Dead Men Walking Podcast Greg Moore & Josh Stacey: Book of Ruth Epsiode 18

And about 10 seconds of silence. Exploring theology, doctrine, and all of the fascinating subjects in between.

Broadcasting from an undisclosed location. Dead Men Walking starts now.

Well, hello everyone. Welcome back to another episode of Dead Men Walking. I'm your host,

Greg Moore. And Greg Moore is reuniting with Josh Stacey. Yes.

He's on again. Back by popular demand. Josh, how are you? I am fantastic. Living the dream.

Living the dream. I always love talking to you because you always have such an upbeat attitude too. Even though you just worked all day in the sweltering heat.

Yes. God is still good, right? All the time. So tonight we're gonna dive, well today, tonight, this morning, whenever you're listening to this, we're gonna dive into the

Book of Ruth. Yes. Which is kind of a passion of yours, I hear. Yes, the Book of Ruth is probably my third favorite book of the

Bible. I probably read it a couple times a month. It's one of the ones that I just always get drawn back to and kind of helps me focus my eyes on Jesus.

Sure. Yeah, so before we dive into that, you got anything going on in your life? Like what's up?

You just working like crazy? Working like crazy. Which I had a pastor tell me once when I complained about work, he said, don't ever complain about work.

The Lord has blessed you with work. Exactly. There's some people that don't have that. Yes. Do it unto the glory of God. Exactly, and the really great thing, our company

Versus Colossians 323 talking about doing everything unto the

Lord Jesus, which is super cool and I'm super blessed to work for a Christian corporation,

Christian company that has those values. And yeah, we have been just going at it.

90 degree weather, we've been setting our sales records month in and month out. We've all been essential.

So work's been really crazy and just really good. Been having lots of even great opportunities.

Even though I work for a Christian company, I have tons of guys that work within the company that aren't believers.

So getting to have those conversations with them, getting to talk to them about the Lord and really testify about what he's done in my own life is always a fun experience.

And it just, it makes it worth it. What it's all about. So how's home ownership?

You're a new homeowner here in the last couple of months. Yes, home ownership. Have the four walls fallen down yet or are you keeping them together?

We're keeping them together. Thankfully, we trust that the Lord built the house. And thankfully, we had a really great realtor friend that if you guys wanna know,

I can tell you about him that helped us find our home. But it's going really well.

We're navigating the summer trying to get all of those before fall projects done.

And honestly, just purging, going back through. Before we moved, we got into minimalism.

And so trying to condense everything down, condense our wardrobes. I'm trying to get my library down to 50 books because I haven't read half of the books that I've had in my library.

Hold on, them's fighting words. You can throw out shoes and you can throw out clothes. It's very selective.

You can't get rid of them books, man. Nah, they're gonna make their way to good homes.

Thankfully. And some of them I've shifted from the things that I thought were important before.

So having to kind of navigate through that. But it's been going really good.

Really loving it. I have recently picked up a new hobby, which is super fun,

Airsoft. So I mean. What's Airsoft, like Airsoft pistols and stuff? Yes, yes. So at work, me and my coworkers, we'll go on the weekends and we'll go play

Airsoft. Wait, where do you do that around here? We get to do it at the old business on School Road for Jacobs.

That's awesome. We're actually working to try and become a distributor for Airsoft stuff eventually.

But it's a big passion of his and he has blessed us to be able to kind of explore it and we have a lot of fun.

Now, I got into paintball when I was younger. But it's kind of the same concept with Airsoft, but you've got the plastic pellets, right?

Yep, absolutely. You gotta wear padding and stuff because those can hurt, I feel like. They can. Give you a little sting. At our last outing, actually, one of my coworkers lost two teeth or had two of his teeth chipped.

He was at the dentist earlier this week. It was pretty rough. But yeah, they can be a little painful. I enjoy it a little bit more than paintball.

I paintballed when I was younger. It feels a little less dangerous, but you wanna wear the right safety stuff, which is something that some people -

You guys are out doing this in like 90 degrees? Oh yeah, man. Going in and out of barns, getting up on roofs and stuff.

It's a lot of fun. See, now, when I was into paintball, I was like the sniper. I would go find a perch high up in a tree or down.

We used to play behind these trails where they would test ATVs and UTVs. And it was an old nursery where they would just take whole trees and scoop them out and then go deliver them.

So we had all these kind of already pre -dug foxholes. You know? So I was a guy that would just sit somewhere and we'd play capture the flag or something like that.

And I wouldn't move for like an hour. And I would always do pretty well because once you start moving around -

That's when they find you. And I just remember thinking when I was younger, I'd go, good Lord, I can understand why people come back with some type of stress when they get into combat when it's like real stakes.

Oh yeah. Like, oh, someone could shoot me at any time and I could die. You feel that tension when you're just playing paintball or airsoft.

Totally. Where it's like, you know, you're looking and you're always over your shoulder and you're making sure you're being stealth and - Yeah. It's crazy.

It gets the adrenaline going. It's a lot of fun. We don't have any snipers yet in our little crew of guys that are doing it.

We have - We need to get one. We've got one guy. He's just, he's very particular. And so he wants to make sure that once he gets his gun and all that going that he's actually gonna be able to do what he wants to do.

Yeah. Well, that's crazy, man. That's cool. Yeah. So yeah, let's jump into Ruth here.

This is gonna be a fun episode for me because obviously know about Ruth and the story but it's not one of those that I return to every month or so.

Yeah. I mean, I am a Job, a Psalms, a James and a Romans guy.

Like those are my kind of - Come on. The ones I fall to, I don't know why. Yeah. And then I find myself going, I need to get into some other, you know what

I mean? I just can't go with those four or five books. So Ruth is one of those that maybe it's a once a year, once every year and a half where I'll go back through it.

But I'm kind of excited to delve into it and just kind of hear your take on it and what it means to you and kind of expose it and dig up some stuff out of Ruth.

Absolutely. So give me a little, maybe we start with what the book's about and kind of, you know, go from there.

For sure. Well, even talking about like the timing of reading it. So it's actually a Jewish tradition yearly to read the book of Ruth during the

Feast of Shavuot or as we would know in Christianity, the Feast of Pentecost. Okay.

So they actually read it once a year on that date because Ruth is one of the direct descendants of King David.

And so during that time, they read it in remembrance and it's just one of those books.

And even with that, it kind of has, when you look at some of the symbolic meaning, it pointing to the

Feast of Pentecost, which we'll talk about a little bit later, it's got some real significance, even for us as Gentiles, which is super cool.

But the book of Ruth, it's four, just little chapters. One of my favorite ways to read it, and I've done this with some of the guys

I've done Bible studies through throughout the years, is I actually will go through, go to your general

Bible app, whatever, and go through and copy it all down and just print the whole story.

I like to do that with different books because originally our Bible was never written that way.

Sure. Thank you, I think it was Tyndale. He was the one that started to pioneer towards the whole chapters.

It was actually a German priest. Was it? He was on the run and he divvied them up so he could distribute them a little easier.

Tinsdale did though give us our verses. Yeah. The chapters were by a German priest and then yeah,

Tisdale did the actual verses. That's cool. You and I are the exact same.

Yeah. Like when I read a book of the Bible, you almost gotta read the whole thing.

Yeah, absolutely. You can focus on a little bit of it, but it's real easy to get it out of context because we naturally wanna make those breaks where the chapter and verses are.

Yeah. And it's like, man, that's not how it was written. Exactly. It'd be like me telling you two minutes of this podcast and it's an hour long and you think you're gonna, you know what

I mean? Absolutely. And you get the whole point of it, but. Yeah, so I love to do that because it gives you the whole framework of the story.

