Open—Wayne Coleman
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After 5.
First Thessalonians chapter 5 and verse 20.
Despise, not prophesying.
Also read it in the Darby translation.
Do not lightly esteem prophecies spray.
God our Father.
We've had much before us the leading of thy spirit.
We are now at another open meeting.
And Father, we ask that.
This meeting would be truly led by Thy spirit.
Will we acknowledge to thee that?
We have sat in open meetings on occasions.
We've not always felt the leading of thy spirit.
And father, perhaps it's because.
Let us know that we would not receive.
A word from thyself.
And so we would ask in a special way this afternoon.
That our hearts would be willing.
That we would be prepared to hear.
Thee speak to us through one or two or three.
Or Jesus, we want to hear thy voice.
We pray that we would.
We ask it in thy precious and most worthy name. Amen. Amen.
An expression that we just sang in this hymn.
That is very precious. I'd like to just read it again, verse 4.
What burning power?
In all thy words we feel.
When to our raptured hearts we hear thee tell the heavenly glories which thou knowest so well.
Well, sometimes we need to be recalled to those burning words.
Let's turn for a few moments to Luke chapter 24.
I wonder if where that's where that expression in this hymn comes from.
Luke, chapter 24.
I like to read from verse 13.
Behold, two of them went that same day to a village called Emmaus, which was from Jerusalem, about 3 score furlongs and they talked together.
Of all the things, these things which had happened, and it came to pass that when they communed together and reasoned, Jesus Himself drew near and went with them, But their eyes were holding, that they should not know Him. And he said unto them, What manner of communications are these, that she have one to another as she walk, and are sad?
And one of them, whose name was Cleopas answering, said unto him, Art thou only a stranger in Jerusalem, and hast not known the things which are come to pass therein these days? And he said unto them, What things?
And they said unto him, concerning Jesus of Nazareth, which was a prophet, mighty indeed, and word before God and all the people.
And how the chief priests and our rulers delivered him to be condemned to death and have crucified him.
But we trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel. And besides all this, today is the third day since these things were done. Yeah, and certain women of our company made us astonished, which were early at the sepulchre. And when they found not the body, they came saying they had also seen a vision of angels which said that he was alive.
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And certain of them which were with us went under the sepulchre, and found it Even so, as the woman had said, but him they saw not.
Then he said unto them, Oh fools, and slow of heart, to believe all that the prophets have spoken. Ought not Christ, or the Christ the Messiah, to have suffered these things, and to enter into his glory? And beginning at Moses, and all the prophets, he expounded unto them, and all the Scriptures, The thing is concerning himself.
And they drew nigh into the village, whether they went, and he made us, though he would have gone further.
But they constrained him, saying, Abide with us, for it's toward evening, and the day is far spent. And he went in to tarry with them. And it came to pass that he sat at meet with them. He took bread and blessed it, and break and gave unto them. And their eyes were opened, and they knew him. And he vanished out of our sight. And they said one to another.
Did not our heart burn within us?
While he talked with us, by the way, and while he opened unto us the scriptures.
And they rose up the same hour and returned to Jerusalem, and they found the 11 gathered together, and them that were with them, saying, the Lord is risen indeed, and so on.
This chapter is, I'm not going to comment on all of it. We don't have time. We could spend another hour or two on this chapter for a great profit. But I just like to point out a couple of things here.
We have.
This line has come up a number of times. There's been a number of comments that have we have expressed our sorrow over those that we have seen slip away.
We have expressed our own weakness and.
Lord, is it I am I? Next we wonder at the power.
That can draw Saints of God who have enjoyed.
Many precious things and and even taught them to be carried away and drifted in into things that they have once preached against.
These are things are very troubling to us. I believe in this chapter we have the reason for it and we have the solution. You know, it's not, it's not great to just point out the problems.
Without the solution, and I believe that this chapter gets right to the core of it and both in the problem and the solution. And that's really just what I had before me.
And particularly this point, as we have had in our hymn. What burning Power in all Thy words we feel, Hebrews, just for a moment. I'm not good at quoting things. I'm going to turn to it.
