Bitter & Sweet | Sermon 06/23/2024

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All right, if you would please turn with me in your Bibles to the book of Ruth. Book of Ruth, chapter 1.

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Ruth is right after the book of Judges, right before 1 Samuel in your Bibles in the

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Old Testament. We're going to be in verses 6 through 22 today, 6 through 22, finishing out chapter 1 together.

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The title of the sermon today, church, is Bitter and Sweet. Bitter and Sweet.

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So starting in verse 6 of the book of Ruth, chapter 1, hear now the inerrant and infallible words of the living and true

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God. Then she arose with her daughters -in -law that she might return from the land of Moab.

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For she had heard in the land of Moab that the Lord had visited his people and giving them food. So she departed from the place where she was and her two daughters -in -law with her.

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And they went on the way to return to the land of Judah. And Naomi said to her two daughters -in -law,

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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.

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May the Lord grant that you may find rest each in the house of her husband. Then she kissed them, and they lifted up their voices and wept.

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And they said to her, No, but we will surely return with you to your people. But Naomi said,

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Return, my daughters. Why should you go with me? Have I yet sons in my womb that they may be your husbands?

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Return, my daughters, go, for I am too old to have a husband. If I said I have hope, if I should even have a husband tonight and also bear sons, would you therefore wait until they were grown?

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Would you therefore refrain from marrying? No, my daughters, for it is harder for me than for you, for the hand of the

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

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Then she said, Behold, your sister -in -law has gone back to her people and her gods.

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Return after your sister -in -law. But Ruth said, Do not urge me to leave you or turn back from following you, for where you go

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I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your

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God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. Thus may the

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Lord do to me and worse, if anything but death parts you and me. When she saw that she was determined to go with her, she said no more to her.

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So they both went until they came to Bethlehem. And when they had come to Bethlehem, all the city was stirred because of them.

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And the women said, Is this Naomi? She said to them, Do not call me Naomi, call me

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Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. I went out full, but the

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Lord has brought me back empty. Why do you call me Naomi, since the Lord has witnessed against me, and the

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Almighty has afflicted me? So Naomi returned, and with her Ruth the

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Moabitess, her daughter -in -law, who returned from the land of Moab, and they came to Bethlehem at the beginning of the barley harvest.

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Thus ends the reading of God's holy and magnificent word. Let's pray once more as a church before we begin.

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God thank you for your word. Thank you for this text Lord. Lord thank you for these two examples that are set before us, bitter and sweet.

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And God we know which one is modeling after the truth, which one is modeling after righteousness

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Lord. And I can't help when I read these things to think of Christ and his example.

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So Lord I pray now that you would prepare our hearts to be challenged with your word.

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God, that we would be people of loyalty and devotion and kindness, not people full of bitterness and anger and hatred.

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So Lord thank you for this example. Thank you for the redemption that you offer to all of us, and the redemption that you've offered even this family in such a scene of tragedy in Ruth chapter 1.

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So Lord please bless our time, help me to speak with clarity and with truth. I pray this in Jesus' mighty name, amen.

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Well we started our series in the book of Ruth last week, and at that moment we were thrust right into the immoral cycle of the time of the judges.

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I was telling you all about it. The people would commit idolatry, God would send punishment for their faithlessness.

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He could send it in the form of famine, in the form of foreign invaders, anything like that.

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And then the people would come to their senses, they would repent, and they would require or make

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I should say a request to God that he would send a deliverer.

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And so this family in Ruth I told you last week didn't believe that God would relent from this famine.

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Elimelech didn't ask God for mercy, he didn't spur his neighbors on to repentance.

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We are to look at Elimelech and see a picture of a faithless man.

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Instead, Elimelech and his family left the place of their inheritance, they left the place of covenant, and they left the place where God's glory dwells, where God's presence is, they left.

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They went east, crossed the Jordan River in the opposite direction to Moab.

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And I told you, the Moabites would sacrifice their children, they would commit ritualistic sexual immoralities, they would have false worship of all types.

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This was a pagan nation. The grass, though, looked greener from their vantage point.

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But the road to Moab did not turn out as they expected, did it?

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Death and barrenness, grief and pain, three women, now three widows.

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I told you being a widow during that time was the ancient slow and painful death sentence if you were a widow.

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Things are looking hopeless, and that's intentional. They're looking hopeless now, but when you already have no hope, you can't go any lower, can you?

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The only direction is up. And that is our hope for these three ladies. It is here that we left off and now we begin again.

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So verse 6 states, then she arose, this is Naomi with her daughters -in -law, that she might return from the land of Moab.

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For she heard in the land of Moab that the Lord had visited His people in giving them food.

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Naomi was brought low. She was brought very low by what happened to her husband

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Elimelech and her two sons, Malon and Kilion. And verse 6 starts, though, with an image that Naomi couldn't take the crippling weight of grief anymore, it said she arose.

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She got up, she arose. And that's the thing, no one can stay at a crossroads forever. You've got to either die or you've got to rise.

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And she arose. Her family may be dead, but she isn't. She has to keep going.

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The text says she arose that she might return, and return here can signify more than just going home.

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This word in the Bible often carries with it connotations of repentance, returning.

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Will this be the beginning of turning back to God? To right the wrongs of her family?

