When I was a 4th grader...I went to a concentration camp. Well, I went to what used to be a concentration camp. In Dachau, Germany.

Even 50 years after the holocaust, death haunts the place. Its difficult to get over gas chambers disguised as shower rooms, and ovens that cooked people, and dormitories that stacked humans on top of one another...its hard to shake that kind of evil even 50 years after if happened.

The systematic murder of Jews in 1940’s Europe is one of the clearest and ugliest displays of evil in history. The name Hitler is synonymous with the devil for many people.

When allied troops liberated a concentration camp in May of 1945 in Mauthausen Austria, its no surprise that they found this phrase carved into one of the walls.

“My God, My God why have you forsaken me? If there is a god, he will have to be beg for my forgiveness.” -carving on the walll of a Mauthausen concentration camp.

You know what? That’s understandable. That makes a lot of sense. See, even standing in a concentration camp 50 years after WWII was over, I still struggled with the darkness...and God’s role in it. That’s a statement I would expect to come out of that darkness. But, its not that statement that catches my eye as much as this one... from another Concentration camp survivor.

“There is no pit so deep that God’s love is not deeper still.” - Corrie Ten Boom

So here’s the question. Who is delusional? Who missed it? I mean, they can’t both be right. Is God on the hook for that evil?...Was he not present?...or the whole time, was he really present? Was his love deeper than the hate inside those death camps?

Listen, if God’s love can be snuffed out by human hate...then God is not as powerful as we sing about in here. So this is a very important question. And one I bet you’ve asked before.

“Where is God?”
...in my suffering?
...in my unanswered prayers? ...in people’s sin against me?

If you have ever asked that question, Ruth is going to give you an answer. Its hard to say exactly what the book of Ruth is about.

On one hand, its almost like reading a classic love story. Down and out girl gets swept off her feet by kind- rich guy. Its kind of like the old Julia Roberts movie... Pretty Woman...except without the prostitution.

There is so much to learn from this little Old Testament book of the Bible... There are captivating pictures of godly womanhood and manhood. There are great takeaways for how to and how NOT to be a parent. This little book is going to push you to generosity and loyalty and commitment. Its going to show you the beauty of sacrifice...all that, and its wrapped up in a story that Nicholas Sparks can’t hold a candle to.

But here’s what I hope God shows you through this short little piece of the Revelation of the God of the universe. I hope he begins to open your eyes to what He is doing when it feels like he’s doing nothing. And that will, more than ever before, having you thanking him, instead of hating him.

So...here’s what I’d like to ask you to do. Ruth is a very short book, only 4 chapters long. Probably takes up about 3 pages in your Bible.

Will you sink your teeth into it for the next 5 weeks?
Will you read it, the whole book, at least once a week for the next 5 weeks?

Grab a pen. Write questions you have. Make observations. Circle things. What confuses you? What excites you? What do you think is beautiful? What do you think is just...dumb? And then, when you come in here, and I preach on it, maybe I’ll answer some of those questions...or maybe I won’t. But the point is, your mind and heart will be right there on the text that my mind and heart is going to be on for the next month. Lets do this together.

Lets saturate ourselves in the book of Ruth for 5 weeks, together, and see what God does with us? Agreed? Great. Here we go.

Ruth 1

In the days when the judges ruled there was a famine in the land, and a man of Bethlehem in 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 Mahlon and Chilion. They were Ephrathites 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 ten years, and both Mahlon and Chilion died, so that the woman was left without her two sons and her husband.

Then she arose with her daughters-in-law to return 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. 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 will I 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.

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

So Naomi returned, and Ruth the Moabite her daughter-in-law with her, who returned from the country of Moab. And they came to Bethlehem at the beginning of barley harvest.

Here’s what I want you to see in this first chapter of Ruth. When everything is going south, When god seems to be absent...he’s actually doing a thousand things you can’t see or understand. He’s doing them quietly. And most of the world is completely unaware of what he’s doing. In fact, a lot of times, even the people he is directly working in to turn things around are unaware of his presence and his work.

But just because you can’t see God working, doesn’t mean he’s not up to something. So today, I want to show you how you can begin to notice the work of God, even in the worst circumstances. If you don’t believe God is working, you’ll try to take matters into your own hand. But...

1) You can’t solve spiritual problems by changing physical circumstances.