In Hebrews chapter 2, verse one. Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard, lest at any time we should let them slip, or more accurately, we should slip.
We need to live in the truth that we have heard and that we profess.
I believe that this is absolutely vital. What happened to this couple, probably a man and wife, was they had heard much about the Messiah they had, they had come to know and to trust in the Messiah, and they were looking for him to come and set up the Kingdom.
But they did not pay attention to the fact that the Messiah was destined to suffer.
And that there could not be blessing for them, except that He would go to the cross. He had told Him that He had told all of his disciples that they were selective in their hearing.
And I would like to suggest to your conscience and to mine many of our troubles come from selective hearing. We wish to hear what we wish to hear, and that's all we really hear.
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And so as they look at the meltdown.
Of things we go through this chapter and we find that in the first part of the chapter we have these dear women who went to the sepulchre and he wasn't there.
Why wasn't he there? Because he said he wasn't going to be there. They didn't get that. They weren't listening for that. And so in their devotion, it was misapplied. And so we find throughout this chapter, there's really a lot of this, and the Lord Jesus in his patience and love is correcting it here. And so we find that.
They are leaving the place of God's appointment. They're leaving Jerusalem.
And they're going away, they don't know where they're going, and it doesn't really matter.
Because they don't have him anymore.
And so it says that when the Lord Jesus himself drew near to them, and he listens to their conversation.
He says, well, what's the problem? Like what's what's going on? And the Lord may say to you or to me, what really is the problem?
We need to tell him and notice what he says to them or what they say to him, and this is very indicative of what was at the core of this.
In verse 18.
Are you out of touch?
With the real issues we're dealing with, have you ever said that to the Lord? Art thou only a stranger to us? Don't you know what we're going through these days? Don't you know how we suffer?
This is something that does come up in our hearts, doesn't it?
Now, it's been said that no, that these things shouldn't come up in the heart of a disciple, but they do.
Where do these things come from? They come from the enemy of our souls. Don't be deceived to think that these are legitimate feelings for a child of God.
There are so many things that pass in our minds and in our hearts these days that are just the enemy of our soul is launching at us and we live in a world that is all indexed by feelings. We're not based on facts anymore and truth and and divine realities is how I feel about it. And that's what we have in this chapter.
These dear Saints are expressing how they feel.
Satan had put a dart in there, and they took it up and entertained it.
And what it really was at the very core of it was you're out of touch. That's what they were really saying to the Lord. You're out of touch. Art thou only a stranger? And don't you know what's really going on? Verse 18.
About all these things. And so he says, well, what things in verse 19?
And so they expressed to him what their idea of him really was. It was a very faulty understanding of who he was. They had reduced him to a prophet. A prophet was really what he was.
And so verse 21.
They say to him, we trusted and he didn't come through.
Has anyone here ever felt that I trusted the Lord?
And he didn't come through.
I've been disappointed. I didn't think the Christian life would ever get this part. I didn't think that the testimony would ever get to this level. I didn't think that our assembly would get to only just a handful.
We trust him.
What are these These are?
Unrealistic expectations.
And this is what we have done.
In our feel good Christianity we have presented.
Unrealistic expectations and many persons.
Have got a faulty foundation based on that.
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We trusted that it had been He which should have redeemed Israel. And here notice this. This is really important. And besides all this, today is the third day since these things were done.
And they say, you know.
And this is the third day. There's something unique about that. We're not too sure what it was, but it's the third day. And this was what often happens when we have unrealistic expectations, when we're indexing to our feelings about things, about our feelings about the truth of God, we lose the realities the Lord had said to them. And after three days.
All rise from the dead and they're saying, you know, there's, it's the third day.
There's something about that. We're not too sure what that is. And so and then they go through the evidences.
And then he says to them in verse 25, Oh fools.
And slow to believe all that the prophets have spoken.