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Going from faithlessness to faith once again. This family has been on what

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I called last week a self -inflicted exile. They've banished themselves from God's presence and God's inheritance.

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This is no surprise to him, though. The Lord knew that His people would wander from Him.

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In fact, before they even got to the promised land, it says in Deuteronomy 30,

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So it shall be when all these things have come upon you, the blessing and the curse which

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I have set before you, and you call them to mind in all the nations where the Lord your

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God has banished you. He knew they would go. And you return to the

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Lord your God and obey Him with all your heart and soul according to all that I command you today, you and your sons, then the

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Lord will restore you. That is the same Hebrew word for return. God will return you from captivity and have compassion on you, and I will gather you again from all the peoples where the

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Lord your God has scattered you. He knew they were going to be faithless. He knew they were going to go into idolatry.

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He knew they were going to be banished and exiled and sent to places, but God has always preserved for Himself a remnant.

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And He would return them, He would bring them back, and this is the promise. And Naomi's experiencing that now.

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She's going to get to return. Now we're not exactly sure how or when

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Naomi had heard in Moab, a nation apart, that the

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Lord had visited His people and given them food. How she heard that is amazing, and I believe that that's an example of God's gracious providence.

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News didn't travel that easy. There was no news app, right? There weren't couriers going everywhere, but somehow in Moab, she heard that God visited

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His people. That's a grace. For Naomi to have heard what the

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Lord did in Judah was a gift to her from God. In the darkest clouds of grief came a ray of light, the smallest piece of hope that the storm will soon end.

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That's often all we need, right? You see blackness, and the clouds barely part, and you see a ray of light come down, and that's all you need.

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The storm's going to end. And that's what Naomi receives here. There's hope.

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God has returned to His people. Notice it doesn't say she heard there was food in Bethlehem again.

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The house of bread, as it is called, has bread once again. The text says not that bread has come to the people, it says that the

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Lord has visited His people. And that word visit in the

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Old Testament is attributed with God's great concern and care for His people.

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It's often used that way. God has visited. God has come and cared for us. He has provided for us.

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It's an image that He won't keep His head turned in the heavens and ignore their requests.

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It's an image that He has made personal effort to see to the needs of His people.

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He has come to them. He has intervened on their behalf. This is another example of God's grace.

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Not only that she heard that God visited, but that God actually visited His people.

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This is grace. She heard the rumors by God's providence.

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The Lord visited. He intervened. He took action. And the object of that action was

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His people. His people. His covenant children. And lastly, this visit we see brought the blessing in the form of food.

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Whether that be like the rains came and crops grew well and the harvest was plentiful.

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The house of bread, Bethlehem, was once again living up to its name.

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There is no hint in the text that God's actions were brought about as a result of seeing the people repent.

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It doesn't say that. Providence must carry things forward. He must continue.

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God must be faithful even when no one else is. And that's what's happening.

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The predestined plans of God must continue in the book of Ruth. Will this be the beginning of faith for Naomi?

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Maybe the beginning of faith even for someone else? We will see. There were a lot of people, if you remember when we were going through the

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Gospel of John, who went out to see Jesus just because of His works, His attesting miracles.

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In other words, things that they could consume. Things that they wanted to see.

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The physical things that Jesus could do for them. Just like this food.

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And then there were some people in the Gospels that heard that the Lord visited His people.

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That God is incarnate. That Jesus is God and He is among us. And that still happens today.

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Some want the Lord and some only want what the Lord can offer you.

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What the Lord can give. Verse 7, so she departed from the place where she was and her two daughters -in -law with her.

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And they went on the way to return to the land of Judah. There's that return language again.

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It was time to leave Moab. They ventured on the way, or in the Hebrew, the path or the road.

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The road of return. That's what it literally says. This is the road of return to the land of Judah. What does

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Judah mean by the way? Judah means praise in Hebrew. These women are destitute, they're low, they're grieving, and they're in despair.

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But then they went on the road of return to the land of praise. Will they have the ability to praise

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God there? Time will tell. But Naomi has a one -track mind at this point.

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She rose, she got up, she grabbed the essentials, and she hit the road. She's returning, she's going home, but something stopped her in her tracks.

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She realizes this isn't just about me. She's going home, but for these two women with her, her daughters -in -law, their homes are back this way.

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They're down the other part of the road. She can't clothe Orpah and Ruth.

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She can't house them. She's worried about herself. Naomi likely intends to beg or glean the corners of a field, plead with her kin that's still there for a place to stay.

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She knows being foreigners in a different land is difficult. She just did it for ten years. I told you last week how much the

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Israelites hated the Moabites for how Moab treated them and what this pagan nation stood for.

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It is not likely life will be easy for these ladies in Bethlehem. Plus, Orpah and Ruth would be a constant reminder of the loss of her sons in her mind.

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Seeing Ruth and Orpah would be remembering the judgment God placed upon their small family for their sin.

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How would she be able to look at these women any other way? It'd have to be God. It'd have to be

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God. And so for many reasons, it appears that this woman,

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Naomi, wants to spare them any more grief. It would be way too difficult for two

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Moabite women to come to Israel. It's fine for her, she can go home, but they've got to go back to their families.

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And so she, as if stopping in the middle of the road, Naomi turns to them and commands them,

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Go, return. Verse 8 -10, And Naomi said to her two daughters -in -law,

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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.