If you are going to understand the book of Ruth, its very important to understand WHEN it happens. And the author tells us, right off the bat. He tells us that this happened in the day when the judges ruled. The book of Judges tells you about this time. You might be familiar with the story of Samson and Delilah. Ruth happens right after that. In your Bibles, it would fall right in the middle of Judges 17. In fact, the parallels between what happens in Ruth and what happens in Judges 17 are pretty striking...but we won’t go there today.

What I want you to see is this phrase that is used over and over toward the end of the book of Judges that sets the scene for what’s going on here. There is no king in Israel, and everyone did what was right in his own eyes. So Israel was a lot like Outback Steakhouse. No Rules, Just Right. There was no moral authority. It means that everyone was their own king, their own god, made their own rules. The book of Judges is moral relativism as its finest. You define what’s right and wrong. You define what’s right for you.

You know, if you live your life like that, you really don’t have anything to say to Hitler. When you enter into a concentration camp, you are simply looking at a monument of someone doing what was right in his own eyes. Hitler would have been right at home during the time of the Judges...which is pretty ironic considering he hated the people of Israel. See, when individuals determine what is right and wrong for ourselves...things always go south. Societies fall apart....and that’s exactly what is happening in Israel when the book of Ruth shows up.

Now, in Ruth, we’ve got a man of Bethlehem (which means HOUSE of BREAD) leaving to go to another country because of a famine. In other words, the house of bread...has no more bread. The promised land...a land that was supposed to be flowing with milk and honey...a land where Israel was SUPPOSED to experience the blessing of God...has now become a barren wasteland...and it is because they decided to throw off the leadership of God and do what was right in their own eyes.Their spiritual throwing off of God’s authority has resulted in famine...and that’s why Elimelech bolts for Moab.

There is so much irony in the opening of this book. The house of bread is out of bread...and you’ll never guess what Elimelech’s name means? It means “God is King” Remember how the book of judges described this time? There was NO KING in Israel. And then you ave the names of Elimelech and Naomis’ 2 sons. Mahlon and Chilion. Which sound cool at first until you know what they mean. Mahlon means “sick” an Chilion means “Spent” or “Dying” This is like naming your kids “Pneumonia” and “Eboli”. I guess that’s what happens when everyone is doing what’s right in their own eyes. You know, If you want to name your kids vomit and diaherrea...that's your biz. I’m sure Naomi’s girlfriends looked at her and were like “OH YOU GO GIRL!” Those names are SOOOOOOOO unique!”

But things go from bad to worse, first Elimilech dies, and Naomi’s like...”ok, at least I have my sons and their wives.” but 10 years after that, “Sick” and “Dying” die too (I know, you didn’t see that coming did you?) That’s kind of like naming your kid “Jeeves” and then being shocked when he chooses to be a butler for a career.

Anyway, here’s Naomi in a foreign land and all she has left is these daughters-in- law. This, ladies and gentlemen, is a pretty terrible beginning...Famine and death. Kids named Sick and Spent. Our Pets heads are falling off! These are dark times for Naomi.

But I want to show you something about Elimelech. Elimelech is expected to be not only the physical provider, but the spiritual leader of his family. Being a spiritual leader doesn’t mean that you know the most theology in your household, it means that you are constantly watching your family’s relationship with God...and making sure that your family has whatever it takes for your family to flourish in a relationship with God.

Elimelech was supposed to show his family that God is King...but instead, he led them to do what was right in their own eyes. He moved his family to Moab, where his sons married foreign women who worshipped foreign gods. Something that was strictly prohibited by God...and don’t miss this irony either. Elimilech moved his family AWAY from Bethlehem because he thought if he stayed they would die. And now, he and his sons are dead.

See, Elimelech was dismissing the spiritual problems, and moved all his focus on the physical problems. Instead of staying in Judah, repenting with his family and leading others to make God king in their lives again, He says, “Oh, my problem is really just that we don’t have enough to eat. I heard in Moab the market is up and grain is at an all time high. We’ll just move there.”

Listen, trying to address spiritual problems with a change in physical circumstances is like putting a band-aid on because you have cancer. It might make you feel better for a couple of days if you REALLY BELIEVE it helps, but cancer is a real disease, not a figment of your imagination. And if its not addressed with something that furiously goes after it inside your body...you’ll just die with a band-aid on...Elimlech, Mahlon, and Chillion, all died in Moab...with tons of bread to eat.