And one of the things that people miss out on, they don't understand why the book of Ruth is there.

We go through, we read our Bibles, you're reading through the Old Testament, you get into the promised land, you get to the time of the judges, and then right before the prophet

Samuel comes onto the scene, we just have this story of this gal that travels with this woman who could essentially be called the female version of the book of Job.

You look at Naomi's life, what happened to her, she left her homeland, lost her husband, lost both of her sons, adopted into her family two young Moabite women, and was left with nothing and felt as though God had turned his back on her.

And so when she returns back to the city of Bethlehem, she tells people to call her

Amara, which means better. So kind of a cool correlation, you brought up Job, but.

Rough life kinda. Yeah, absolutely. But the book of Ruth is, one of the reasons it's so, so essential is that when you read the book of Revelation in chapter five, it gives reason and precedence for what happens there, which

I'll build up to that, I don't wanna give it away right away. But it's one of, it carries the basic tenets of understanding so that we can understand what the whole chapter five is about when

Jesus shows up while the father is sitting on the throne and is able to take the scroll.

And so to kinda rewind and go back, there are so many little biblical principles from the

Levitical law, the ceremony, things that are actually littered through the story of Ruth, but when it starts out, you hear about this family, this man named

Elimelech, and his name means my God is king. Okay. And one of the cool things

I love in Hebraic thinking, the names are so important when you go, and we talked about this when we talked about the

Moses tabernacle, but the names have such significance. And so I made sure to jot them down because I can't always remember it.

But Elimelech stands for my God is king. Naomi, her name means pleasing.

Ruth means, come on, man. Ruth means friend, which that one, that's kinda significant.

But the two sons' names, Melon, his name means sickness, and the other son,

Chilion, his name meant wasting. Okay. And we see this Jewish family.

They leave the land, they leave Israel to go to Moab. And Moab in that day was one of the most unclean nations to them.

That's where Balak, the king of Moab, hired Balaam to curse

Israel, and then he instead blessed them later. The nation of Moab actually came up from the peoples that were born out of the incestuous relationship of Lot and one of his daughters.

That is where the kingdom of Moab actually came from. And so to the Lord, they were considered an abomination.

God told the children of Israel different points in time, have nothing to do with them whatsoever.

So you have this family that leave, then once they get there, they've been settled there for 10 years, and then the father,

Elimelech, and the two sons both die after the two sons have taken wives. The first one's name is

Orpah, and then the other, not Oprah, Orpah, and then the other one is Ruth. And so Naomi comes to this point where she hears that, again, in the land of Israel, because the reason they had left was because there was a famine in the land.

And when this happened during the time of Judges, so when you read through the book of Judges. Yeah, because Judges and Ruth are pretty, they're kind of happening at the same time, right?

Yes, definitely. Ruth happens sometimes within, sometime within the component of the book of Judges, because it says that the

Judges were over the land of Israel, and they were in one of the times of famine. So that meant the nation had turned from God and had given over to apostasy, and so God's judgment was there, and there was no food.

There was famine and all those things going on. And so Naomi heard that bread, that food had returned back to Israel, so she had decided that she was going to return.

And she entreated her daughter -in -laws to stay in their nation, stay in their land.

And Orpah was like, all right, cool, I'm out of here. Her name literally means fawn, so like one of the little deer.

That's kind of how I imagined she was just ready to just run off. She wasn't committed, she wasn't loyal. But then you look at Ruth.

Ruth makes some really significant statements. She says, where you go, I'm going to go. Where you lay,

I'm going to lay. Your God, and this is super big, because in Moab, they believed in a completely different God.

They believed in a fish god. And so she was forsaking her ancestry, forsaking her homeland, to say your

God, Jehovah, your God, Yahweh, will be my God. And then she says, and if I leave you, may death be on my hands by the accordance of your

God. And at that point, Naomi's like, all right, I'm not gonna argue with you. And they head off to the land of Israel.

And so that kind of sums up the first chapter. And one of the things that I love going into chapter two, so they get there, and they get to Bethlehem, which one of the cool things with that,

Bethlehem means house of bread. So they return back to the nation of Israel, to the city that's name means house of bread.

And they get there, and because Ruth has grown up with Naomi now, don't know exactly how many years, but she knows that her and her mother -in -law are widows.

And there's actually a law that is given in the book of Leviticus, where people are told during harvest season that they are supposed to leave grain and leave different pieces for the people, the widows and the poor to glean from.

And so she entreats her and says, let me go and let me find a field to glean from so that we might eat.

And so she sends her out. And I love the word, like, this is one of those things,

Chuck Missler always used to say that the rabbis coincident, the rabbis would say that coincidence is not a kosher word.

So when something just happens, we know that like God so specifically knew that that was going to happen.

It did not just happen by happenstance or circumstance. And there's one of these verses, it's chapter two, verse three.

And so she went to glean in the field behind the harvesters, and she just happened to come to a part of the field belonging to Boaz, who was from the clan of Elimelech.

She just happened to come upon this field. And so she happens upon this field.

And in that same moment, that is where Boaz returns back to Bethlehem. He greets the workers in his field, and he begins to ask them about her, who's this young lady?

And they tell him, and he tells them specifically, let nothing happen to her, protect her and even leave behind extra.

And Boaz in this point, and this is one of the things we talked about it a little bit last time.

People can get super weird when it comes to typologies and symbolism and stuff like that.

But Boaz is a type of Christ in this kind of scenario. And one of the things that he really shows us, and just he shows us the right way to live is how you treat the foreigner.

Which I mean, even in our day and age right now with everything going on, let's treat the foreigner right.

In this moment, he opens up everything to her saying, go ahead, make sure you're even getting something to drink.

They're gonna let you do whatever you're gonna do. You're even gonna be protected from the young men.

We all know what that means. So like, he was putting specific protection over her so that she could do her due diligence.

One of the main reasons because he knew who her mother -in -law was and that he actually was related to her late husband.

And so it comes to the point she eats at the table and Boaz is just super kind and she gets to thank him and just say like,

I can't believe the favor that you have shown me and the way that you have opened up let me pick from your fields and just so grateful.

And she goes home to her mother -in -law and she brings back what she gleaned throughout the day and she's super taken back.

Naomi was surprised essentially because she had so much. And so she asked her, what field did you happen upon?

And when she told her, Naomi knew that that man was someone who could be a redeemer for them, who could be a kinsman, a near kinsman that through something called

Leverite marriage because Ruth's husband had died, he actually could lay claim to Naomi's land.

And in that it meant that he would take Ruth on as a bride. And so that sets the precedent now for the next parts of the story.

And so it goes forward where, let me bust it out for a second to kind of refresh.

So we're moving into chapter three at that point. And I would say to your point too, he goes above and beyond what the law requires.

Yes. He could have just done the bare minimum and let them glean which the Levitical law and he would have been called righteous for doing that and a good

Jewish man for doing it. Definitely. But he goes above and beyond to show her a certain amount of grace.

Absolutely. Which I think once again is that Christ kind of figure. Yeah, absolutely.

And it sets the stage for what begins to happen afterwards. So as it goes into the next component, and most people kind of miss, they misread chapter three.

People get confused by what happens in chapter three because the rest of the season goes on and she's able to glean from the fields of Boaz, but it comes time to the threshing floor season.

So when they are separating the wheat and the chaff and they have a big party and everybody gets rowdy and is merry and has a good time.

And Boaz stays up the entire evening waiting for everything to be put asunder and all of the different components to be waived out.

And Naomi gives Ruth some really specific instructions of something to do at this time.

And she tells her that she puts on her best and then she goes and she waits the entire evening no matter how long it takes.