You know, they had been selective. They did not and were not prepared to accept that the Messiah could suffer. They wanted a salvation. They wanted a deliverance by a deliverer that would not have to suffer. It really is not addressing the same question. It's not getting to the root of man's trouble. And we've had that here in our gospel meetings so wonderfully brought out.
They were attempting to bypass that.
And so ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to have entered into his glory, and beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself. I believe that this is the cure right here. Are you disappointed? You may have a lot of reason to be disappointed.
Failure is everywhere, primarily internally, isn't it your own disappointment with your own progress?
Well, the fact is.
That the Lord Jesus has suffered to bring you into liberty. And maybe you've missed that point altogether.
Ought not Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into His glory? And so he goes back through the Scripture. This must have been an incredible meeting that they had with Him. Well, it was that they say that their hearts burned within them as He went through the Old Testament Scriptures and through those prophetic psalms. And he talked about His sufferings and he talked about His coming glory and so on. I would like.
Suggest to you.
That if you're discouraged and if you have a sense that your expectations of what the Christian path would be.
Has been unrealistic. You need to go to the cross. You need to go to the sufferings of Christ and make a study of the sufferings of the Lord Jesus Christ. Go through the New Testament and focus upon the sufferings of Christ, the atoning sufferings of Christ, his sympathetic sufferings of Christ. There's lots of helps that you can get that will direct your heart.
In ministry to the sufferings of the Lord, go back through the Psalms and look at the sufferings of Christ. It will change your perspective. We have this idea that if we are faithful, our lives are going to work out just fine, and when persecution and difficulty comes, we lose our way.
And so as we look at the Lord Jesus and we see him as the perfect servant, suffering untold rejection and dishonor and shame, it draws out our hearts and we're willing to go with him. And that's really what happens here. And so he begins to speak to them about about himself.
And his suffering. It was a balanced exposition.
They were unbalanced. They were picking and choosing what they wanted in the Scriptures. They were going to their favorite verse and they were not going and taking in all the Scriptures. And so in verse 29.
They constrained him abide with us, whereas toward evening and the day, as far as spending, he went in, and then as he broke bread with them, they must have seen his hands.
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I'm not sure really, but.
They got it.
Their eyes were opened, they knew him, and he vanished out of their sight. And so their hearts are burning with desire for him, and they find their way back and where they got up right away and they retraced their steps. You know, I don't think that we can obligate anyone to retrace their steps.
They are going to have to work this out.
At the foot of the cross, you know, we got saved there and we get away from the Lord and I believe that we have to go back there and we have to see Him suffering for us. He pulled out all the stops and suffered untold agony and suffering so that He could set us free. And we want to have this easy.
Life here that we can't handle any disappointments or we can't handle much, and I believe that we live in a bit of a bubble.
In these last couple 100 years, it's been uncommon to the Church of God and we're very weak and very feeble and we will get strength as we observe the suffering of the Lord Jesus Christ. So I believe that the the.
The remedy is to see him as the suffering one we had our brother bring before us with regards to Joseph.
Benjamin That's what broke them down.
They had, you know, everything was exposed in their hearts when they saw the innocent 1 Benjamin suffering. They knew it should have been them and it just broke them down. And I believe that as we occupy ourselves with a suffering Lord that it will really convert us. May the Lord help us.
I.
I.
Let's turn to a verse that we know well in Psalm 42.
I.
I.
Psalm 42.
And verse 7.
Deep calleth under deep at the noise of thy water spells all thy waves, and thy billows are gone over me.
I want to speak about something for a few minutes.
It's been on my heart for some time. The subject is love. I know some years ago Mr. Ironside wrote a little pamphlet called Holiness, the False and the True. I don't want to speak about that, but I do want to speak about love, which we've been speaking about, the false and the true. And this follows up somewhat with what Wayne was speaking about. We had lunch together and spoke about some of these things, but I came across a.
Little chart here on the Internet not too long ago that touched me. I just want to read parts of it. At least it speaks about on the one side of the chart the biblical Jesus and on the other side the postmodern Jesus.
We don't have time to go in much detail about what postmodernism is, but it comes down. We'll see as we go through this chart comes down partly to the idea that we live in a relativistic world.