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May the Lord grant that you may find rest each in the house of her husband. Then she kissed them, and they lifted up their voices and wept, and they said to her,

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No, but we will surely return with you to your people. This is what you call tough love, right?

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Go, return to your mother's house. Why not fathers? There's headship in the

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Old Testament. Why does she say mothers? Well, this is an expression used in Hebrew, that when you go to your mother's house, or I'm a woman still part of my mother's house, that's used in the realm of love and marriage.

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They were taken from their mother's house in marriage by Malon and Kilion, and what

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Naomi is trying to say is, Reverse what has happened here. There's no point in living in this state of grief anymore.

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Go back to where you came, and by going to the mother, Naomi is saying, You have my blessing to get remarried.

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Go back to the place of eligibility. It's okay. You don't have to live in a state of being a widow forever.

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You're young enough. You don't even have children, either of you. Go back to your mother's house. Go to the place where you talk of love and suitorship with your mother.

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You can get remarried. If that's on your mind, if you're grieving, if you feel guilty, we should just stay widows like Naomi.

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She says, No, go back. You can get remarried. That's fine. And so, that is why verse 9 says,

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She says, May you find rest in the house of their own husbands, meaning new husbands. Go and do what makes sense.

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You're young. Take the road that is most rational. Start over. Go back to your families and your gods. And interestingly,

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Naomi calls upon Yahweh, the Lord, to give the young women what is called hesed.

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And hesed is going to be a big theme through the rest of the book of Ruth. Hesed cannot be defined by just one

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English word. Hesed is an amazing word. Hesed is all the positive attributes of God.

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Hesed is love and mercy and grace, kindness, goodness, benevolence, loyalty, covenant, faithfulness.

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One Hebrew scholar states, In short, hesed is the quality that moves a person to act for the benefit of another without respect to the advantage it might bring to the one who expresses it.

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It's selflessness. God has been thinking of others.

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He practices hesed. And Naomi thanks and asks the

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Lord to give hesed to these ladies. Hesed is not simply emotion.

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It's accompanied with action. And Naomi assumes that the God of Israel, Yahweh, can bless two women of Moab with hesed.

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That God can cross the boundary lines of the nation of His people. He can bless other people.

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She assumes it. She doesn't invoke Chemosh. She doesn't invoke

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Chemosh, the demonic false god of Moab. She invokes the authority of Yahweh.

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Therefore, Naomi recognizes God allowed this tragedy, but only He can bring restoration to this situation.

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And then she tenderly praises the girls for their hesed, their kindness that they've dealt to her and her sons.

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To Israelites! Moabites were able to give hesed to Israelites.

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The women performed gracious acts that come from the attributes of the only

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God. They have appealed to the image of God in them without even knowing it.

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And there Naomi ends her blessing by requesting Yahweh to give the women rest in the house of a new husband for each of them.

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She says, Lord, don't give them restlessness like me. Don't give them the restlessness that I'll experience until I die.

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Give them peace in the house of a new husband. These women have prospects to be cared for.

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Naomi has a bitter future as a sunless widow.

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She's a sunless widow. Can't get any worse. And she kisses Orpah and Ruth.

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They all lift up their voices and weep. Amazingly though, they both say no. Whether they're naive to the difficulties ahead to live in Israel or not, both women want to go with their mother -in -law.

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Go to verses 11 -14 now. But Naomi said, return my daughters.

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Why should you go with me? Have I yet sons in my womb that they may be your husbands? Return my daughters, go, for I am too old to have a husband.

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If I said I have hope, if I should even have a husband tonight, and also bear sons, would you therefore wait until they were grown?

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Would you therefore refrain from marrying? No, my daughters, for it is harder for me than for you.

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For the hand of the Lord has gone forth against me. And they lifted up their voices and wept again.

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And Orpah kissed her mother -in -law, but Ruth clung to her. So Naomi was primed for another speech.

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She was ready to go. She doesn't want these young women throwing their futures away.

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Although she is returning back to the promised land after the land of compromise, all she sees is the land of no promise.

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She sees no future ahead. So to convince them to go back to their homes, Naomi will give three arguments.

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First, she tells them to return based on the incredulous statement that she has no sons in her womb.

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She knows if they went with her, no Israelite will want to marry them. That's true.

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But Naomi is likely long past the ability to bear children, and she will never get remarried.

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And although her statement is meant to sound ridiculous, it's incredibly serious. If they go with her, they cannot expect either husbands or care for themselves.

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Naomi thinks she is sparing them. Verse 12 shows us her second argument, as if to curb any rebuttals from the women that she could just get remarried.

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Well, just get remarried. Have more sons. She tells them, I'm too old for a husband now.

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And even if she got one this very night, would they both wait around for,

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I don't know, 20 years until they were fully grown? They too would likely then be out of the age of childbearing.

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Would you change the infant diapers of your future husbands? A little weird, huh? Probably not.

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And her third argument in verse 13, Naomi doesn't even let them respond.

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She says no to all of these. No. In the

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Hebrew, she literally says, it is much more bitter for me than for you because the hand of the

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Lord has gone forth against me. So this widow finally reveals her true feelings about all that has happened.

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Naomi is a bitter woman who blames God for her current state. That God has set up His targets on her and aimed and shot.

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That phrase, the hand of the Lord, is often a phrase of judgment in the

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Bible. The hand of the Lord. It can either be something of judgment, or it can be that God takes you by His hand.

