Cure For Despair (Part 1)

Thanks for tuning in to No Compromise Radio with pastor and author, Dr. Mike Abendroth.

Today on No Compromise Radio, we'll be hearing Pastor Mike open the Word of God in a recent message he preached at Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston, Massachusetts.

Now let's join Pastor Mike in progress as he preaches through the scriptures, verse by verse, with No Compromise.

The world knows despair.

Listen to a few quotes from popular writers about despair and despondency.

My drunk soul is sadder than all the dead Christmas trees of the world. Despair is the price one pays for self -awareness.

Look deeply into life and you'll always find despair. Sometimes you can cry until there's nothing wet in you.

You can scream and curse to where your throat rebels and ruptures. It goes on with no sign as to when it might release you.

And you know that if it ever did relent, it would not be because it cared. I wish

I could tell you how lonely I am, how cold and harsh it is here. Everywhere there is conflict and unkindness.

I think God has forsaken this place. I believe I have seen hell and it's white.

It's snow white. There's even an online industry making a business out of despair, despair .com.

Some of you have probably gone there. It says at despair .com, I kid you not, we offer the cure for hope, not finished, and for a surprisingly affordable price.

We understand why the world despairs. We get it why the world is full of despondency.

But what about Christians? Are we to despair? If we do, is there a cure for despairing?

How do we navigate life? Are we just like the world and we're forced to live like this, bitterness, lack of hope?

Honestly, who wants to live like that? Especially in light of these words of Jesus, the thief comes only to steal and to kill and to destroy.

I came that they may have life and have it what? Abundantly. I'm the good shepherd.

The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. Elsewhere, Jesus says, all things have been handed over to me by my father and no one knows the son except the father and no one knows the father except the son.

And anyone to whom the son chooses to reveal him. Come to me all who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest.

Take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I'm gentle and lowly in heart and you will find rest for your souls.

For my yoke is easy. My burden is light. Why don't we open our Bibles this morning to Ruth chapter one as we delve into the sermon this morning, the cure for despair, despondency and bitterness.

Even Christians struggle with this melt gone bad view of life.

I want to inform you this morning through the sermon and the message in God's word that misery, desolation, anguish, gloom, dejection are not fruits of the spirit.

I want to repeat that. Misery, desolation, hopelessness, anguish, gloom, despondency, dejection are not fruits of the

Holy Spirit. The question really is, how can

I have joy in spite of their troubles, trials, illnesses, sufferings, war issues?

How do I have joy in spite of all these things? I can't make them go away.

How can I have hope even though, and there's two roads for the

Christian, the road that says God's trying to get you, God's making all this happen and you're going to turn into Naomi, bitter, this self -pitying myopic.

It's not even a fair fight because God is God and I am who I am. He's going to win every time, despondency.

And the other road is, there's more to the story than meets the eye and I'm going to trust in who

God is and what he says. That's the issue. Two roads and we're going to see those roads today.

If I ask you the question, how does the world cure despair? What would you say? Well, I found quite a few things online.

You just resign yourself to whatever happens, happens. Some people say, well, here's the cure.

Just have faith in faith. The object of your faith needs to be faith itself. Others say, find somebody who's got it worse than you do and then rejoice, right?

A schadenfreude kind of thing. Is there somebody out there suffering more than I am? And when

I typed in to the Google search engine, cure for despair, the number one article, psychology today, clinical despair, science, psychotherapy, and spirituality in the treatment of depression, written by Steven Dimon, PhD, 2011.

It was interesting because he even knows, whether he's a Christian man or not,

I don't know. But he knows and he knows that the psychological world understands that somehow religion has to have a place.

Carl Jung knew that if you've got a despondent patient, you've got to send that person back to their house of worship.

And if they don't have a house of worship, well, their new worship needs to be psychotherapy. But he understood spirituality had something to do with this.

Kierkegaard had the same thing. We need some kind of faith. At the end of the article,

I thought it was interesting. The writer says, sometimes clinical despair, it seems, must simply be endured, patiently accepted, tolerated, and suffered through with a stabilizing and supportive presence and accompaniment of the compassionate psychotherapist until it eventually turns into something else.

Courage, hope, joy, love, rage, passion, faith, our creativity.

How am I going to live like that? We all suffer. We all have issues in our lives.