There's no absolute truth. We make up our own truth. We live in the moment. It's all about me. Let me read through this because this is so predominant in the world, first of all. And then it invades Christendom, and then it invades the assemblies as well. The biblical Jesus. I'll read that side first. It says born as God.
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In the flesh, the postmodern Jesus.
Born as a man who was promoted to deity, Biblical Jesus again warns of sin, judgment and hell. The postmodern Jesus never says anything negative. Maybe that sounds familiar. The biblical Jesus commands repentance of sins.
The postmodern Jesus disregards repentance of sins.
Biblical Jesus gives you salvation, hope, peace and joy, while the other gives you health, wealth, and happy feelings.
Biblical Jesus is hated and despised by the world.
Postmodern Jesus is loved and accepted by the world.
The biblical Jesus hates sin and exposes the truth about sin.
The other condones sin and never corrects you or your sins.
The biblical Jesus commands with divine authority. The other gives suggestions instead of commandments. Biblical Jesus offends the world with the truth.
But the postmodern Jesus hates to offend you, loves political correctness.
The biblical Jesus brings division when necessary. The other promotes unity and tolerance at all costs.
The biblical Jesus preaches God's righteousness.
The other preaches only on love.
The biblical Jesus exalts God the Father's will. The other serves your will, not God's will. The biblical Jesus warns of false signs and wonders, magnifies God's word. The other exalts, signs, wonders, and mysticism above God's word. The biblical Jesus demands that emotion.
Experience and opinion.
Conformed to sound doctrine. The other exalts emotion, experience, and opinion above sound doctrine.
The biblical Jesus commands you to deny yourself and allow Christ to work in you.
The postmodern Jesus encourage you, encourages you to love yourself and gratify all your fleshly desires. And then the question at the end is, which Jesus do you follow? It's a good question for us, isn't it? We are affected by these principles that invade the world.
And invade Christendom. And I'm afraid that we've been affected by the false love.
Of covering things up and that's why I read this verse in Psalms. Sometimes we hear the expression unconditional love. Well if used properly that's fine, but it can be used improperly. And I believe what this verse means in Psalm 42 verse 7, deep calleth unto deep.
At the noise of thy water spouts, I believe the deep is the love of God, satisfying the demands of the holiness of God.
I know it's been applied to God satisfying the needs of man, and I don't object to that as an application, but I believe that the true interpretation is that love and holiness go together. God is light and God is love.
Deep calleth under deep at the noise of thy water spouts. What's that mean water spouts? Well, I think it means, as we sometimes say, the cross is the center of two eternities. It broke up the universal order, and it brought in and introduced a new order, and that's the order of which Christ.
Is the last Adam, and then we have all thy waves.
And thy billows are gone over me. Just what our brother Wayne was speaking about, the awful sufferings that our Lord passed through in order to inaugurate this new order, without which there could be no blessing for the broad creation. Thank God for it. Now I just like to take a couple minutes. We've spoken about the false love.
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And how we're susceptible to it. Scripture teaches didactically.
That is, one verse after another, the text Scripture teaches by example. It teaches by type. Let's turn back to the book of Ruth. And I have enjoyed for some time how we have an expression in the four chapters of Luke about the true love according to Scripture in Ruth.
Ruth, Chapter One.
Beautiful little book, as we well know. In fact, the very name Ruth means beauty. She is a spiritual beauty. She's a picture of one who takes God's side at all times. We can be a Ruth too. God would desire that. We would be a Ruth in our little corner. And so we have Ruth in chapter one. We spoke about Agape this morning.
That's very helpful. Agape, as we mentioned, is the love of devotion.
Commitment, not so much an emotion. We see that a little bit later. It's that which is unconditional in that sense. But of course it's always consistent with the holiness of God. And so we have Ruth speaking as we read in verse.
14 We know the story here.
Ruth and her husband went down into the land of Moab to escape the famine.
Maybe there's a famine in your little assembly.
They tried to escape it and all they found was death and finally.