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He upholds you by His righteous right hand. But in this way, in this formation, the hand of the

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Lord was against me. She's using it in judgment language. In Exodus 9, it was the divine hand of the

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Lord that struck Egypt with plagues. In Deuteronomy 2 .15, it was

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God's hand that destroyed a nation of Israelites in the wilderness for their sin.

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And all throughout the period of Judges, the people have known that it has been

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God's hand that is against them. That's what it says in the text. God's hand is against us.

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The biblical author doesn't even tell us if the famine in Israel or the deaths of her husband or sons, or if the barrenness of her daughter -in -law were acts of divine judgment.

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But she surely believes so. She thinks God is the cause of all her troubles.

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What is so disturbing about this? What's so disturbing about this fact is that she just previously said by Yahweh, may you be blessed, to Orpah and Ruth.

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The God who took from her, she asked to give to others.

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Instead of taking ownership of her own sin, her people's sin, Israel's sin, and the sins of her family, and no doubt her own, as no one's perfect, she only sees injustice with God.

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We're fine. We're 100 % victims of what You've done to us.

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That's what her finger's doing. Her finger's pointing back to God. That's the age -old question, isn't it?

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Why do bad things happen to good people? You hear that before?

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Why do bad things happen to good people? But that presupposes two things that can be very wrong.

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Bad could only be your perception of bad. And the other thing is, the

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Bible says no one is perfectly good. And so the question is better stated, how could anything good ever happen to us bad people?

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How could anything good ever happen to all of us bad people? And that's Him. And so Naomi doesn't inspire these young women to faith or to hope.

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They disintegrate into weeping again. However, Orpah is convinced, alright,

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I'm going back. And she kisses her mother -in -law, and she leaves. She goes down the other road.

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And she does what many would consider is the sensical thing. At the fork in the road,

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Orpah sees a nice turnaround with beautiful vistas and a hopeful destination.

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The narrator doesn't present this as necessarily unbelief or even as negative.

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It just is. Orpah left. We don't know what happens to Orpah. This is the time where Orpah has entered the

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Bible and leaves it, and we never see her again in the history of this book. And so she goes back to her people.

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She goes back to her gods. She thought the road Naomi was taking led to emptiness, but it's safe to say

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Orpah probably experienced her own sort of emptiness with her own gods, false gods.

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Ruth, however, wants to take the path to the left, west to Judah.

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On the road of uncertainty and hardship, her escort there? A bitter old woman. A bitter old widow.

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And she clings to Naomi, it says. This is the word cleave. It's fastening oneself to another.

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It's binding oneself to another. It's so strong of language, this clinging, this cleaving, that this language is used, you've probably seen in Genesis 2, of a husband to his wife in marriage.

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It doesn't make sense. Ruth knows she'll be rejected in Judah.

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Ruth knows her future will be just as bitter as Naomi's, except it will be even longer.

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She's going to live longer with this. This is not the way people think.

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This isn't self -preservation. In fact, I would argue, Ruth is not even thinking about herself.

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All Naomi can do is appeal to Ruth's connection with your sister. Well, what about her?

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Look, she just went back. What about her? Do what she's doing. Go ahead. Do what she's doing.

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Follow her. V. 15, Behold, your sister -in -law has gone back to her people and her gods.

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Return after your sister -in -law. Your sister took the U -turn. Go back with her.

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Go back to your people and your gods. And Naomi should know, Naomi should know this, do you know it's not good that Orpah went back to her people and her gods?

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It's not. Because she's going back to false gods. Naomi makes it sound as if, hey, our nation has our

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God, and your nation has your God. Go back to your

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God. But it's not true. There's not this sort of relativism or many gods.

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There's only one God. And so she's sending her back to a place where there is no gods.

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The Lord sent those plagues in Egypt and delivered them from slavery to show them and the world

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He is the only true God. Israel was to be the nation that positively influenced other countries for righteousness.

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That they would be the entry point in which the nations would come and stream up to the mountain of God, it says.

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Israel was to be a tutor to the world. People were supposed to marvel and go, what a great

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God! What a great law! What a great Word! God is there! That's what the

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Lord said. People are to marvel from other nations. What a great God this is! And yet,

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Naomi sends her back. She lets her leave.

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Then, one of the most remarkable and unlikeliest things occur.

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Looking at the road ahead and looking back at Orpah and the potential new life that Moab carries with it,

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Ruth says this. Look at verses 16 and 17. But Ruth said, Do not urge me to leave you or to turn back from following you for where you go

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I will go and where you lodge I will lodge. Your people shall be my people and your

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God my God. Where you die I will die and there I will be buried. Thus may the

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Lord do to me and worse if anything but death parts you and me.

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This is the first time that Ruth speaks on her own. And for many, it is one of the most memorable speeches in all of sacred

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Scripture. Not many pronouncements in the Bible carry with it such beauty and equal strength.

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Conveying such a fierce loyalty and even a spiritual maturity, I think that probably surprises

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Naomi. Something she's never seen before. Because this isn't like the casual move of going from Salt Lake City to say

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Provo. This is a complete identity change for Ruth.

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A physical, emotional, and spiritual transfer of sorts. But Ruth would have changed her own name if Naomi asked her to.

