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A Prayer for Mundane Devotion

O Lord,
Whose power is infinite and wisdom infallible,
Order things that they may neither hinder, nor discourage me,
nor prove obstacles to the progress of thy cause;
Stand between me and all strife, that no evil befall,
no sin corrupt my gifts, zeal, attainments.

May I follow duty and not any foolish device of my own;
Permit me not to labour at work which thou wilt not bless,
that I may serve thee without disgrace or debt;
Let me dwell in thy most secret place under thy shadow,
where is safe impenetrable protection from
the arrow that flieth by day,
the pestilence that walketh in darkness,
the strife of tongues,
the malice of ill-will,
the hurt of unkind talk,
the snares of company,
the perils of youth,
the temptations of middle life,
the mournings of old age,
the fear of death.

I am entirely depended upon thee for support, counsel, consolation.
Uphold me by thy free Spirit,
and may I not think it enough to be preserved from falling,
but may I always go forward, always abounding in the work which thou gives me to do.
Strengthen me by thy Spirit in my inner self
for every purpose of my Christian life.

All my jewels I give to the shadow of the safety that is in thee–
my name anew in Christ,
my body, soul, talents, character,
my success, wife, children friends, work,
my present, my future, my end.
Take them, they are thine, and I am thine, now and forever.

From The Valley of Vision (page 244)

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Mundane Devotion

Mundane means common or ordinary. Devotion is defined as profound dedication. The high drama of Ruth’s story often causes us to lose sight of her mundane devotion. Listen to these summary words at the end of Chapter 2:

So she kept close to the young women of Boaz, gleaning until the end of the barley and wheat harvests. And she lived with her mother-in-law. (Ruth 2:23 ESV)

After Ruth’s first encounter with Boaz, she reaped throughout the barley and wheat harvests. Barley is ready first. The wheat is harvested about fifty days later. For at least (probably more) fifty days, Ruth got up early and got home late. She walked the distance from the town of Bethlehem to the fields of Boaz to harvest wheat. A foreigner in a strange land, she stood out among the other poor women of Bethlehem. She had become a scavenger for bread in the House of Bread.

Ruth practiced mundane devotion. It’s really an oxymoron. Mundane devotion. Ordinary but profound dedication. Ruth worked through long hot days in the field. She gleaned behind the other reapers. For almost two months Ruth lived off of Boaz’s leftovers. She was content with crumbs from the table. And she carried those crumbs to the woman who had nicknamed herself Bitter. Bitter had come home to Bethlehem and was resigned to a diet of bread crumbs–leftovers.

You must remember that we are privy to the rest of the story. Ruth had no idea how this would turn out. God did. Ruth had no idea that chapter 3 was following chapter 2 and that her story would unfold the way it did. She did not know her story would be written down and that millions would read about it!

She practiced mundane devotion.

Mundane devotion is the wife who cares for her suddenly ill husband.

Mundane devotion is the parent of a special needs child.

Mundane devotion is working in the shadows while someone else basks in the sunshine.

Mundane devotion is giving with no strings attached.

Mundane devotion is praying privately for God to work publicly.

Ruth practiced mundane devotion.

Do you?

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Satisfied

“And at mealtime Boaz said to her, ‘Come here and eat some bread and dip your morsel in the wine.’ So she sat beside the reapers, and he passed to her roasted grain. And she ate until she was satisfied, and she had some left over.” (Ruth 2:14 ESV).

For some time Ruth had been taking care of her bitter ole mother-in-law, and in our text she is now in Boaz’s field gleaning from his barley harvest. She had been working all day long with little rest, and now it was time to eat. Like any of us would have been Ruth is hungry from all of her hard work. She sits down at the table with Boaz and all of his workers and eats all the food she wants until she can’t eat any more. She even has enough left over to take back to Naomi! First off it was a big deal that Boaz allowed Ruth “the Moabite” to sit at his table because by doing so he was saying to her and the rest of his people, “I see you as one of mine.” But secondly, she goes from a traveling, sojourning stranger in Israel, to an accepted Moabite at the table of Boaz, eating enough to satisfy her, and then some! She left the table lacking nothing. She was completely and graciously filled.

In John 6 Jesus is talking with a crowd of people who are looking for a sign in order to believe Jesus in the messiah, and he tells them in verse 35: “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.” By making this statement Jesus is saying that He is the life-sustainer, the one who satisfies hungry people completely. He is not talking about physical hunger, but rather spiritual and emotional cravings that we so often seek elsewhere.