And once Boaz falls asleep, she's to go up and she's to uncover the bottom of his cloak.

And when she does that, she's supposed to put herself underneath it and wait. And so she does so, and he wakes up, he's had a little wine, he's been celebrating, he looks down, he doesn't recognize who it is and he says, who is that?

And she says, it is I. And he's asked, what are you doing here?

And she lets him know, I'm here because you are able to be my kinsman redeemer.

And so this is the principle to pull out and what the foundation block for even the

Revelation chapter five thing, Boaz, because he is a part of the family of a

Lamelech can claim Ruth as his bride. And so she does that.

And there's been commentaries through the ages and all those different things that assumed that relations were had and some different stuff, but it was really just the act of her saying,

I am putting myself before you for you to consider me to be your bride.

And what happens, he gives her six things of barley in the morning.

He has her sleep the rest of the night because they don't want anybody to see it. One reason is because there is a near kinsman who actually can lay claim beforehand.

And the way that it has to be addressed has to be done in a certain form and fashion according to Levitical, to the law that was given.

And so in the morning he sends her away with the six e -paths of barley. And so when she gets back to Naomi, the way as much as she gave to her, as much as he gave to her, it actually makes it look like she has a baby belly.

And one of the incredible kind of symbolic things is that he was sending her back to Naomi full because Naomi makes a claim when she returns back that she's lost everything.

And so it's Boaz saying, I'm actually going to refill everything. Right. And then

Naomi tells Ruth, then you just have to hold tight and he's going to take care of this matter and there'll be settled by the end of the day.

And so that moves into the segue of the next fun part where Boaz has to go to the city gate and he's standing there, he's waiting and waiting for the near kinsmen to pass by and he sees the guy pass, flags him down.

Hey man, we got to have a talk. And then flags down some of the different elders of the city to sit there and to be witness to what's going to happen.

And he comes and he tells him, now that Naomi has returned, you have stake to her land.

And the gentleman is like, okay, I'll take that. And then he said, but in order for you to do that, you have to take

Ruth as your wife as well. And the guy steps back and says, I don't want to do that because I don't want to ruin my own inheritance.

And it's because she's a Moabite. So to him, she's an unclean person.

Now, one of the things that's interesting though, Boaz doesn't seem to care. And the reason why, and this is something that gets alluded to at the end is because he is part of the lineage of Perez.

And so, and we'll dig into that. The other interesting thing is that he is actually the son of Rahab.

Who's Rahab? Rahab from the story of Jericho. Oh, from Jericho. Yes, that lets the two spies in and protects them and then therefore she is from the destruction of Jericho.

Boaz is her son. Oh, wow. I didn't know that. Yes, it's super incredible. It verifies it in the book of Matthew through the genealogy of Joseph.

It actually points out that he, that Boaz was her son. So he's already outside, not he's in an irregular bloodline at the moment.

So he's not that worried about it, which sometimes that can kind of like just go over our heads, but when understanding a little bit later, because he goes and does that and he does the gentleman.

Or unique bloodline. Very. A very ordained, unique bloodline, much like Christ, I would say.

Very much so. Another parallel there. Yes. And he directly is a part of it.

That, and there's some things that happened within the bloodline that get fulfilled because of him becoming in relations with Ruth and everything that comes apart, which is, it's just crazy.

It's crazy when you see things in scripture that like you read about and you're like, why is that?

Why did God make that a law? Right. Why was that important? Right. And so the gentleman ends up having to give

Boaz his shoe. And that's kind of him saying like, I pass on rights and ownership.

And it's actually a super shameful thing. But the way the story alludes to it, he was just kind of like, just get it over with.

I don't want to deal with this anymore. And so that leads into the component where Boaz and Ruth are able to get married and super celebratory.

It's amazing. And at the end of the story, there are some interesting things and just interesting correlations that happen where the women are blessing

Naomi. The women of the city are blessing Naomi, even though it's Ruth, who isn't even her blood daughter, who's being married in with Boaz.

And they're all celebrating and talking to Naomi about it. So why are they celebrating Naomi? Just because she's in on the -

Absolutely. Part of that blessing. Yes. Both of them are being taken care of now. Yes.

Okay. Because like one of the things that could be asked is like, well, why didn't he marry

Naomi? Instead of, now Naomi would have been much older and wouldn't have been able to bear seed.

And the whole component of him, by Levirate marriage, marrying Ruth is so that it can carry on the family line of a

Limelech and keep it flowing and keep it going because legacy is one of those things that is absolutely important to God.

And when people are a part of his family, in the Jewish people, the legacy component is a very important thing as you read through a lot of the things in the

Old Testament. And then one of the blessings that the women give is that their child would be like the lineage of Perez, which is super interesting because it actually turns out that he is a part of the lineage of Perez.

And now the reason why that's important, many people might not even know the name of Perez. If you go back to the story.

I feel like you're gonna tell us though. Absolutely, gotta open it up because this is where these things, it's just so cool how

God ties and weaves all these things together because there is a certain man from that pioneered and that let, whose inheritance became a tribe of people named the tribe of Judah.

Okay. And his bloodline seemingly stops in the book of Genesis. We don't read anything more about it.

Now in the book of Genesis chapter 38, we see a really interesting story about Judah, the son of Israel.

And what happens to Judah is Judah has a son and he has a wife named Tamar, who also is a part of the bloodline of Jesus Christ when we read through the lineage that's given in the book of Matthew.

So Tamar is married to Judah's son and he dies.

And then through the Leverite marriage, same way the other's son of Judah is supposed to marry

Tamar. Well, he won't fulfill his husbandly duties. And there's a whole thing about him spilling his seed and all that stuff.

And God gets pretty frustrated about it and kills him. And he dies. Then Judah had one more son, but he was a wee little lad, couldn't get married, wasn't ready for all of that.

And so the way things were looking, it was looking real bleak for Tamar. She lost her first husband,

God killed the other one, and she's gonna be waiting for this wee one to grow up. And so she gets this idea.

She dresses up as a prostitute. She goes and stands on a corner and she seduces her father -in -law.

And so Judah has relations with her. And then she takes his cloak and his signet ring and disappears.

Can't find her. He goes back to the same place to try and find where she is. Can't find her.

And then a few months go by and she turns out to be pregnant. So then

Judah is furious, super frustrated. Like, I'm saving my son for you.

You already, all these things have happened in my life because of you. And then this and disrespected me.

And she pulled out the signet ring and said, actually, actually, you are the one.

And it's super interesting because Judah is actually really taken back and apologetic and claims to be the sinful one in the whole situation.

And the child that is born out of that, can you guess what his name is? It's Perez. And so the interesting part of that, he was born out of an improper marriage.

And there is a specific verse in the book of Deuteronomy 23, verse two, that talks about illegitimate birth and his generations being excluded from the assembly of Israel, excluded from citizenship for 10 generations.

And so the interesting thing about the line of Perez and it lays it down, and Boaz's son, his name is

Obed. And we know in the bloodline of King David, Obed was his grandfather.

And then you have Jesse, then you have King David. And so as you look at the genealogy that's at the end of the book of Ruth, from Perez to King David is 10 generations.

That curse, the illegitimacy of his bloodline lifts when

King David comes on the scene. Wow. And one of the really cool things, because people so often just think that Israel made this split second choice to just say, you know what?

We want a king now. We want a king. And it seemed like they went to God, but actually in the book of,

I wanna say it is Deuteronomy. I did a teaching on this at another study the other day, but God made an entire set of things of his desire when he was going to place a king over Israel.

They were literally going to come to him and say, we want a king like the rest of the nations. And God had a specific person in mind already.