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And don't think the way Ruth structured this was simply for poetry. Her speech starts with this imploration that Naomi never protest her choice again.

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Don't ever ask me to leave you again. Then, three heavy commitments, and she binds all that she says together with an intense oath invoked not under the general name of God.

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She doesn't say under the name of Elohim. She says under the name of Yahweh. She says the only

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God's name. The personal covenant name of our Creator.

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This is so serious to her, you guys. This is so very serious. I can even see that Ruth is probably a bit hurt in her first response.

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Don't urge me to leave you. Don't tell me to turn back from you. Don't say this to me.

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I can't think of anything else. I've got to go with you. I've got to follow you.

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This verb is so strong. She's saying, you're asking me to abandon you.

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There's this sense of duty to Naomi now. Where you go, I will go. Where you stay,

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I will stay. I've been with you through all this grief from the very beginning, and I will stick with you through all the grief of our combined futures.

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Your future is my future. If you've got grief in that future, that will be my grief too.

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This is an amazing woman. Unbelievable. Unbelievable. If Naomi goes to the grave,

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Ruth will join her. In Israelite burial, it was typically a familial tomb arrangement.

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Ruth is saying, we're family now. You think you have no one, but you've got me to the very end.

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I'll be buried with you. And the most powerful commitment here is her answer to Naomi's earlier saying.

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If you remember, Naomi said, go to your people and your gods. And then

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Ruth literally says, this is it. There's no italics or words in the

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Hebrew. It literally says, your people, my people. Your God, my

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God. That's what she says. Simple as that. It's hard to understand, but in this context of the ancient

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Near East, this is one of the greatest displays of self -sacrifice one could give.

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To leave her people is to leave her sense of security, especially as a widow.

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Can you imagine? Many of us still communicate with our parents.

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Some have their parents live near them, but Ruth will essentially never see her family again.

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To say she will not follow Kamosh, the demonic deity of Moab, is to lose out on what they believe blesses her.

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Do you get that? In their culture, to leave your

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God and to be buried somewhere else is to think that the afterlife will be horrible for you.

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So Ruth isn't doing this lightly. She goes, your God will be my God. Where you go,

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I will go. If you die, I'll be buried there with you. That is to say, if Kamosh doesn't give me the best afterlife, if I don't go to some sort of paradise, that's how much this means to me to follow you.

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I'll lose everything in this life and the next to be faithful.

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Ruth understands to change her nation and her people is to also change her God. They go one and the same.

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So I wouldn't exactly call this a conversion. Ruth isn't a proselyte.

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She's not even a God -fearer in the sense that we know. It's like a transfer of sorts is being made.

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Do you get it? But she will commit herself to Yahweh and His precepts.

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It's unlikely she fully knows what all that entails. So I won't sensationalize this.

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I won't sensationalize this section. I won't tell you that right in this moment

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Ruth is doing this because she already loves Yahweh with all her heart, soul, mind, and strength. I won't tell you that.

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It doesn't say that. Ruth is not doing this based on a faith in the

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Lord, although because she is leaving Moab and Kamosh, she must begin to put some level of faith in the

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Lord. And I definitely think that this is the beginning of the possibility of that.

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She is doing this based on a fierce sense of loyalty and duty to Naomi, not to Yahweh.

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What I think I find striking is she is displaying the qualities of even

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Jesus. Things that Jesus has shown us that He's called

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Christians to. Matthew 16 .24 says, Then Jesus said to His disciples,

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If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow

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Me. That's what God calls us to. Ruth is doing this for someone she loves.

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But what's crazy is many Christians won't live this kind of radical loyalty, this undying dedication and intense self -sacrifice.

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They won't even do this for Jesus Christ. She does this for a human, but Christians won't even do this for Jesus.

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She does these things without saving faith. And some Christians won't live like this even with faith.

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But then that brings up the age -old question from the preacher James. What use is it, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but has no works?

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Can that kind of faith save him? It's one thing to say you have faith.

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It's another to live it out. Ruth has lived more like a Christian than many who have said

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Jesus is Lord, and that ought to concern us, of course. Well, Ruth finishes by giving an oath,

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Thus may the Lord do to me and worse if anything but death parts you and me. What she's saying is if I go back on my word, may the

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Lord Yahweh abandon me like I abandon you, and may

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He do even worse. May He do worse to me if I do this to you.

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Beyond the normal curses. This is a very serious vow to make.

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Today, people say in vain, I swear to God. Right?

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You hear kids say that too? Don't let your kids say that. I swear to God. Don't say it.

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You hear that today? People say it. Children and adults can say I swear to God while lying through their teeth.

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But back then, so great was it understood that God acts in this world that to call upon the name of the

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Lord in this sort of oath -taking way was saying that He is a divine witness to this.

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He is a guarantor of the promise she just made. And He'll act if she doesn't act rightly.

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In the length of her devotion lifelong, only death could break this pact. And the whole speech leaves

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Naomi speechless. The resolve and determination displayed in this young woman must have been very impressive.

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There are a lot of fake people in this world, are there not? A lot of fake people. And so to meet someone with such conviction is a bit arresting.

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She essentially said till death do us part. So verse 18 says when she saw that she was determined to go with her, she said no more.

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She said no more. She went along with her. Let's finish this out now. Chapter 1, go to verses 19 -21.

