who did the unexpected and found Ruth and made Naomi a blessing to Ruth. Now Naomi is coming into Bethlehem in the companyof her daughter-in-law. She is not alone: God has been with her and God has shown himself to her, and Naomi can say 'Yes, it was bitter and difficult; and yes, he emptied me and there were tears, and there were doubts; and yes, there were shadows, and yes there was darkness in my cup, but there was blessing in there too.' And now at the very gates of Bethlehem, she is able to say "Hitherto, the Lord has helped me, and the blessing is here". In the darkest of her hours, in the most unseeming of situations, in the most difficult of trials, in the most testing places of her life, God has been there, and one evidence of his grace is that the Bible says "So Naomi returned and Ruth the Moabitess her daughter-in-law with her!

Do you know, child of God, that every trial, every difficulty, every cloud, every shadow, every tear, every sigh, has God's blessing all around it? I know that it is difficult -- sometimes near impossible -- to realise that, when the darkness is pressing in, and when the flood and the fire are so overwhelming. It is difficult then to say this is good; it is easier to say with Naomi, 'this is bitter for me' than to say 'this is better for me'. The story of Naomi reminds me that every step that the people of God take is hedged around with God's blessing. What a blessing to have this great assurance in our own lives! To know that every step is measured, every experience weighed, to know that God sets limits to all our heartaches, and says "thus far, and no farther," that he is able to take light out of darkness, who is able to bless even the most trying of our experiences and circumstances, and to say to his children "All things work together for good to them that love God, who are the called according to his purpose" (Romans 8:28).

It is only the Christian who is able to look at affliction that way. I suppose at last that it is one of the great tests of our Christian profession. It's so easy to make a profession when things are well. To say that God is our God, and to sing 'Our God Reigns' when the winds are favourable and when the sun is shining and when we are by the still waters and the green pastures. But when a man in the furnace of affliction can say, "God is my God and though he slay me, yet will I trust him" (Job 13:15), then there is living proof of real faith. It is there you have the acid test that this man is truly a child of God. It is easy to sing at the top of the mountain, and at the height of noonday, that God is ours and we are his; but take away the sunshine, take the man into the valley, subject him to trials and temptations and testing times there -- will this man still say then that God is his, and that he is God's? Look at Paul: he has known blessing in his life, he has seen the hand of God at work, he knows that God is with him, he knows that his work has been blessed. Yet he is subjected to trials and afflictions. What does he say about them? "Our light affliction, which is but for a moment, works for us an exceeding great and eternal weight of glory" (2 Corinthians 4:18). If you were to take a pair of scales, the affliction on its own would weigh you down. But weighed against the weight of glory, the affliction is light!

The great shepherd psalm, Psalm 23, talks of leading by still waters, and feeding in green pastures. But it also talks of walks through the valley of the shadow of death. It talks of enemies and trials. But the experiences do not belie the bond between the shepherd and the flock. He is their shepherd still. There is a song which says:

The God of the mountain is still God in the valley,
When things go wrong, he'll make them right;
And the God of the good times is still God in the bad times;
The God of the day is still God in the night.

And that is how Naomi is here. She's been through her valleys of darkness. She's had her bad times. She's proved the faithfulness of God. And if the presence of Ruth testifies to how far away from God Naomi went, it also testifies to how near to Naomi God came. Ruth the Moabitess is with her! The blessing of God is in her cup, along with the bitterness and along with the trial and along with the affliction -- it's all been mixed together for good, as God promised.

Naomi's Future

But there is something here, I think, about Naomi's future too. Her past has been woven with a variety of threads, light and dark, a mixture of light and shadow; her present now gives evidence that the blessing of God has been on her life and has been with her up to this point. What of the future? What about the days to come? Well, God has made provision for her there too. 'Naomi had a kinsman whose name was Boaz' (2:1). There was much that Naomi did not know at this particular time. She did not know what lay ahead, she did not know what life would bring, what Bethlehem would mean, what she would yet experience.

But at the beginning of chapter 2 we are reminded that God knew. And God had already made the provision: there, in the fields of Bethlehem, there was a man who was going to be a means of blessing to these two women. God is running before Naomi and he is running before Ruth. He is breaking up the way and preparing the way and making sure that everything she needs is already managed and ready. Isn't it so easy to fall into the pit of despair and depression simply because we cannot face tomorrow? But are we not reminded here that the God who holds us holds the future, and he has already singled out Boaz, who is going to do Naomi good?

I want you to remember that. For every single one of us who loves Jesus Christ, there is this great assurance. Much may be unknown to us, but God has already made the provision for all our tomorrows. He has already undertaken to write the providence that will keep us and guide us in all that lies ahead. He has already appointed the means and the men by which blessing will come; he has already appointed the ways by which we will know his nearness and his favour -- it's all there in his plan. "Don't worry about tomorrow" (Matthew 6:34), says our Lord. Paul puts it like this: "In everything with prayer and supplication and thanksgiving, make your requests known to God and the peace of God will keep you (Philippians 4:7). The God who kept his eye on Naomi has already got his eye on the Boaz, on the means of blessing, on the channel of favour.

Sometimes we become so obsessed with the future of the church, but I want to say that God has already provided for the future of the church. Sometimes we become so obsessed with our own personal immediate futures and I want to say, God has already made provision for our immediate future. We become so obsessed with what we cannot see; yet God asks us to live by faith because he sees the end from the beginning. He's already got this man, this mighty man of wealth, of the family of Elimelech, marked out, and through him blessing will come to Naomi and to Ruth, and to the whole world.

That's the kind of God that we have: the God who runs before us and who says, 'wherever I take you, I have gone before; and wherever I lead you, I have already been, and whatever you experience I have already prepared what you need'. What a blessing to be safe in the hands of that God! Although we do not know what the future holds, we know who holds the future. If you are unconverted, I am asking you to come with all your cares and all your burdens and your anxieties, and I am asking you to bring them to the God of the covenant. Let him empty you of all that you ever thought you were, so that he'll fill you with a blessing that overflows.

And if you know him personally, I am asking you to go forward in the strength of God, the Lord. He can see much further than you can, and he has already been ahead, paving the way, preparing the road, and blazing the trail to glory. Did he not say "I go to prepare a place for you" (John 14:1)? Did he not call us his kept ones (1 Peter 1:5). When we come into his fields there will be provision for us -- 'enough and to spare' -- and his grace will be as our days. Our God does not change. What he was for Naomi, he will be for you. What he was for Ruth he will be for you. The answer to the cares of our past, present and future is to be found in the one who is the great 'I AM', the Lord Almighty, whose name is Jesus.

© Iain D. Campbell 2001