What's our view? What's our outlook? Is there a better way? And the answer we're going to see in the book of Ruth is the way out is the way through as you cling within the white knuckle grip to the doctrine of God's sovereign care.

God creates, God upholds, God directs, and God rules.

It's the doctrine of providence. This whole morning, we're going to look at Ruth, and I want you to just see the world rightly through the lens of God's sovereign, gracious care.

You know I love to talk about the sovereignty of God, and as R .C. Sproul said, it's God's favorite topic, so God likes to hear about it as well.

And R .C. went on to say, if you were God, it'd be your favorite subject as well, the sovereign control of God.

Let's go to Ruth chapter 1, and to focus in this morning on verses 19 through 22 to finish up the chapter.

I think the best way to review, especially since it's a narrative and it's not meant to be broken up into sections necessarily,

I'm just going to read the first 18 verses to catch us up so that we can understand what's happening in the story.

Some of you have missed a week or two here or there. Maybe you're just visiting this morning, and I'm going to read

Ruth chapter 1, verses 1 to 18, and I want you to remember this morning that God cares and rules and provides and controls the world and everything in it.

Ruth chapter 1, verse 1, ESV says, In the days when the judges ruled, there was a famine in the land.

A man of Bethlehem and Judah went to sojourn in the country of Moab, he and his wife and his two sons.

The name of the man was Elimelech, and the name of his wife, Naomi, and the names of his two sons were Malon and Shilion.

They were Ephrathites, and they're from Bethlehem in Judah. They went into the country of Moab and remained there.

But Elimelech, the husband of Naomi, died, and she was left with her two sons. These took Moabite wives.

The name of the one was Orpah, and the name of the other, Ruth. They lived there about 10 years, and both

Malon and Shilion died so that the woman was left without her two sons and her husband. Then she arose with her daughters -in -law to return to the country, or from the country of Moab, for she had heard in the fields of Moab that the

Lord had visited his people and given them food. So she set out from the place where she was with her two daughters -in -law, and they went on the way to return to the land of Judah.

But Naomi said to her two daughters -in -law, Go, return each of you to her mother's house. May the

Lord deal kindly with you as you have dealt with the dead and with me. Verse 9, the

Lord grant that you may find rest, each of you in the house of her husband.

Then she kissed them, and they lifted up their voices and wept. And they said to her,

No, we will return with you to your people. But Naomi said, Turn back, my daughters.

Why will you go with me? Have I yet sons in my womb that they may become your husbands?

Turn back, my daughters. Go your way, for I am too old to have a husband. If I should say I have hope, even if I should have a husband this night and should bear sons, would you therefore wait till they were grown?

Would you therefore refrain from marrying? No, my daughters, for it is exceedingly bitter to me for your sake that the hand of the

Lord has gone out against me. Then they lifted up their voices and wept again. And Orpah kissed her mother -in -law, but Ruth clung to her.

And she said, See, your sister -in -law has gone back to her people and to her gods. Return after your sister -in -law.

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 I will be buried.

May the Lord do so to me and more also if anything but death parts me from you.

And when Naomi saw that she was determined to go with her, she said, No more.

Let's look at verses 19 through 22 and then talk about the doctrine of providence so that you don't despair.

Verse 19. So the two of them went on until they came to Bethlehem.

When they came to Bethlehem, the whole town was stirred because of them. There's a commotion. There's a buzz, literally a hum.

It's very onomatopoetic. Everybody's talking. And the women said, Is this

Naomi? Here's a picture of her homecoming. And now everybody's talking.

They knew who she was. And now they begin to talk about it. This same buzz about town word is used in 1

Samuel 4. As the ark of the covenant of the Lord came to the camp, all Israel shouted with a great shout so that the earth resounded.

There's so much talk going on. It's like the earth is moving. The city is in an uproar.

They left Moab. They get to Bethlehem. Takes maybe seven, 10 days.

And they see Naomi and they see hardship. They see a woman who's worn.

Her appearance must have been changed. Here's the journey of 10 days. That's rough on her.

But more than that, the last 10 years, one man said, it suggests that Naomi remembered

Naomi and that she had experienced an observable change, obviously for the worse.

Is this Naomi? And what don't I see as I look at this?

It's like there's some covert op going on.