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So they both went until they came to Bethlehem, and when they had come to Bethlehem all the city was stirred because of them.

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And the women said, is this Naomi? And she said to them, do not call me Naomi, call me

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Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. I went out full, but the

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Lord has brought me back empty. Why do you call me Naomi, since the Lord has witnessed against me and the

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Almighty has afflicted me? Now, we don't know how

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Elimelech's family originally left. Whether there was a going away party, maybe

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Bethlehem was tearful at their family leaving. Maybe relatives and friends were imploring them not to leave, trying to convince them not to go to Moab and stay.

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We don't know. All we know is the last time the townspeople had seen

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Naomi was over ten years ago. And when she left them, there were four total.

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One woman, three men. Not two women. They're back in Bethlehem and the whole city was stirred.

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One way to say that would be that the city was buzzing with excitement. The women of the town see these ladies enter the village and they ask one another, is this

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Naomi? Now, one could be incredulous at the sight of someone they haven't seen in over ten years.

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But I wonder if part of their question was Naomi's appearance. Ten years of incredible grief can aid you a lot.

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It's a lot of stress. It's a lot of heartache. It can alter you.

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It can make a soft face a hard face. Remember in Hebrew, Naomi's name means lovely or pleasant.

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Is this the pleasant one? They ask. But before them stands an old destitute woman and it seems

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Naomi overhears some of the buzzing and commotion to the point that she has a public outburst.

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All the years of frustration, all the years of pain from the fact that the famine led them to Moab to the death of her husband and sons, all that bitterness caused her to shout, do not call me pleasant!

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Do not call me lovely! Do not call me sweet! Call me bitter.

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Call me Mara. Because the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me.

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She said the Almighty, by the way. This is El Shaddai. And this term has much to do with the one true

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God's hand of blessing and prosperity. It's possible she's using it cynically.

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It's like saying this, look how the Provider provided for me and pointing to nothing.

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El Shaddai. El Shaddai was against me. In those days, your name wasn't just a title, it was your whole identity.

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Naomi's entire identity has fundamentally changed and she sees the Lord as the one to blame.

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She's not kind, she's not lovely, she's not sweet, she's bitter. And so she levels four accusations against God.

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First, she states the Almighty has made her life bitter. Second, she said she went out full, but Yahweh brought her back empty.

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Which as you can see, by the way, that bitterness has blinded her from the fact that she's not quite empty.

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Who's with her? Ruth. But she says I went out full, now I'm empty.

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She can't see that Ruth is accompanying her. Third accusation, she says the

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Lord has taken up testimony against her and found her guilty as in a court of law.

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As if there was a heavenly court and Naomi was put up there and God says I testify against her guilty.

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And finally, she says specifically, El Shaddai, the

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Almighty has afflicted me. In Hebrew, this word often means that one has done wickedly or evil against another.

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This is the word for intentional harm. She says God has intentionally harmed me.

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And I think as chapter one finishes here, we all probably feel terrible for this woman. I would be surprised if you didn't feel some level of sympathy for her.

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But on the other hand, her family didn't have faith that God would provide. They left

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Israel from Moab. She let her sons... Remember, Elimelech was already dead.

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She was leading her family and she let her sons marry, intermarry with Gentiles, which was against God's law.

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And when given the opportunity to help Orpah come to the one true

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God, she told her, go back to your gods. Does she have some shred of faith after all of this?

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Well, she did ask for Yahweh to bless her daughters -in -law. She did respond with faith in coming back to Israel.

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But whatever faith is there, church, it's trying as hard as it can not to be choked out by bitterness.

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Naomi sees God as sovereign. No problem there. By the way, it's only a modern construct that people have an issue with God being sovereign.

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It was like everyone understood God's sovereign. God's over everything back then. She understood it. The issue is she sees

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Him as all -powerful but not all -good. She sees justice, but she sees no mercy.

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The fact is, when you take a cup of a sweet drink and you add just one drop of bitterness, it corrupts the whole cup.

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Her experience isn't allowing her to think clearly. She has to see the goodness of God again in her life.

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Verse 22 finishes the first scene. They're back in Israel. So Naomi returned, and with her

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Ruth the Moabitess, her daughter -in -law, who returned from the land of Moab, and they came to Bethlehem at the beginning of barley harvest.

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Well, let me finish up here. We see two completely different attitudes among these two different women.

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One chooses to be bitter and one chooses to be sweet. Naomi has bitterness towards God.

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She blames God for all her sorrows. And many people are like this, even Christians.

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Some have had bitterness so long they are codependent to it. They survive with their bitterness.

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You can even see it on the face of some people as they talk. You can see it even when they're happy or sad.

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You can see bitterness. You can hear bitterness in someone's voice when they talk about specific subjects.

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They are bitter and it has consumed every part of them. The Apostle Paul tells the

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Ephesian church, let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice.

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Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving each other, just as God and Christ also has forgiven you.

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He says, put it away! Put away all bitterness. Not some.

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He says all bitterness. Not just all future bitterness.

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Hey, from now on, things are going to happen with God. Things are going to happen with people. I'm not going to be bitter, but I'm going to hold on to the bitterness in my past.

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That I can hold on to, but no, Paul says all of it. All bitterness gone. Hebrews 12 .15

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says, See to it that no one comes short of the grace of God, that no root of bitterness springs up causing trouble, that many are defiled by it.