Many times in our everyday life we look for so much to satisfy our deepest longings. As imperfect beings we look to things other than Christ to satisfy those. Ruth came to Boaz (the picture of Christ in that text) and ate at his table until she was satisfied, Jesus looks at those seeking a sign and tells them that anyone who comes to Him will never hunger or thirst again. Jesus is simply saying, “You want to be accepted? Come to me.” “You seek approval from everyone; instead come to me, and based on who I am I’ll approve you.” “You long for emotional stability; I alone give that freely to those who ask.”

Whatever it is today you seek to satisfy the longings in your life; maybe it’s your job, your family, or some hobbies. I encourage you to instead go to the ultimate and complete satisfier of all your longings, The Lord Jesus Christ.

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Your Failure Is Not Your Identity

“Ruth the Moabite.” This is a common phrase in the book of Ruth. In chapter 2 alone she is referred to as ‘Ruth the Moabite’ three times.  Had she been known as  ‘Ruth the great’ or ‘Ruth the wonderful’ that would have been one thing, but Moabite? This was not only her ancestry, but also a stigma. The Moabite lineage stems all the way back to Lot, Abraham’s nephew.  Lot lived in the sinful city of Sodom with his daughters, and was taken out of there only because God had to send his angels to take them out before he destroyed the city! After Lot and his daughters left Sodom and were living in Zoar, there was absolutely no man to be found to give Lot’s daughters a son to carry on his line.  Lot’s daughters then decided to deceive their father by getting him drunk and sleeping with him, and the oldest daughter had a son and named him Moab…  WOW! (The full story is in Genesis 19)  What an unbelievably terrible story about your ancestors. This would be comparable to discovering your great grandfather was the absolute worst Nazi general, who was responsible for killing most of the Jews during the Holocaust; nobody wants that to be their identity, but this was Ruth’s. She was “the Moabite.”

Her failure had become her identity. The writer of Ruth intentionally and divinely placed her identity in the text, but according to our story it didn’t matter to Boaz that Ruth was a Moabite. Boaz was able to look beyond Ruth’s stigma to meet a need that only he could meet. This is such a beautiful picture of Christ!

How many of you reading this blog have allowed your failure in this life to become your identity? You have let your major failures define who you are! God is speaking through this passage to a generation of failures saying, I don’t care what you’ve done, I don’t care what others say about you, it doesn’t matter how you feel about yesterday, you may not can forgive yourself but I will… I will accept you; I am willing to lower my status and risk losing everything for the sake of taking care of you & giving you the value you’ve been looking for your entire life.

Boaz gave Ruth value and did not discount her because of her failure. Praise The Lord Jesus that He’s done the same for us by way of the cross! As followers of Christ our past sin and failure has been nailed to the cross, therefore canceling our record of debt to God, which was our sin (Col. 2:14-15). Your new identity is therefore now a child of God, a son or daughter of the king, someone who’s gone from spiritual death to eternal and abundant life!

Paul said: “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” (Ephesians 2:10)

Embrace your new identity.

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Who’s Your Boss?

And behold, Boaz came from Bethlehem. And he said to the reapers, “The LORD be with you!” And they answered, “The LORD bless you.” Then Boaz said to his young man who was in charge of the reapers, “Whose young woman is this?” And the servant who was in charge of the reapers answered, “She is the young Moabite woman, who came back with Naomi from the country of Moab. She said, ‘Please let me glean and gather among the sheaves after the reapers.’ So she came, and she has continued from early morning until now, except for a short rest.” (Ruth 2:4-7 ESV)

We infer from the opening lines that the field was outside Bethlehem. Boaz, a wealthy landowner, came to check on his reapers. He happened to come the very day that Ruth arrived. Immediately we see Boaz’s character. His first words to the reapers have nothing to do with how much grain they have harvested. Rather He blesses them. The LORD be with you.

Second, his workers weren’t surprised by his greeting. They knew exactly how to answer him: The LORD bless you. Not often in Boaz’s day (nor today) do bosses interact with their employees like Boaz does with his field workers. The socioeconomic distance between Boaz and his field workers was normally insurmountable!

Then Boaz saw Ruth. He didn’t hire her so he naturally inquired about her. Whose young woman is this? Don’t miss how the servant described her: She is the young Moabite woman. Ruth must have been shaking in her sandals. She knew she would never rid herself of this title. Who came back with Naomi from the country of Moab. Her plight isn’t getting any better. She’s a foreigner who came with the bitter woman back–to the bitter woman’s home turf.

How could this turn out for Ruth’s good? One way: end up in Boaz’s field. And work hard. She did both. So she came, and she has continued from early morning until now, except for a short rest. Yesterday we defined faithfulness as doing what you know to do–and doing it now. Ruth did what she knew to do. She worked hard and when Boaz came to the field he recognized her diligence.