You ever try to fix something spiritual by changing your physical circumstances? I'll give you a couple of examples. Ever felt lonely and insecure because you aren’t in a relationship? So what do you do? You date somebody. Or maybe you’re dating somebody and as well-intentioned as you are, you end up losing your self-control and having sex...so, that’s easy to fix, just get married, right? Or maybe you’re married, and things are bad. There is so much fighting and anger...so you’re solution? Divorce.

But what if most of your problem wasn’t your circumstance? What if it wasn’t outside of you? What if it was inside? See, Lonely and insecure single people become lonely and insecure dating people. And people who have no self-control when they are dating, continue to have no self-control when they marry...and the deep anger and hate in you that your marriage exposes will not go away when you get rid of your spouse.

Those are all spiritual problems. And they are all spiritual problems that will catch up to you and kill you. That eat away at you...and you couldn’t do anything worse than to bury them and run off to a new circumstance to start over. The death that Elimilech ran from in Judah caught up with him in Moab. Unless you actually have the courage to face all the spiritual junk happening in your life...you’ll just move from place to place, person to person, bedroom to bedroom, job to job, spouse to spouse...and you’ll even pass it on to your kids.

When life takes a turn for the worse, running away is not always the best thing to do. Sometimes you need to take a look your heart, and the heart of the people you love and lead and ask, “What do I REALLY believe about God? Is his love deeper than the deepest and darkest pit...or do I believe he needs to beg for my forgiveness?”

And when you finally go looking for God in the worst of circumstances....you need to know what you are looking for. Its not money. Its not bread. Its not even good fortune.

2) If you’re looking for God in the dark, look for sacrificial love.

In Corrie Ten Boom’s book, the Hiding Place...which I need to tell you, if you have not read this classic, you need to get it yesterday. Some of the most gut wrenching beauty you’ve ever encountered. Corrie Ten Boom is my girl. There is a reason her last name ends with BOOM...because she drops lines in this book that will make you stand up and say “BOOM!”

ANYWAY...at one point, after she and her Christian family have been shipped off to a concentration camp for hiding Jews in their house in Holland, she and her sister eventually end up in the same dormitory. And somehow, they have smuggled in some pages of the Bible without the guards knowing it. And everyday, the other women in the barracks would gather around them to hear words of hope. Let me let Corrie tell you about it. (pg 194-195)

“Whenever we were not in ranks for roll call, our Bible was in the center of an ever- widening circle of health and hope.”

“Like waifs clustered around a blazing fire, we gathered about it, holding out our hearts to its warmth and light. The blacker the night around us grew, the brighter and truer and more beautiful burned the Word of God.”

“Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?...Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.”

“I would look about us as Betsie read, watching the light leap from face to face. More than conquerors....It was not a wish. It was a fact.”

“We knew it, we experienced it minute by minute — poor, hated, hungry. We are more than conquerors. Not “we shall be.” We are!”

“Life in Ravensbruck took place on two spearte levels, mutually impossible. One, the observablee, external life, grew every day more horrible. The other, the life we lived with God, grew daily better, truth upon truth, glory upon glory.” - Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place

Corrie. TEN. BOOM! I told you girl was droppin’ that verse on you. Do you see it? This is not a made up story. This actually happened. These are the words and account of a woman who endured the most despicable treatment the world has seen...and there is something about the depth of the love of God...the love of Christ...that not only brought hope in the darkness to her...but all these other women.

Now, take a look at what happens next to Naomi. First, she hears that prosperous times have returned to Bethlehem. So she decides to go back. But she doesn't want her daughters in law to come with her.

Now, you have to think about what’s happening here. First of all, Naomi is in a pretty hopeless situation. See, her family tree has ended. Her husband and sons are dead, and her daughters-in-law never got pregnant. In this day, children were like your retirement policy. They were the ones who took care of you when you got older. So for an old widow without kids...she was out of luck. She would be turned out on the streets unless someone showed her compassion. Her only hope is to go back to Bethlehem and hope somebody will care enough about her to help her out. Now Ruth and Naomi, they’re widows too....but they are still young enough to remarry and have kids. In other words, they still have some hope.

Here’s something else you need to know. Ruth and Naomi are Moabites. Saying you are a Moabite woman in Israel is like walking into a Donald Trump rally with a Hillary Clinton t-shirt on. You might get killed.

Israelite men don’t go anywhere near Moabite women. Moabites were the people who were formed from the incestuous relationship between Lot and his daughters. At one point, the Moabite women seduced Israelite men, and the punishment that God gave was that 24,000 of them died. So, Naomi knows if Ruth or Orpah come back to Israel with her, they won’t ever get married...and they will experience the same fate she is now having to face. So, Naomi insists they don’t come along. But look what she does. She asks that her God bless them. She uses God’s covenant name. That’s why LORD is in all caps.