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That word defiled is corruption. Bitterness corrupts your entire being like it has for Naomi.

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You can't keep bitterness and just pour in some sweet. You can't have bitterness and pour in sweet.

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It continues to fester. It continues to ruin things. It must be removed.

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The author in Hebrews says here, remove the root of bitterness. Don't just cut off the top leaves.

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Those of us who have to pull weeds know you can't just pull off the top. You've got to pull it from the root otherwise it keeps growing back.

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It keeps coming back. You've got to remove the bitterness. And some of us won't even be able to hear something like this because we think our own bitterness is too insignificant.

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It's not big enough. I don't have a real problem, we think.

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I haven't had an outburst like Naomi. Oh, but you've had outbursts in your head.

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You've held trials for other people in your head. You've declared sentencing in your mind.

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We've all done it. And it tries to rise to the surface anyways. The Apostle Paul understood that it is impossible to simultaneously be compassionate and forgiving and tenderhearted toward one another when you are also bitter.

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That's why he says you've got to remove it all so that you can forgive and be tenderhearted and loving. You've got to get rid of it.

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You can't do both at the same time. And you certainly can't have a rigorous and healthy relationship with God when you're bitter with Him.

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One author says guilt is what we feel when we sin. Guilt is what we feel when we sin and bitterness is what we feel when others sin against us.

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And that can be even when they actually haven't sinned against us. We believe that their actions are sin even when they're not.

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When one is bitter, they can only see what others have done or what has happened to them.

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They have tunnel vision. Someone who's in the gulls of bitterness can only see what has been done to them.

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They can't see what they've done to others. They see themselves as only the victim.

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I'm only the victim in this. They overlook their own part that played into their current state like Naomi.

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It's hard to see who are indeed there for you in your trial. Naomi values

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Ruth. After that tremendous display of devotion, Naomi values

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Ruth as nothing. That's what she says. I've gone away full and I've come back empty.

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Naomi can't even see in her bitterness that there's someone with her. Ruth is with her.

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She says I'm empty. Bitterness causes us to falsely accuse others.

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Bitterness can only see the sin of others. It doesn't see our own sin. It won't let you see that you are blessed of God.

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Bitterness won't let you see the blessings of God in your life. Naomi can't see how she's blessed of God.

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God delivered her people from Egypt and from slavery. God gave her a land to build a life forever.

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God gave her life. God gave her a husband and sons that she did get to enjoy.

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She got to enjoy many years with her husband and sons. And I'm not saying that what she went through was easy.

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But God gave her loving and loyal daughters -in -law, especially with Ruth.

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God brought them back to Israel safely. God has provided for them this whole time. Bitterness, hear this, bitterness cannot see blessing.

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It cannot see blessing. I'll also say it's possible when someone's struggling with depression and spiritual loneliness, it can be because we won't release our bitterness.

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It poisons everything, even the good things in your life, to where you can't enjoy them properly.

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We're almost done here. In Exodus 15, listen to this, in Exodus 15, the

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Hebrews were led by Moses from the Red Sea into the wilderness and they were thirsty. They came upon the waters of what's called

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Marah. The waters of Marah. But they couldn't drink the waters of Marah because the waters were so bitter.

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Do you know what it took to change this? Moses cried out to God.

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He told God the waters are bitter and God gave the solution. He said, put this tree in the waters.

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The Lord said, throw this tree into the water and the waters will become sweet. And the people drank to the fullness.

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Do you know how to fix this bitterness inside of you? We need to cry out to God like the

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Israelites. We need to surrender the bitter waters to Him and He will give you the tree.

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He will give you the tree which is the cross of Christ and that will remove the bitterness.

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You say, Pastor Wade, I've already got the cross. I've already got Christ. Why do

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I need that tree to throw into the bitter waters? Well, you and I need the cross every day, don't we not?

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We need the cross every day of our lives. We need to throw it in the waters of our bitterness.

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You can't do this on your own. You need God's help. I need God's help. The poison has stayed in us for far too long.

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It's time to remove it. And so let me give you a few final tips to help with this church.

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First, remember that bitterness. Bitterness remembers details. Bitterness can play back the situation in your mind with perfect detail.

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And not even that, bitterness adds to it. It changes the story. It makes it worse than it was.

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Bitterness makes you remember everything and all that they did to you. And so you've got to change that.

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You've got to stop ruminating over what happened again and again and again. You get in the shower and you think and you think and you think about that thing that happened today and that person.

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It's that same person who keeps talking to me that way and we think about it over and over again.

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We are a society that does too much reflection in my opinion. We spend too much time in our own minds thinking about ourselves and how we feel far too often.

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You must stop thinking about this person or this situation and what they did over and over again.

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You've got to renew your mind. You've got to seek the Word of God. When you start playing over the situation, when you remember details, remove bitter thoughts and just start quoting

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Scripture. I'm telling you. Use that sword of the Spirit. Quote Scripture.

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Replace bitter thoughts with the good thoughts of God. I dare you to make a list of the good qualities of the person who hurt you.

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Make a list of the good qualities in the way that this person has blessed you. Maybe there's not much, but there might be something.

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Next, you must see how sinful bitterness is.

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You must hate it. Yeah, this person may have sinned against you, but don't introduce into the situation more sin on your behalf.