It was always supposed to be David. He is from the bloodline of Judah. He said originally that the scepter was never going to depart from the house of Judah.

He talks about it in Genesis 49, a couple of their different areas, but they choose

King Saul from the tribe of Benjamin because he's tall, good looking, and looks like all the other kings on the earth in that day.

Sure. Now, one of the really neat and significant things, so we see there the bloodline of Judah from Perez down to David, the way it lays it out, without the book of Ruth, that connection point's not there.

Without the book of Ruth, we don't see what happened after Perez. Paul definitely warrants against people getting so wrapped up in endless genealogies and some of those different things, and especially you look at the

Jewish world today, it's gotta be confusing some of them wondering what tribe was I from? Where am

I playing in all this stuff? But the significance behind understanding the genealogy, it validates who

Jesus Christ was. It validates his hold to the actual kingship that is afforded to him because of the bloodline of Joseph because all of these different people are tied directly in to the bloodline of Joseph, even though he was a stepdad.

There's still an important claim to be had there for him. Now, one of the cool things, and this is something that Chuck Missler talks about, and we talked about it a little bit, his study on learn the

Bible in 24 hours, because this would be a difficult one unless you're a Hebrew whiz.

In Genesis 38, if you go and you break down the whole chapter in 49 -letter intervals in the original

Hebrew text, it spells out the genealogy of David.

Really? Hidden in the text, underneath it, proclaiming and talking about the king that was eventually going to come from this really weird story of essentially a kind of incestuous relationship of a law and her father -in -law, which according to Leviticus 17, that's a no -no, and they produced an illegitimate child.

And so to kind of pull it all back, it's really cool because then you get this tie -in for King David being that 10th generation and being the first one that is legitimized again in the assembly of the

Lord, and then we see his life. We see the way that King David lived his life, and God literally called him one, a man after his heart, which is just so incredible because before that, none of them were even considered citizens of Israel.

None of his family members before that. And so it's super cool, and it's just one of those neat ways that we let the

Bible interpret the Bible. We let the Bible lay out our timelines and all of those cool things. And so now to why is it important to Jesus?

How much more is it important to Jesus? And it's the whole principle for Boaz being the kinsman -redeemer for Ruth.

And just as much as Boaz was a kinsman -redeemer for Ruth, Jesus is a kinsman -redeemer for us.

Correct. Bought and paid on our behalf so that we could be in relationship with him forever.

And one of the cool ways that that actually happens is because of this Moabitess woman who to the people of Israel in that day and age was unclean, undesirable, not even supposed to be wed in.

And yet she made it into the bloodline of Jesus. She made it into the lineage of Jesus and her being a part of it as a

Gentile is actually what grafts us into the bind. Sure. It makes it so that we actually have direct connection with Christ.

And one of the reasons I really love it is because in that day and age, she would have been considered like the leper.

And as we talked about my story last time, I'm like a leper of the 21st century.

One of the ones that is disregarded, unwanted, nobody cares about me or my rights or any of those types of things.

And she was the same way. And so I feel a kindred fellowship with her and knowing that and seeing just the redemptive power of God in it.

She laid down her life for God saying, I am going to follow you wherever you go and your

God will be my God and made that choice. And seeing what God did, he literally painted her into the story of the

Messiah. How incredible would that be? Because they always read this on the

Feast of Pentecost. They always read this every single year during the time when the birth of the church happened, which is essentially the greatest infusion and grafting in of the

Gentiles with Israel that ever happened. It's just, wow.

And then if you even look at, excuse me, if you look at, if we're following that analogy of Boaz being that redeemer and representing

Christ, you have a Jewish man that is obeying

Jewish law. And then, like I said earlier, going above and beyond the law through grace, fulfilling that law with grace.

And then who benefits from his grace to a Gentile, but the

Jews? And who benefited from the grace that Christ showed the

Gentiles, the Jews? He says, look it, when he tells Abraham, you're gonna have all these, this is the stars in the sky and the sand on the earth.

And even Jesus said, you Jews who I came for are gonna benefit from blessing through these

Gentiles because now I've come for them as well. So I even see Ruth representing us, like you just said, being grafted in into a, he could have very well married

Naomi. Like you said, there's probably some logistical things there with the legacy and the generational having children and stuff.

But how apt is it as a representation of Christ that he goes outside of,

I don't wanna say outside of the law, he fulfills it through grace by saying, I'm going, you know, cause there was another

Jewish man was like, hey, whoa, no Moab, no, I'm not taking part of that. Even though I'm supposed to fill that contract through law and it's supposed to be the right thing

I'm supposed to do. No, I don't wanna get in bed figuratively and literally with a foreigner.

Exactly. But Boaz being such a great representation of Christ says, no, I take her in and with that, the

Jewish people are blessed as well. So, and we see this with David being a representation of Christ, you know, obviously with Boaz.

And I like it because sometimes I feel, and we talked about this before, you talk to Christians now and it's like, and don't get me wrong,

I love the New Testament. I love the words of Jesus. I'm a red letter Christian through and through. But man, sometimes we don't dig in to where our faith was.

That's the foundation of our faith really, it's the Old Testament. It is. Our faith is Judeo -Christian.

Yeah. It's Jewish in foundation. So when you can dig into these things and you can see the reflection of Christ through these characters.

And then like you said, I didn't know that was 10 generations. That just blows my mind. To me, that tells me the people are saying, we want a king and God's going, no,

I'm supposed to be your king. And he's like, no, but we wanna pick our king. And he's thinking, well, you can't not pick anyone but Saul because guess what?

You still got a generation left before this curse is lifted. Exactly. Like he knew exactly what he was doing and how funny, as soon as that curse is lifted, look at the man of God David was.

Yeah, it's incredible. You know? And just to even touch on what you're saying, that's one of my hearts, man.

Because you can get weird with the Jewish stuff. People, there's parts of the

Hebrew roots movement that are super weird. But. You remember that Bible code book that was out like 10, 15, maybe even 15 years ago?

No, it wasn't in yet. Yeah, they took the original Hebrew and you could basically find messages of the future and stuff in the original, like it was a coding.

Oh dude, totally. And look at, I believe in an all powerful, all knowing omnipresent God that can do whatever he wants.

And he could absolutely, the exact words in that Hebrew. Now, it's not doctrinal for me.

I'm not going and learning Hebrew and then trying to find codes and then predicting the future with it.

But I think those are legitimate. I think God knows exactly what he's doing all the time. I think numbers are very important to him.

Names are very important. Order of sequence is very important. Generational things are very important. So we can't throw those out.

Now, we can say all day long, people can get weird with it and they can. But that doesn't mean we throw the baby out with the bathwater and say, our

God isn't very specific, all knowing and sets everything in perfect order because he's a

God of order. Yeah, absolutely. So even, like I said, even when you just said that 10 generation thing,

I said, oh, that is so cool because that makes total sense because it was, because I've always, when you read the verse that says, you might have to help me on this, but you'll see a curse from the third and fourth generations and there's even some scientific evidence with like junk

DNA and stuff that backed that up. And I think it can be spiritual. And I think it could also be something that science hasn't found out yet.

I mean, I can take it multiple ways because God said it. I can believe it in every format. I might not just have the head knowledge like right now as a man to fully grasp it, right?

But if he says it, it's true. And it's fun when you start to find those things out and go, oh, that's what that meant.

You know, 10 generations previous, who knows? Maybe there was Jews standing around going, what are you talking about?

Okay, 10 generations he'll be, you know, outside of the whatever, you know, and then boom, 10 generations, you see this direct lineage and then

David picks up right where that lineage left off. But you said they were saying in there, we want your child to be like the lineage of Perez, correct?