Well, you're not supposed to mention the Moabite. Not supposed to mention Ruth. It's like the community knows.

Here's Naomi. Welcome, Naomi. Naomi looks a little rough. She looks a little haggard.

Nobody's talking about Ruth the Moabite. Don't mention her name. Verse 20.

She, Naomi, said to them, don't call me pleasant. That's what

Naomi means. Call me bitter. The Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me.

And again, it's not even a fair fight because it's the Almighty, the all -powerful El Shaddai.

What he does, I can't control. And he has been harsh on me. Not any talk of, we shouldn't have gone down to Moab.

We shouldn't have stayed in Moab. There shouldn't have been any marriage to Moab women. God has done this to me.

Now, see, she knows in the sovereignty of God, but she doesn't understand it properly. Self -pitying here.

Just call me bitterness. This makes the reader think, yeah, remember back in the wilderness where Israel didn't have any water and they're all mad at God and they grumbled, what shall we drink?

That was a place called Mara as well. Naomi's had it rough. We would all grant that.

Husband, she buries. Her sons, they marry the foreign women.

The two sons, her sons -in -law, they bury. Infertility.

She's no longer the same woman. God did this to me. Very fatalistic.

And what don't you hear? What don't you see? You don't hear Ruth saying any of that.

You don't hear Ruth complaining. You don't hear Ruth do anything. We've only seen

Ruth move out in faith. And by the grace of God, trust in who Naomi's God was.

Verse 21, Naomi actually calls God Yahweh or Lord, this covenantal name.

A God who's faithful. A God who's faithful to his covenantal stipulations for Israel.

And she evokes his name now. I went away full. Well, you say, yeah, but I thought she was starving when she went.

No, I went away full like I had a husband. That's what she means there. I went away with a husband. He's brought me back.

I'm a widow. Why call me Naomi when the Lord has testified against me?

He's brought me to the bar of the courtroom, and he's put me on the trial stand, and there's no way

I can stand up to him. And the Almighty has brought calamity upon me.

I have nothing. Now, the whole time this is happening, who's standing probably right next to Naomi?

I've got nothing. God's been totally horrible to me. I've lost my wife, excuse me,

I lost my wife. I've lost my, that's why we have two services usually. So then

I make the corrections at halftime and then come out for the second sermon. I've lost everything.

And the whole time Ruth is right here. Ruth is faithful companion, is faithful daughter -in -law.

God's testified against me. Ruth is probably having the look like, what am I, chopped goat liver?

Right? I was pleasant, now

I'm bitter. What would you tell Naomi? Let's say you're a woman in Bethlehem, and Naomi comes, and what would you say to her?

I know you're angry. I know you're bitter. I know you know in the sovereignty of God.

I know you know God's Almighty. God's covenant -keeping God. What would you tell her? What's the cure for despondency, despair, bitterness?

I don't know what pastors did before the internet, but I looked on one website.

Here's some cures for despondency, aromatherapy.

Naomi, you just need a little citrus oil. That's all you'll need. Just a little dab will do you.

Naomi, get as much exercise as you can because serotonin levels are down when you don't exercise, and you could probably deserve some exercise.

Well, I guess you couldn't use this. She's just come up for a Moab. You need to spend more time outdoors.

Sorry, that one didn't work. Watch your diet. When you eat the right things, you feel better about yourself.

Make it your goal, Naomi, to laugh at least once every day. Have you laughed today,

Naomi? The author says on this online prescription, don't hold your feelings in.

Ask help if you need it. Look after yourself. Look for the positive. What's the answer?

And now the author helps us see. Look at verse 22. God is in charge.

God is working. God is guiding. God is caring. I don't care what it looks like.

That's why we have to trust in the word. A fool trusts his own heart. We can't trust ourselves.

We see the world, don't believe your eyes. What does the scripture say? So Naomi returned, and Ruth the

Moabite, her daughter -in -law with her, who returned from the country of Moab.

I mean, it's almost like, okay, we know all that. Just get to it. The author is writing this. So you're like, okay, what's the point?

What's the punchline? Naomi returned, Ruth the Moabite, her daughter -in -law.

Yeah, I know, I know. Who returned from the country of Moab. I get it. And they came to Bethlehem. Didn't you already say that?