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You must see that your bitterness is sin just as they sinned against you.

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You must hate it. You've got to look at all the verses that say to get rid of it. God wouldn't command us to get rid of bitterness if He wanted you to keep it.

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Keeping bitterness is an affront to God. It offends God that we would keep bitterness inside of us.

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Bitterness is a terrible evil, especially when you and I have had Jesus take all of God's wrath and any right that He had to be bitter with us, and Jesus placed it upon Himself.

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How can we hold something against someone that even God doesn't hold toward us?

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The other way to get rid of bitterness is to follow Ruth's example. Get this,

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Ruth lost her husband too. Ruth never had a child.

01:00:00

Ruth has no son. Ruth has no husband. She never got those things.

01:00:09

Children, blessing. She has all the reason to be bitter herself like Naomi.

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She has the right to be bitter apparently, but she chose not to. She simply chose not to be bitter, and what helped her to do this?

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What do we see? Self -sacrifice. Self -denial. Serving someone other than herself.

01:00:32

Serving others and praying for others, especially those who you are bitter with, helps remove bitterness.

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Because get this, it's hard to be bitter towards someone else if you're starting to care for them.

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How can you start to care for the person you're bitter with? But the biggest tool you and I have for this, and it's probably going to sound way too simple.

01:00:59

Pastor Wade, this is way too simple. Here it is. To get rid of bitterness, you must confess bitterness before God in light of Jesus Christ, giving us the effects of the tree that He died upon.

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Only Christ's tree and the confession of sins that we can give through Him change the bitter waters like it did in Exodus.

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God said throw the tree into the waters of Marah, into the waters of bitterness, and it will become sweet.

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They confessed to God. They implored God. God gave them the solution. And the waters became sweet.

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And you must do the same. You must confess your bitterness until it is no more.

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And I promise you this helps. Get a pastor. I'll do it for you.

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Get a spouse. Get a close friend that you trust. And sit down. Who is the person you're bitter with?

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And I dare you, I dare you to on paper, finally write down all that they've done to you and point at it.

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And look at it. Because number one, the way you've been thinking is you've probably been adding all these details, all these false accusations that are not true.

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Write it down. What did they actually do? And point at it. See it for what it is.

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Because I can tell you, we're often making it bigger than what it was. We're lying in our minds.

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We're not believing truth about this person. Call it sin. Confess it. Or it will destroy you.

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And look through the rest of Ruth. Naomi begins to serve Ruth. Naomi begins to help

01:02:46

Ruth. Naomi considers Ruth eventually as more important than herself.

01:02:53

She sees Ruth's future as more important than her own. Naomi starts to see

01:02:59

God working again. And what happens? She begins to release that bitterness.

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There is hope for her. And there's hope for you. Be a Ruth and not a

01:03:11

Naomi today because that is the example of Jesus Christ. Because today, all of your sins are forgiven you if you're in Christ.

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And if my eternal debt is gone, how can I demand payment to me?

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Myself? This is it. The person who

01:03:35

I'm bitter with has either already had all their sins forgiven them, and I'm saying

01:03:41

I hold some of these at the cross. No, not all of these are paid for. That's either the case of the person

01:03:47

I'm bitter with, or the other thing is we ought to hope and pray that the person we're bitter with has all their sins forgiven them one day.

01:03:58

Those are the only two options. And in both situations, you can't hold it.

01:04:04

Because either they're going to pay for their sins for all eternity, or Jesus paid for their sins once and for all.

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That's it. That's it. And so release the debt. Release the bitterness.

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Be sweet and not bitter as the

01:04:22

Word says. Let's pray. Lord, thank You for the Word that went out today.

01:04:29

Thank You, God, for this example. It's amazing to see a woman like Ruth with such devotion, such loyalty, even when she has not yet fully had faith.

01:04:48

She's seen a glimpse of it, Lord. And she does such a selfless act.

01:04:55

She has every right to be bitter. She has every right to be grieving. But Ruth does the righteous thing.

01:05:01

She's selfless. She's like Christ in that sense who didn't regard

01:05:09

Himself over others. He gave

01:05:15

Himself. He died upon that cross. And Lord, we know that part of what

01:05:22

You paid for Jesus was our bitterness. Our bitterness was nailed to that cross, and yet we keep trying to come up to that cross with a hammer and prying it off and holding it.

01:05:40

God, let us remove all bitterness as the Apostle Paul says. Remove all bitterness. Let us remove the root of bitterness that has grown in us.

01:05:50

God, we need You to do it for us. We confess it to You, God. We are a bitter people. We've been like Naomi in our lives.

01:05:57

We've been angry with You. We've been angry with what we've been dealt with in this life.

01:06:04

We've been angry. Lord, at how this has gone. We've been angry with other people.

01:06:10

We've been bitter, Lord. God, help us to run to the cross. Help us to run into Your arms.

01:06:17

Help us to seek grace. Because we were like the slave who had so many thousands of talents forgiven him, and yet we go to another brother or sister and we say,

01:06:32

You owe us this many denarius. And so, Lord, help us to not do that any longer.

01:06:39

Help us with specifics, God. Help us today to not just generally say,

01:06:45

God, I confess bitterness. Help us, God, to actually think of the people that we are harming in our minds, that we're bitter with in our minds.

01:06:54

People who have hurt us. And help us, Lord, to let it go. We love