Naomi says, “I want you to find rest not in the gods you used to worship, but in my covenant God. The God who claims to not just the god of the Jews, but the God of all creation, all cultures, and all races.” But, at the same time, she is sacrificing for them. She isn’t just wishing them well...she is protecting them while hurting herself. On one hand, She is releasing them from any sort of obligation to her so that they can eventually marry and be provided for. But on the other hand, she is sealing her loneliness and hopelessness. Without family, she is reduced to a begging widow. So Orpah takes off, but look how Ruth responds.

She says, “I’m not leaving you. In fact, your people are my people and your God is my God.” This is one of the best testimonies of salvation in the entire Bible. Do you see what Ruth is saying? She is saying, “Because of the sacrificial love you’ve shown me...because you were willing to be destitute and lonely so that I could flourish and live...I believe in your God, and I am with you...even if that means walking into a land where I may be rejected...where I may never have the family I long for. I know this might mean death for me, but you have laid aside your own life for me...so now my life is yours.”

You know, God is not mentioned very much at all in the book of Ruth. There are no miracles. No one reads any Scripture. But right in the middle of the darkness is same beauty and hope and light that shone so bright in Ravensbrook concentration camp for Corrie and Betsie Ten boom when they huddled around those old pages of the book of Romans. Sacrifical love. Think about it.

In Ravensbrook concentration camp, those ladies were reading about the love of Jesus Christ. Which says that when you were spiritually dead, when you were as in bad a shape as Israel was in the time of the Judges...without God as King...and doing what was right in your own eyes, God became a man in Jesus Christ, and then he died a terrible death on a cross...so that you wouldn’t have to die that death spiritually.

On the cross, Jesus cried out “My God, My God why have you forsaken me...” SO that you don’t have to beg God for his forgiveness. Rather, you can now have an eternal family...the church...not based on anything you’ve done...but based on God’s unconditional love and forgiveness for you in Jesus.

See, that’s what they were reading in Ravensbrook. And it made all the difference. They knew that even though it was dark all around them, that Jesus had given them something that could not be taken away...something that no gas chamber, no oven, no gun, no beatings, could ever take away from them. And you know what our response to that kind of grace is? Jesus says, “when you see the cross I bore for you, you now are willing to bear a cross for me.”

Isn’t that what happens here? Ruth sees Naomi’s sacrificial love for her, and she is so moved by it that she is now willing to attach herself to Naomi, even it means losing her life in Israel. Even though the word of God is absent in Moab...and absent in Ruth. Even though nothing explicitly supernatural happens in the whole book, indeed, God is very present. He’s present in the sacrificial love that Naomi shows because she knows the love of her covenant God...and then Ruth responds to that deep covenant love, by placing her trust in the same God. See, sacrificial love, when it is rightly received produces more sacrificial love. It produces commitment. Look at the loyalty of Ruth.

She is looking ahead at what could be a miserable existence for her in Israel...and she’s saying, “When the walls are closing in on me...no matter what comes my way, I’ll remember what God did here through you. I’ll remember this love today when I’m tempted to look at this God and say, “God, you’re not there.” Look, this is why as a church we make a covenant together. We make promises to each other. Because the church is a group of people that have experienced the sacrificial love of God in Jesus Christ and so now we commit to each other to make that love known to each other...and to others.

But what happens if you forget? What happens if you forget the sacrificial love God has loved you with? Well...that’s the difference in Corrie Ten Boom and telling God he needs to beg for your forgiveness.

That’s the difference in a life lived in gratitude and one lived in bitterness. 3) Bitterness blinds you to grace. Gratitude opens your eyes to see God.

Do you what grace is? Grace is when you get something good that you don’t deserve. That’s exactly what sacrificial love is. It's a kind of grace. Its one person experiencing loss so that another person gains. When Naomi and Ruth return to Bethlehem, people are floored. They can’t believe Naomi has come back. And that she’s got this Moabite woman with her. I’m sure the years of pain and loss have worn on Naomi’s face and body. When she left, she was the matriarch of a promising family. Now, she’s come back an old, haggard widow with nothing but the pity of a lowly Moabite woman. Her life, for all practical purposes is over.