Long before Paul penned these words to the Colossians, Ruth practiced them:

Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ. (Colossians 3:23-24 ESV)

Who are you working for? Who’s your boss?

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How Good God Is

Now Naomi had a relative of her husband’s, a worthy man of the clan of Elimelech, whose name was Boaz. And Ruth the Moabite said to Naomi, “Let me go to the field and glean among the ears of grain after him in whose sight I shall find favor.” And she said to her, “Go, my daughter.” So she set out and went and gleaned in the field after the reapers, and she happened to come to the part of the field belonging to Boaz, who was of the clan of Elimelech. (Ruth 2:1-3 ESV)

Faithfulness is underrated. Just yesterday we celebrated two teams winning the big game to make it into the Super Bowl. No one talked about their workouts. No one saw the hours spent in the gym, the grueling practices, the ice baths to soothe aching muscles. Everyone watched as Russell Wilson threw the touchdown pass that could not have been more precise. Seahawks fans celebrated the touchdown–not the workouts. Faithfulness is underrated.

Ruth was faithful. She did what she knew to do. She was a Moabite on Hebrew soil. Her family heritage was nothing to write home about. Her family roots twist and turn their way back to an opportunistic man named Lot whose daughters got him drunk and had sex with them. She had no claim to fame.

She was hungry. Her hunger drove her to the fields. Faithfulness kept her there. I love the way the writer says it: she happened to come to the part of the field belonging to Boaz. No one happens to do anything–God is completely in control of the course of events of human history. We call that the sovereignty of God. Your faithfulness (doing what you know to do now) and God’s sovereignty form a crossroads to the future God intends for you.

Ruth did not go into the field that day knowing anything would come of it but some leftover grain. She faithfully went so that she could feed her (bitter) mother-in-law. That’s faithfulness: doing what she knew to do then. God sovereignly intervened and gave her favor in Boaz’s sight…a point that will become critical later in Ruth’s (and Naomi’s) story.

J. I. Packer says this:

“Guidance, like all God’s acts of blessing under the covenant of grace, is a sovereign act. Not merely does God will to guide us in the sense of showing us his way, that we may tread it; he wills also to guide us in the more fundamental sense of ensuring that, whatever happens, whatever mistakes we may make, we shall come safely home. Slippings and strayings there will be, no doubt, but the everlasting arms are beneath us; we shall be caught, rescued, restored. This is God’s promise; this is how good he is.”

Ruth, the meandering Moabitess, is about to find out just how good God is.

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A Prayer Naomi Could Have Prayed

This prayer is from The Valley of Vision, a book of Puritan Prayers and is called by that same name. Read it (and pray it) slowly and deliberately. Quiet yourself before the Lord.

The Valley of Vision

Lord, high and holy, meek and lowly,

Thou has brought me to the valley of vision,

where I live in the depths but see thee in the heights;

hemmed in by mountains of sin I behold thy glory.

Let me learn by paradox

that the way down is the way up,

that to be low is to be high,

that the broken heart is the healed heart,

that the contrite spirit is the rejoicing spirit,

that the repenting soul is the victorious soul,

that to have nothing is to possess all,

that to bear the cross is to wear the crown,

that to give is to receive,

that the valley is the place of vision.

Lord, in the daytime stars can be seen from

deepest wells,

and the deeper the wells the brighter

thy stars shine;

Let me find thy light in my darkness,

thy life in my death,

thy joy in my sorrow,

thy grace in my sin,

thy riches in my poverty

thy glory in my valley.

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When God Changes Your Name

Throughout all of Scripture God has changed people’s names. Abram became Abraham. Sarai became Sarah. Abram means “noble father.” Abraham is the “father of many. Sarai is a princess; Sarah is the mother of nations.

Then Abram fell on his face. And God said to him, “Behold, my covenant is with you, and you shall be the father of a multitude of nations. No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations. (Genesis 17:3-5 ESV)

Jacob became Israel. His name change was dramatic. Jacob means “supplanter.” Israel is “one who strives with God” because Jacob refused to let go of God until God had blessed him. God specializes in changing you for the good. Speaking to his people through the prophet Ezekiel, God says:

And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules. (Ezekiel 36:26-27 ESV)

God delights in making you (and all things) new. Naomi didn’t get that. She blamed God for doing exactly the opposite.