So do you think they had knowledge that there was direct lineage back to Perez through Boaz? They could have, but it was six generations past already.

I mean, that's, what was a generation back then? Typically, it's between 40 to 60 years.

Okay, I was just gonna say 60 years. So that's what I thought. I couldn't remember, I had to go back to my Sunday school there for a minute. So yeah, so I mean, you're talking - 240 years.

Yeah, almost 300 years. Yeah, and yet that is - That'd be like us knowing what

Benjamin Franklin and Jefferson were talking about. Yeah, it's crazy. And to touch on, this is a little fun fact with the generational cursing.

So for me, I was released from prison when I was 27 and so was my father.

Wow. Yeah, and once he got out, that was when he met my mom and his whole life changed.

And it's really cool even for me. That's why I love, like we said, there is a spiritual component to it, but there's definitely, you can look at it in a natural component and see some of the same things sometimes.

It was just mind blowing when I kind of learned that stuff and learned that history with my dad of just seeing like, but it could end with this generation.

Right now, my children may not have to go through that because of the blood of Jesus, the impact that he's had on my life.

Late claim and hold onto that, but it's super cool. Yeah, it's just super neat.

Or like the name thing. Like I'm a huge believer, like you said at the top of the episode here, you were saying like, oh no, names mean something because that always stuck out to me when

I read through the Bible and the Lord would change someone's name. Oh, come on. Why are we changing someone's name?

That's my first thought. It's like, what is a name, but just, sounds coming out of your mouth to form, wavelengths to make a noise, and then it's like, no, there's something very, and I think it goes deeper than that.

I mean, we don't even know how sound waves, or they did a study in Japan where the guy put up two plants and one plant, he just talked horrible to it.

You're a horrible plant, you're gonna die, right? And then to the other plant, oh, you're a lovely plant. And he did this for 30 days and he did it five times and every time, and he switched locations, but the one that he despised and said negative words to died, the one that, and you go, okay, look at,

I can't, that's not a coincidence at that point. He did five blind placebo tests in a row and the one he's cursing is, you know what

I mean, dying. And then you go, okay, so there's something to do with words there. And we can talk about positive confession and all that kind of stuff.

Definitely. And how people can get wacky in that, but there is something in how you say it and what you say, how the intention of your heart and when it comes out in physical words affects somehow.

Now, I don't know how that works. I mean, we're still studying it as scientists and as, you know, as fallen men, but God knows what's going on there.

I think the son of God, when he came to earth, when he cursed the fig tree, it just straight up died. It did.

Whatever we don't have there, he had to be able to go, no, you know what I mean? Yeah, absolutely.

He did to that plant or that fig, what the guy did in Japan, but in less than a day, but so names are the same way.

So I look at like, even like personally, like before I even was saved or was into names, my name in the original

Greek means a watchful one or guardian of truth. And I've just found that that's my whole,

I'm just always seeking and trying to guard truth. What's the truth? I want people to know the truth. You can't tell a falsehood, right?

That's just what I'm drawn to. Sometimes a little too overboard to where, you know, you get blow back. My wife's name in the original

Greek means one who listens. She's the most introverted list. I mean, everyone comes to her to just tell her stuff.

She goes, I don't know why they come. Well, because you listen. And then you're wise when you do open your mouth, it means something.

When I open my mouth, people just go out, Greg's talking again. But when my wife says something, people go, wait, what was that?

Because it's very measured and she's a listener. And what does your name mean?

I gotta think you know. The Lord is my salvation. That's perfect for you, right? Yep. Oh yeah, it's

Yeshua. That's what your name is, Yeshua, it's Joshua. Yes. Oh, wow, brain fart.

Sorry about that. Of course, that's what it means. But so I don't know, I haven't figured it out.

I haven't figured that out, but there's something about the name, how it's pronounced.

I don't know what it is. It's like, it puts a mantle and a calling on you. We see that in the Bible all the time.

It doesn't really discuss why, but it's there and it's real. Absolutely.

And I've seen names actually affect people who aren't believers to the negative, to where I've seen their name means something and you're like, oh my gosh, you're doing that exact thing that's detrimental to your health and your name.

And you're almost like, not only do we need to tell you about the gospel, I think we need to change your name when you get baptized. You know what

I mean? Come on. Well, I don't understand it. That's one of those things that just, it bugs me, but it amazes me because I wanna understand it.

But you just have to have that faith and go, they're important. Names, generational curses, these are all things that are real.

Numerology and how God sets up numbers. I mean, we talked about that on the previous episode with the tabernacle.

Those things are all important or they wouldn't be in the Bible, first of all. Exactly. And God wouldn't focus on them so much like he did.

I don't know. That was kind of a thought that just popped into my head because this book that you're talking about,

Ruth, it is so, it's such a gap filler, like you said, for the genealogy, but there's just so many analogies and comparisons and deeper things in it.

Because if you read it at face value, it's kind of like, there's a lot of crazy, there's some lying going on. There's some, you know what I mean?

It's one of those books where, you know. It could be a soap opera. It could be a soap opera, right. And you're like, what is this even in here for?

Like, what am I, you know? Exactly. And especially because the way it's portrayed, it's not even the story about a

Jewish woman. It's a story about a woman that was actually a part of a people that were appalling to the

Jewish people. And she comes in and she, it's one of two books that's actually written about a woman.

Right. Which is super cool. And even to touch on the biblical numerics thing, a little tie in the 10 generations, the number 10 generally talks about the divine ordering of God.

Sure. Which is super cool, because not only was it 10 years that they had lived in Moab before they returned to Bethlehem, but then it was also the 10 years in tangent or the 10 generations from Perez to the bloodline of David that was connected, which is just awesome.

And now I'll touch on the Revelation five, which five is the number of grace, which is just super cool and powerful.

You go read Romans five. That's the one that just lays it out. Sure. It's the grace chapter essentially.

And so you go to the story of the book of Revelation in chapter five, and you see

Jesus, the slain lamb, approach the throne of God. And the

John's weeping, the elders are weeping. Everyone is just crying because no one can open this scroll.

No one is found worthy. But Jesus approaches and the angel says, be joyful.

The lion of the tribe of Judah approaches. And he is worthy to take the scroll.

And everybody just freaks out. They sing a new song in heaven, but you see him take the scroll. And the reason why it was so important and why it ties back to the book of Ruth is because of the principle of the kinsmen redeemer, because Jesus is our redeemer.

The reason he is able to take that scroll is because he, as a man, paid for our sins, became our propitiation and our cost for the father's relationship with us.

And the other thing that he bought though was the earth. He took back over inheritance over the earth by taking away the authority from the devil, by taking back the keys to sin in the grave.

And ultimately he sets the earth back up for his return later. And the reason why is because he fulfilled the role.

One of the components of the messianic profile is that he would be the kinsmen redeemer for humanity.

And it's just, it's super incredible. And like people can read the book of Revelation in that one chapter and be like, why does he get to take the scroll?

Like, what is that thing even about? You read the description of it and it's a scroll that's written on the front and on the back, and it's got these seals on it that have sealed it.

And then all of a sudden these seals start opening and all that other stuff. But why does, why, what made him worthy?

And it was because he was our redeemer. He was the one, because he came as a man.

And the cool thing, when you look at the genealogy of Joseph. Fully God and fully man. Yes, exactly.

And you look at the genealogy of Joseph, Joseph wasn't his father. He was his stepdad.

I know what it's like to be a stepdad. That was probably, I've seen, I always see that meme of baby

Jesus standing on the water and Mary telling him to get down. Like, I can only imagine what it was like to be the stepfather.