This is all literary perfection. And at the end of the verse, it says, at the beginning of barley harvest.

This is so lucky. So I'm so glad she made it just at this time. Doesn't really have any food.

And she just so stumbles into life. Goes up to Bethlehem at that time of year, late

April, early May, where there's a barley and wheat harvest, plenty of food.

That is such a coincidence. See, the writer is setting it all up. Naomi is misreading providence.

She doesn't see things rightly. But we, the readers, because the author is trying to let us know.

Look at God's got everything in charge. You can't always go by what you see. You look at the world and you go,

I'll tell you what I think. This world is not going to hell in a handbag. Handbasket?

Handbasket? No, our handbags. Our fake Gucci bags. It's already gone.

It's done. It's over. So now with the word, I have to think, now wait a second. I see this, but what does

God say? Naomi, you think you know, but what does

God's word say? And they stumble back to Israel, the eighth month of the agricultural calendar for Israel.

And you are starting to get, as the reader, the understanding that there's going to be a reversal.

There's going to be fortune. There's going to be favor, is a better word. Time will reveal the purposes of God.

I don't want to fall into the Naomi trap, I'll call it. The Lord's gone out against me.

You can just call me bitter. Sounds like Job's wife. He said to her, you speak as one of the foolish women speak.

Shall we receive good from God and shall we not receive evil? I don't want to be like Naomi.

I don't want to be like Job's wife. I don't want to be like Jonah. And the sun rose,

God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on the head of Jonah so that he was faint.

He asked that he might die and said, it is better for me to die than to live. But God said to Jonah, you do well to be angry for the plant.

He said, yes, I do well to be angry, angry enough to die. So let me give you several exhortations so that you see providence properly, properly so that you are not bitter, you are pleasant regarding these issues.

Number one, walk by faith and not by sight. Walk by faith and not by sight.

Scripture says God has not abandoned the world. Scripture says that God created the world, upholds the world, governs the world.

All right, let's make it more preaching now. Scripture says that God orchestrates everything in your life, your life.

Everything that God has gone on and will go on and will ever go on, God is sovereignly providential over.

Say, well, it doesn't look like it. That's why we have a book like Ruth, because I can't trust my eyes.

I can't trust myself. I can't see everything that God is doing. Why don't we turn our

Bibles to Hebrews chapter one, and I want you to see how God does this, and who in the

Godhead is, in fact, doing it according to Hebrews chapter one.

Trust and obey, I think, is a good way to think about this issue.

God is working, as the Westminster Confession of Faith says, his immutable counsel of his own will.

He is doing all this. And even though you look at the tea leaves of providence and you can't decipher them, you can trust in God's promises.

Let me repeat that. You might not know what God is doing, but you can trust who God is.

That's the whole sermon. That's the whole book of Ruth. That's the whole book of Esther. That's the whole book of Romans chapter eight.

I don't understand it, but friends, you don't need to understand it. You need to understand who

God is. I can't understand what he's doing, but I can understand scripture and I can trust his promises.

That is the essence of faith. You can't see something, but you trust in who

God is. It's obvious in Ruth's life. It's obvious in Joseph's life. It's obvious in everybody else's life,

Samuel's life. And it's obvious in your life. You just might not be able to see it.

God upholding, God directing, God decreeing everything that will come to pass.

Hebrews chapter one. I'm after verse three, but I can't just read that. Let me read the first few verses as well.

Long ago at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets.

But in these last days, he has spoken to us by his son.

Of course, we're talking about the Lord Jesus Christ, whom he appointed heir of all things, through whom also he created the world.

He, Jesus, is the radiance of the glory of God. This effulgent glory and the exact imprint of his nature.

Here's what I'm after. And he, Jesus, in spite of what you think, in spite of what your eyes tell you, in spite of what the world is doing, in spite of how

Naomi looks at the world. He upholds the universe by the word of his power.

That's what the Bible says. No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston, Massachusetts.

Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life -transforming power of God's Word through verse -by -verse exposition of the sacred text.

Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 8 .30 and 11 a .m. and Sunday evenings at 6 p .m.

We're located on Route 110 in West Boylston, Massachusetts. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org

or by phone at 508 -835 -3400. The thoughts and opinions expressed on No Compromise Radio do not necessarily reflect those of WVNE, its staff or management.