So the two of them went on until they came to Bethlehem. And when they came to Bethlehem, the whole town was stirred because of them. And the women said, “Is this Naomi?” She said to them, “Do not call me Naomi; call me Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. I went away full, and the LORD has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi, when the LORD has testified against me and the Almighty has brought calamity upon me?” (Ruth 1:19-21 ESV)

God didn’t change Naomi’s name–she did. God longed for her to be the “pleasant one.” She chose to become bitter. The question in the mind of the readers of Ruth has to be this: will God change her name back. Will the God of Abraham and Israel prevail as the God of Naomi? Time will tell.

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The Sorrow of Sin

So the two of them went on until they came to Bethlehem. And when they came to Bethlehem, the whole town was stirred because of them. And the women said, “Is this Naomi?” (Ruth 1:19 ESV)

Sin disfigures. Sin destroys. Sin devastates. When Naomi returned to Bethlehem she was hardly recognizable. As an Ephrathite she was among Bethlehem’s elite, a member of the aristocratic class. Well respected when she left town, she comes home stripped not only of her self-respect but also visibly bearing the wear and tear of her stay in Moab. Naomi’s former friends didn’t even recognize her. As soon as they saw her the whispering began. “Is this Naomi?”

William Paul Young said, “Sin is its own punishment, devouring you from the inside.” Paul’s now famous words in Romans 3:23 echo Young’s statement: The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Paul used very familiar imagery so that his audience would get his point. Sin always writes you a paycheck and always pays you the same wage: death.

If sin is so deadly, then why do people do it? Why do people choose to live their lives in perpetual sin? Remember the hall of fame of faith? Moses demonstrated both the danger of sin and the delight of God.

By faith Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin. He considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward. By faith he left Egypt, not being afraid of the anger of the king, for he endured as seeing him who is invisible. By faith he kept the Passover and sprinkled the blood, so that the Destroyer of the firstborn might not touch them. (Hebrews 11:24-28 ESV)

Moses shows us how to avoid sin. He refused to be called the son of Pharaoh. There will be times you will simply have to say “no.” Moses also chose. He chose one option over another. Option #1 was to be mistreated with the people of God. Option #2 was to enjoy the fleeting pressures of sin–indulge the flesh one more time. Third, Moses considered. Moses had to weigh his options. He was set to inherit the treasures of Egypt. He considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt. In other words, Moses valued God above his own selfish desires.

Sin is serious. 3 quick questions:

1. What are you allowing right now that you need to refuse?

2. What decision (choice) do you need to make today?

3. What (or who) do you value more than God?

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The God Who Connects the Dots

Steve Jobs said…

“You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something – your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

Tucked in Steve Job’s convoluted idea of whom to trust are some kernels of truth: you can’t connect the dots looking forward. Ruth looked back at Moab and saw a comfortable past–she looked ahead to Bethlehem and saw an uncertain future. God did not allow her to connect the dots. He seldom does.

Steve Jobs’ second kernel of truth: You have to trust in something. He’s right. Everyone trusts in something. Even if you don’t believe God exists, unbelief in God is a belief system. You are trusting that your lack of faith in God will have no dire consequences. The assertion that there is no God reduces life to the here and now and eliminates the possibility of heaven and hell. You are still trusting something: unbelief.

So here’s a question: as you look back over your life, where do you see dots connected now that seemed nothing more than fuzzy lines at the time? This is the story of Ruth.

But Ruth said, “Do not urge me to leave you or to return from following you. For where you go I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there will I be buried. May the LORD do so to me and more also if anything but death parts me from you.” (Ruth 1:16-17 ESV)

Ruth moved forward trusting that God (whom she had not known before now) would somehow make crooked lines straight. After all God promised Israel this is what He would do:

And I will lead the blind in a way that they do not know, in paths that they have not known I will guide them. I will turn the darkness before them into light, the rough places into level ground. These are the things I do, and I do not forsake them. (Isaiah 42:16 ESV)

God kept good on His promise to Israel and little did Ruth know that God would keep good on that same promise to her–and she was a foreigner! John the Baptist preached about this characteristic of God:

As it is written in the book of the words of Isaiah the prophet, “The voice of one crying in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall become straight, and the rough places shall become level ways, and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.’” (Luke 3:4-6 ESV)

It is likely that many of you reading this are dizzy from trekking down the crooked road of the last 24 hours of your life. You don’t know why things are happening the way they are. You don’t understand decisions being made around you. God seems strangely silent. Life isn’t fair. In those moments trusting God is paramount. You cannot connect the dots looking forward. One day you will. I remind you of John Oxenham’s poem:

He writes in characters too grand
For our short sight to understand;
We catch but broken strokes, and try
To fathom all the mystery
Of withered hopes, of death, of life,
The endless war, the useless strife,–
But there, with larger, clearer sight,
We shall see this–His way was right.