Have you ever heard like Jim Gaffigan's bit about that? From like, oh, it's one of his original. He goes, could you imagine being like Jesus?

Jesus' dad, you know? Now Jesus, I want you back at 10 o 'clock. Yeah, whatever, you're not my real dad.

You know, like that kind of stuff. Dude. A little sacrilegious, but kind of funny. Like basically putting it into perspective.

But yeah, you're right. So stepdad. So, that's one of the things that, no, no.

You were going. I've often wondered like, what would that have been like? How many times, did

Jesus, did you ever really say that to Joseph? Like, you're not my real dad, bro.

I think the hyperstatic union of Christ being fully God and fully man, he was obviously limited in his nature as a deity because he was in human form and had emotions and things like that.

But he was without sin. So I think he showed the proper respect where he needed respect.

I don't think he went through his terrible teens because that's, you know, rebellion is just a natural state of fallen man.

And he was without sin because of man. So don't, you know. We have to realize that that's the mystery of Christ.

And we're getting off on another tangent here, but we can talk about it for a minute because sometimes I also see people will go one way too far or one way or the other.

Well, he was, he emptied himself. He was fully man. Well, hold on. No, he was also fully God or he was

God. So that's why he could perform miracles and do all this. And well, no, but he had the limitations of human nature, not sin nature, but human nature.

He cried. He got tired. He got hungry. He probably did get annoyed without sin.

He got upset, righteously anger. I mean, it wasn't based in a sin, but it was those natural emotions that men have.

And for an almighty holy God to essentially, you know, put himself in his own creation in a jar of clay, so to speak, that's an amazing thing.

And then have it, and Michael Heisner talks about this, about how, and it's so funny because he says it kind of like a snarky, which

I thought was hilarious. He said basically along uses a serpent or lizard or whatever you think was to basically, you know, say, hey, you should take that apple or fruit or whatever it is because you could be like God, right?

Tricks, God's creation. Yep. God comes down and goes, oh, first of all, you're gonna crawl on your belly.

Let's just get that out of the way. All right. Cause you're not worth to be elevated for even allowing Satan to use your form.

Okay. Two, he goes, the exact creation that you thought was going to ruin me,

I'm gonna use their seed to crush your head. And come on, man. And then from that point forward,

Michael Heisner's like, then it was just like Satan on the run and seeing Christ -like images. Boom, Abraham, boom,

Elijah, boom, Moab, boom, David. And it was just like, Satan was probably like, okay, is this the one?

Is it like, it was just image after image of what was to come and how his head was going to be crushed by the seed of the man.

Because the whole, cause Heisner has this whole seed war thing too. You know what I mean? Like Satan was like, nah, man, the humans on my side, we'll have them repopulate.

God gave a command. No, you populate the earth. And then God just comes down from his counsel and goes, oh no,

I'm just gonna use that exact seed that you think is going to work to your benefit to crush your head. Yeah. And the crazy thing with that too is like, whether we realize or not,

Satan knows the word better than you do. Like he knows the word. I always say that. Satan believes in Jesus.

He knew who he was. Exactly. Bow before me and I'll give you this key. He wanted his earthly authority, you know?

And you see, just like you were saying, the moment from that point forward, you just see

Satan on this objective to try and destroy the work of God in that every opportunity good.

When you see the destruction in the killing of the Hebrew children in the story of Moses, in the time of Jesus, you see all these different things.

And how much do you think it just messed him up when he didn't realize that the reason he couldn't pinpoint

David's family was because he thought they were excluded? Yeah. Or his, you know,

David's, I don't know what it would be. Great, great, great, great. How many generations you said it was back to tomorrow. Yeah.

But that was a rape situation. Yeah. That was a horrible situation.

And that's why I love the verse when it says, what you meant for evil, God meant for good.

He can work in any situation and this tapestry of genealogy preordained before the beginning of the world because he knew that his redemptive work was going to take place.

And just to work that all out, you know what I mean? And Satan always thinking, oh,

I can do this horrendous act or I can, you know, afflict this horrendous death or, you know, whatever it is on this person or this family.

And it's like, God's going, who do you think you're messing with, first of all? You know, I'm the creator of this universe, time, space, everything in it.

And he doesn't prevail. That's the good news, he can't prevail. Satan cannot win. He's already lost.

Yeah. Our team won, we're one and oh. We're, God and Jesus are one oh universe champs, you know?

Yes. Back to back champs. But that's why

I just, I love reading through the Old Testament too and seeing it just so neatly in the

New Testament and just all those reflections of Christ in the Old Testament. That's why, like, if I sit down with a

Jewish person, first of all, I love their history. I love their perspective on the

Old Testament just because, first of all, it was written by them for them well before I was ever here or Christ was ever thought of to them.

But then also, when I bring those things up, because I've had a chance to talk to a few Jewish people, and go, well, what do you just think about these kind of foreshadowings of Christ?

Well, that's quite a coincidence because, yeah, they either have to say, well, the New Testament writers wrote that way so they could reflect it, or it was reflected but it's not really

Jesus, it's someone yet to come. Those are the two main arguments I usually get. And then I say, well, in the second point, that would be a vast conspiracy that 15, 20 different guys across 200 years got together to somehow make some agenda to make it look like, you know.

As for, like, they think he's still yet to come, that's probably a better argument for them to take, but then

I would just say, there's just too many correlations between the new and old. So many. That just say, this was,

I mean, that happened while Jesus was here on earth, that just line up all those things, those 750 messianic prophecies.

You just go, well, like you said, you know, an hour ago, what is it, Jewish people say, coincidence is not a kosher word.

Thank you. Jeez, been a long day, I'm stumbling over my words. Great time to stumble over your words on a podcast, but yeah, so, same thing with me, like,

I look at coincidences and go, I don't think so. Especially when I'm reading the Bible. All that stuff's laid out and it's so exciting and it's stuff that,

I love your excitement for it too, because I think it's things that believers really need to delve into.

Not just have a surface understanding of who Christ was. Well, he died for my sins, he loves me,

I'm going to heaven. Okay, all that's true. Yeah, that's all true. But man, how much does it reaffirm your faith?

How much does it set the anchors and the rebar in that wet concrete when you first come to the Lord and you start digging down into that and you can get a hold of a new believer and go, well, hold on, if you think that blows your mind, let me show you this.

And just reaffirms, reaffirms, reaffirms. And it really just strengthens, and we don't necessarily need that, right?

We're saved by faith alone through grace, or grace alone through faith. But boy, do

I love it. I love all that stuff. It helps you run the race. It does. It helps you just see, like when you read in the book of Hebrews and it talks about the great cloud of witnesses, it lets you know who they are, what they went through, and really getting an understanding, because we can so often read the

Bible and read these stories and think of them as stories. We're so inundated with the entertainment industry and the way that entertainment is that we can even read the

Bible and just think, man, that was a really great story. Or I heard about that one in Sunday school when

I was a kid. We had the little foam. I didn't go to Sunday school, but had those little foam things with the

Noah's Ark. I've heard about that one. Heard that was a great hit. But you look at that. The felt.

Yes, the felt. Stick the felt up there, yeah. But this is why I get so excited, because it's a part of our heritage.

Jesus was a Jew. He was not a Palestinian. He was a Jewish man living in Israel.

And when he returns, that's where he's gonna be. And to know that these were his people, these were true things that happened that God mapped out and knew were going to happen and strategically planned and placed everything in such a way is just so incredible.

And it just opens up the scriptures in such a greater way. We can understand even what it was like to be one of the apostles, to really understand, oh, wow, that when those dudes were walking on the road to Emmaus, this is what

Jesus might have been talking about. This is what Jesus could have been alluding to, because when it says that he opened up the scriptures to them, it's not talking about Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, guys.