So Naomi just decides to end all the chatter. She looks at all the folks talking about her and says, “Don’t call me Naomi anymore. Now you can call me Mara...because the ALMIGHTY has dealt bitterly with me.” See, her name Naomi means pleasant... and Mara means bitter. She is saying, just call me what I am...Don’t call me sweet little lady, call me bitter old hag...because look what God did to me. When I left, I was full. We may have been hungry...but I had my family...I had a future... I had hope. Now, I have nothing...and this is all God’s fault. Now if you’re Ruth right here, THIS. IS. AWKWARD. You just left your way of life, your people, your family, and your future behind, to come with your Mother-in-law to a land where people are likely to hate you...and you are likely to grow up to be just like her...a bitter old hag... and here’s Naomi overlooking all of that.

She has been given astounding grace...sacrificial love...and still, with that grace standing right by her side...she embraces bitterness toward God. She doesn’t see God’s hand in the gift of Ruth...she can only see God’s hand in her misery.

You know, at the end of every worship gathering we send you outta here with one phrase...do you know what it is? Go and Remember the gospel. Do you know why we say that every week?

Because of all the temptations in the world, none is greater than the one Naomi succumbs to here at the end of chapter 1. This temptation to forget grace is the temptation that opens the door to all other temptations. In fact, if you read through the New Testament epistles, you’ll find over and over the command to remember the gospel of Jesus Christ...and give thanks. Its given as a kind of weapon to fight off other temptations and sins. Because when are grateful for what God has done to overcome your sin and suffering...its kind of hard to embrace sin and bitterness that suffering brings.

See, the gospel tells you that in Jesus Christ, God has been Ruth to you. Think about it. The gospel says that Jesus left his heavenly home, he left his Father’s side, so that he could enter into our suffering and die for our sin. And in that death, he would make a way for us to be forgiven...so that we could be brought into the family of God.

Yet still, day by day, in all of our sufferings, that surely pale in comparison to concentration camps, or famines, or losing OUR entire families...we remain bitter toward God...when God himself, in Jesus Christ is standing right by our side.

Naomi overlooked God’s grace to her in Ruth. And so she embraced a life of bitterness. Toward God. Toward others. But because of the gospel, there’s a better way. Gratitude. I want to end by showing you a picture of that...from the middle of a concentration camp. The worst kind of suffering you can imagine.

Corrie Ten Boom wrote about the realizations she and her sister, Betsie had about how gracious God had been with them even as they endured the horrors of the camp...but they only found that grace...they only found that gratitude, when they put their face in the Word of God.

“Sometimes I would slip the Bible from its little sack with hands that shook, so mysterious had it become to me. It was new; it had just been written. I marveled sometimes that the ink was dry....I had read a thousand times the story of Jesus’ arrest — how soliders had slapped Him, laughed at Him, flogged Him. Now such happenings had faces and voices. Fridays— the recurrent humiliation of medical inspection. The hospital corridor in which we waited was unheated and a fall chill had settled into the walls. Still we were forbidden even to wrap ourselves in our own arms, but had to maintain our erect, hands-at-sides position as we filed slowly past [the] grinning guards. How there could have been any pleasure in the sight of these stick-thin legs and hunger-bloated stomachs I could not imagine. Surely there is no more wretched sight than the human body unloved and uncared for. But it was one of these mornings while we were waiting, shivering in the corridor, that yet another page in the Bible leapt into life for me. “He hung naked on the cross.” ... The apintings, the carved crucifixes showed at least a scrap of cloth. But this, I suddenly knew, was the respect and reverence of the artist. But oh— at the time itself, on that other Friday morning — there had been no reverence. No more than I saw in the faces around us now. “Betsie, they took His clothes, too.” Ahead of me I heard a little gasp from Betsie “Oh, Corrie. And I never thanked Him.”

If you want to find God when he seems absent...sure, you can look for the unconditional love and sacrifice of others...but people will always let you down. The greater gift is the gospel of Jesus...because if you believe it...wherever you go, whatever happens to you... you can be sure that you will always have the sacrificial love of God to put your mind on.

Remember the gospel, and you’ll walk in hope, even in the darkest of circumstances.

Forget it...and you’ll live in bitterness...even when God himself is standing right next to you.

Because of Jesus, you can be sure that “There is no pit, where God’s love is not deeper still.” When no one else can reach you...even when locked away in a concentration camp...He’ll find you.

...and because of Jesus, you can know that there is a God...and you don’t have to beg for HIS forgiveness...he freely gave it to you when he died on a cross.