It's talking about Genesis, Ezra, Nehemiah, Isaiah, Malachi, whatever book you want to go to.

And the thing I really love to kind of bridge on what you were talking about a moment ago, the way the

Bible validates itself through some of these crazy little things. One of the fun things, is when it comes to talking to a

Jewish person, because when I went to Israel, I got the really unique opportunity to hang out with non -Messianic

Jews. They were my tour guides. Quite a while. Yes, 10 days, man. I got to meet with one of the most prominent

Jewish rabbis of today. He has a quote at the Wailing Wall and got to go inside of his synagogue and see the

Torah scrolls that they have there. It was so awesome. And getting to have those conversations about these things and same types of responses and very passionate ones, because for Jewish people that take their culture and their heritage seriously, they have something called chutzpah.

They have an angst for it. They have just a passion for it that even here in this day and age, we don't see any longer and it's sad.

But this is an interesting one when you can have a conversation with a Jewish person, go and ask them to look at the genealogy of Noah.

So for them, and I think I might have bridged on this, but for someone that may not have listened to the podcast last time, if you go through the genealogy of Noah, from Adam all the way up to Noah, you got

Seth, Enosh, Mahaloel, Kenan, Yared, Enoch, Methuselah, Lamech.

You go through those guys and you study what their names mean in the Hebrew and it literally spells out the

Christian gospel. It literally goes, as you read through their names, it goes, man is appointed mortal sorrow, but the blessed

God shall come down teaching that his death shall bring the comfort rest.

No way. It's incredible. And so like that right there, that is the gospel.

That is the Christian gospel hidden in the genealogy of Noah in the

Old Testament. By the definition of names. Yes, by the definition. And that's just a very -

Why didn't you tell me that a half hour ago when I said I gotcha? It's a very, I was waiting. I was waiting.

Cause that's like one of my favorite, when you can just stump them. Cause they'll look at you and be like, oh.

And they'll say, well, it's coincidence. That's whatever it is, but God knows what he's doing. Yeah. And then you can ask him, well, was it coincidence when

Ruth happened upon that field? Right. And one other, because the reason these things are in the

Bible and the way God set it up is he's gonna validate everything he wrote. So this is one of the cool ones.

And I know because of the numbers saying, this is a New Testament one. This is really interesting. It's really fun.

If you take Jesus's genealogy in the book of Matthew, first 18 verses, Matthew 1, 1 through 18, and you take that in the original

Greek. Now the Greek language is one of the most precise, specific languages ever.

Besides Hebrew, it's probably one of the most beautiful, but it's so specific, so precise. You have 27 words for love and English has one, just to give you an example, yeah.

So when you go through and you break it down in the original Greek, if you go through, you count the number of consonants, you count the number of vowels, you count the number of nouns, verbs, adverbs, names.

Every single one of them is divisible by seven. Really? Yes. And that includes their gematrical value.

So in the Jewish culture, and some other languages do this too, they have gematria, so they can correlate the letters of their alphabet to numbers.

And so at the same way, those words, their gematrical value also adds up to a number that is divisible by seven.

And it has over 73 different variations of codes that can be lined up in that specific scripture, talking about Jesus's genealogy.

Now, I know Matthew was a tax collector and he probably knew math, but he wasn't that stinking smart, guys.

He could not have manipulated the text in order to do that. And that is where we see the four different women who are included in the genealogy of Jesus.

You have Rahab, you have Tamar, you have Ruth and Mary. Yeah. And you look at that and that's one of those ones where you just go, wow.

Now, another interesting part, and this will be some, cause I think the last time I was on, we talked a little bit about transcripts and the different biblical transcripts.

Right. So one that is widely challenged cause they say that it wasn't in older transcripts is in the book of Mark, chapter 16, verses nine through 20.

So that is what the Gnostics would try to argue and be left out because it was about the resurrection.

If you take that same portion of scripture that is not included in the Alexandrian codices and you put that same principle against it, the consonant vowels does the exact same thing.

Wow. And that's just one of those things where God, the supreme ruler of the universe, the creator, the one who made numbers, the one who made language and everything confined within our reality.

Yeah. So made his word come together that it did that. Well, that just also reinforces when we say

God breathed. Yeah. Right. It just doesn't mean, cause I truly believe the exact words and the exact order of what is written down in our canonized

Bible was exactly what the Holy Spirit wanted. Absolutely. And really you can talk about different parchments and different texts and things like that.

Dead Sea Scrolls put a lot of that to rest when they discovered those whatever it was 75 years ago. Cause it just reconfirmed everything.

It did. And all the atheists and agnostics and people who in liberal scholars were like, oh darn, we were hoping that says, you know what

I mean? Cause it really did. I mean, now we're nitpicking some other things and hoping to find something, but I mean, it really solidified before, when was

Dead Sea Scrolls, 55 or I don't know when they found the last big portion of it.

I think it was 54 or 55. And I'll look it up and we'll post it just to make sure cause

I don't want to misguide anyone, but it was really a kind of a faith -based statement to say

God breathed and these are the exact words and they're inherent and all that. And then once again, the

Bible is proved right through scientific method or whatever it is. I kind of love that.

It's kind of a, you know, it's kind of like punching the devil in the throat a little bit. Heck yeah. Cause it's always trying to mislead, not trust, downplay the authenticity of God, the sovereignty of God, the power of God.

And, but yet it just keeps, you know, that's why I love Job too. Cause there's so many things in there that are just like, they didn't even know existed.

God's talking about making them. And then, you know, five, eight, 10 ,000 years later, we're now finding these things and we're going, oh, is that when the book of Job is talking about when

God came down and was like, have you made the rivers in the oceans of the deep? Have you done this? Have you done that? Have you put, you know, have you moved the sun through space?

And everyone goes, sun doesn't move through space. We move around the sun. And then we realize, oh, we're moving around the sun.

Well, everything's expanding. The sun is moving through space. Like everything's moving because everything's expanding. Right? So all these things that were very specific when they were writing it down.

And I always think of the person who's writing that down going, this doesn't even make sense. I mean, the sun's moving and there's rivers in the water, the deep and all these things, right?

Yeah. But God knows exactly what he's doing. And I think he knew exactly what he was doing in Ruth too, in making sure that she was taken care of.

And it was a beautiful representation of a foreshadowing of what Christ did for us. Absolutely.

Yeah. And the engrafting, that's one of those things that I love because she was a Gentile and it made way for us.

And the day of the birth of the church is when the Jewish people still read that story today and still remember that.

And eventually God's going to open up that mystery to them too. And it's going to be amazing and just beautiful.

And how about the four women in his genealogy, in Christ's genealogy, that were just kind of either outcast, promiscuous.

They were like not, wasn't like it was the queen of whatever. Yeah. I mean, it was Rahab, right?

It was Jamar. It was, obviously Mary was outcast with what was going on with her and Joseph.

Yep. And then Ruth. Ruth, thank you. We're talking about it. All kind of had these issues and problems, had to depend on other people.

Yeah. Whether it be outcast or, you know, and you just go, that right there is such a beautiful thing that the

Lord, his power is not made known unless it's through your weakness.

Come on. Your weakness is his power. Yeah. And the world just doesn't understand that.

No. It weirds them out, actually. It does, doesn't it? They can't get why someone wouldn't want to use their strength.

Yeah. It's just, it's baffling. I remember when I was an evangelistic atheist back in my high school days and I would argue with my

Christian friends back then and just, I can never understand it. Even when I was first coming to faith and I was telling all of my garbage to this pastor that just decided, that opened up his church to me to say, yeah,

I'll come and listen to you. And just, it was him just being a meek man, not trying to give me all the answers, not trying to tell me what to do, but just listening.

That was the thing that shook me. I couldn't shake it off. I couldn't stop, and then

I had to ask him, dude, what is it? How can you treat me the way that you treat me?

And he told me, it's Jesus. I mean, even look at like, I was just talking to a pastor earlier today and he said, he brought the example of like Corinthians.

He's like, literally the worst church. Just, they had the market on taking everything pagan and trying to make it, normalize it and rebel against God.

And what does Paul do? He comes with them with grace right off of chapter one. Like the only thing I want you to understand is

Christ crucified. Like grace, grace, grace. And that would have been a really good opportunity for him to get up on his high horse and say, hey, you guys aren't doing what

I told you. You know, you're sinners. You're going to go to hell, all these things. Instead he said, oh no,

I'm the chief of sinners. And by the way, grace and the gospel and Christ crucified you. And that's what

I work on daily to make sure that the same, I mean, I'm never going to be able to extend the same grace to people that God extended to me because I know what a wretch

I was. And still am. But that's what I work on.

Making sure that I'm not that parable of the debtor. You know?

That was forgiven such a huge lifelong debt that he couldn't pay off even if he worked the rest of his life.

And then sees his friend, throws him in for 10 bucks. Put him in prison. It's like, I never want to be that guy in my theology and the way

I talk and the way I treat people and the way I look at people that believe differently or don't believe. God's always just tapping me on my shoulder going, excuse me?

Do you remember what I saved you from? So have grace. Yeah. Maybe that comes with age and maturity.

It's hard for me though. You know? But I think it's hard for a lot of people. Absolutely. We get up in our own little heads and we think, well,

I deserve this and that and God loves me, but he doesn't. We love to compare sin too. Like, oh, at least

I don't do that. And God's like. Bro. Your righteousness is like filthy rags.

All right? So. Yeah. And it stinks. And the only way you got righteous is of my son. Exactly. So don't be acting like you did anything.

Come on. So as we finish up here, man, the time just flew by. It's always good having you here.

I know we powered through almost two hours last time, but we're a little over an hour. So let's kind of, you got a final thought on Ruth or anything else that you wanted to add before?

I mean, we went pretty deep. Yeah. We got into numerology. We got into genealogy.

We got into foreshadowing of Christ. All out of a four chapter book that I would say many

Christians kind of overlook or I've heard the Naomi relationship preached a hundred times which not a bad thing, but never really what you hit on in which

I find absolutely beautiful is that foreshadowing of a Christ redeemer.

And Boaz and the relationship between a foreigner, right? Like you said, in this climate, in this culture.

Come on. And really looking at Ruth. So you brought up the Ruth Naomi, her statement.

When we as Gentiles, it's a completely different thing for us to follow the

God that we follow. It goes against our nature. The people of Israel were raised knowing

Yahweh. Even the ones that are secularized Jews now, they know of their heritage, they know of all those things.

But for us, just like Paul at Mars Hill saying you have this altar to this unknown

God. We approach and get to meet and encounter and know a

God whom we did not. And say when we accept Christ and when we truly follow after him as he would desire, we forsake all else.

We say where you go, I will go. Where you lay, I will lay.

Your God will be my God. We choose that because he chose us.

Because he chose us, we get that opportunity to choose him. And when we have that, it's just so beautiful.

He's so kind to us. When, like you were saying, of all

I am the, I would say, for things I've went through, Jesus, man,

I'd love to try and talk to Paul and be like, hey man, I don't know, I'd like to argue. Yeah, but I'm just overwhelmed by the goodness

God in that, in that he chose us and he made a way for us. And for those listening, really quick before we wrap up, when

Josh and I are saying, chief of sinners, we're not living in a state of condemnation because there is no condemnation in Christ.

But I think it's good to know what you were saved from. If you think you're a pretty good person and I'm okay, then you don't really need the gospel and you don't need saving.

I think it's to know, amazing grace, like me, he understood where the

Lord brought him from. And I think that's what we're talking about. We're not saying get up every day and go, oh, I'm such a horrible person and I'm gonna sin again this week probably and God's probably gonna drop a piano on my head.

No, we're not saying that. The good news is we've been called righteous. We have righteousness impudiated onto us because of what

Christ did on the cross. When God looks at us, he looks at righteousness because the law requires perfection.

We could never do that, Josh. I can't do it. You can't do it. Guess who can do it? The son of God, Jesus Christ.

And now when we've been engrafted in and God looks at us, he goes, I see perfection. Yeah. You've been purchased with a price and you have right legal standing before me.

And that's the good news of the gospel. So I just wanted people to know when they're hearing us say that, we're not wallowing in what we were, but we don't forget where we came from.

We know that we were sinners in need of saving. So there's a dichotomy there that I think is important to make sure we're not on either side of that.

Yeah, and guys, with that, having that right perspective on that, because I even know earlier in my

Christian walk, it was hard for me to reconcile that. It was hard for me to walk that out. It being able to walk with Christ and overcome the shame of the things that I had done when

I was without Christ, but really recognizing the power that you have and the power that comes behind your testimony.

It is literally the witness of Christ in your life that no one can argue with.

People that have known me in my 30 years of life, people that knew me when I was a heathen, running in the streets, drinking, partying, and all that stuff.

All those things, yep. They look at my life now and they know that that person is dead.

They know and they look at my life and they call me. They won't say it to my face, but I'm the

Jesus freak. I am the person that they feel like left their life because I went and joined a cult, but really it's just because I love

Jesus and I know that he redeemed me from all that. And you never know, even yesterday, hired a new guy at work.

He's a believer, goes to a Bible study with my boss, but he's very young and he just looked at me, he asked me my story and I was very real and raw and my story can be a little rough on people.

You got six to eight hours, sit down. Yeah. I'll tell you. And when I told him and he just looked at me like deer in the headlights,

I was like, man, that's what Jesus can do. And that was the thing that really shook him in saying, man,

I don't know what it's like to have done all this stuff that you did, but man, Jesus is good to me.

Jesus is good to us. And it just, it created and took our work relationship and our friendship to a whole new level because he could understand even what the

Lord had brought me through. And for all you guys and gals listening out there, that's an important component of your testimony.

Yes, we tell people that Jesus Christ is Lord, that he is savior, that he can save them, that they are in need of a savior, but tell them what he did for you because people can't argue with a transformed life.

People can't argue with the fruit of the gospel, which is a life transformed. Amen. Ioannou, I think we're gonna wrap it up there.

I couldn't have said it better myself. Josh, it's always great having you on. You're gonna have to come back again.

Definitely, I love it, man. And we'll deep dive into something else. If people wanna get ahold of you that are listening, is there a ministry page or a

Facebook page or where do they get ahold of you if they will go, hey, I want some notes on Ruth. I like what you said there.

Absolutely. I do have a Facebook page for the ministry. It is His Purpose Ministries.

It's got a cool little HP and a compass because that's really what my ministry is all about is helping people discover what the work that God is doing in their life is all about, to discover his purpose for them.

And so you can reach out to me there. I also have personal Facebook. And I am currently in the works of becoming a 501c3, gonna have a website and get all that stuff up and running probably in the next three months, which is super exciting.

Well, when you get that all up and running, come back and maybe we can talk about that a little bit too in that journey.

And of course, if anyone needs to get in touch with Josh, you can always get ahold of us at Dead Men Walking on Instagram, Facebook, or in our email, which is deadmenwalkingpodcast at gmail .com.

And I'll get you in touch with Josh. As always, guys, thanks for listening and God bless.