Naomi returns or begins to return, and one of her daughter in laws, Orpha in verse 14, kisses her mother-in-law. But Ruth clave under her. And she said, Behold, thy sister-in-law has gone back under her people, and under unto her gods, return thou after thy sister-in-law. I suppose that was a test for dear Ruth.
And Ruth said, Entreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee.
For Withers outgoest I will go, and where thou logist I will lodge. Thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God. Where thou diest will I die, and there will I be buried. The Lord. That's the key, isn't it? The Lord had touched her heart.
The Lord do so to me, and more also if aught but death part thee and me. When she saw that she was steadfastly minded to go with her, she left, speaking under her. So they returned back to Bethlehem. Was it an easy thing to do? Ruth had left some time before.
And she comes back in many respects, broken. She says to call her Mara. That's where our name Mary comes from.
But she did repent and that was the beginning of blessing. I have a note in my Bible, it says that she returned to the place of blessing. That's good. Isn't it important for us to return to the place of blessing? But then let's read in chapter 2. You know, I love this chapter 2.
I think it's a beautiful illustration of what we have in the New Testament of the order of God's house. We have the different people that are involved. We have Naomi, who's an older sister. We can read in First Timothy and in Titus about the place of the older sisters in the assembly in the Christian community. We have Ruth, of course, who's the subject.
We have Boaz, who's a picture of the risen Lord Jesus, the one who's commanding everything.
We have the One, the servant to Boaz, who's over the reapers. He's a picture of the Spirit of God who carries out the will of Boaz, the exalted Savior. We have the reapers, a picture of those that are helping us to understand the scriptures as we've been speaking, that go out into the fields and service.
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We have the young men that draw water out of the wells.
Help us understand the scriptures as well. We have the maidens that were to be the companions of Ruth and so we have Phileo love here. Don't wait. This is the love of affection. And so once we've turned to the Lord and laid ourselves in consecration to the Lord to lead us into a place where there will be.
Companions that will be a help to us with them, that call on the Lord out of a pure heart.
So if the 1St chapter is the place of blessing, I have a note here in my Bible that says the 2nd chapter is the blessings of the place. It was a happy place, a happy community, the order of God's house. This is what God has prepared for us. And so they all work together. Well, we see that Ruth is diligent. We're thankful for that. We don't have time to go into details, of course, but look at the end of.
Chapter, if you would please, verse 20.
And Naomi said unto her daughter-in-law, Blessed be he of the Lord, who hath not left off his kindness of the living and to the dead. Naomi said unto her, The man is near of kin unto us, one of our next kinsmen. And Ruth the Moabitess said, He said unto me also, Thou shalt keep fast by my my young men, until they have ended all my harvest. Now watch your young people.
What the older sister counsels the younger sister? And Naomi said unto Ruth, her daughter-in-law. It is good, my daughter, that thou go out with his maidens, not his young men, that they meet thee not in any other field. So she obeyed. She kept fast by the maidens of Boaz that gleaned onto the end of barley harvest and of wheat harvest, and.
Her mother with her mother-in-law. Remember what it says in Revelation chapter 3 we see.
Bowing to the word of God here the Lord Jesus says as many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. That's not the postmodern Jesus, is it? There's not rebuke and chasing, but too often times it's we avoid conflict and allow people to go on in a pathway.
That's not help, not helpful or helpful, but here we have that balance.
First of all, Naomi repenting and coming back to the place of blessing. And then she corrects Ruth. Ruth naturally would have liked to follow the young men. She apparently was a young person, not too old yet a widow we know, but nonetheless an attractive young lady. She would have liked to have followed the young men. Not what Boaz said. And Ruth is corrected by Naomi. She said no, you follow the maidens. That's good advice, isn't it?
The order of God's house. So as many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. Be zealous therefore, and repent. We don't like that word so much today, do we? And I've seen others that the young people get in trouble.
The tendency is to cover it over and excuse it, and then the next tendency is that too often is Wayne was alluding to. They follow the young people out.
And it's not a happy path though. It's not the place of blessing. So she returns to the place of blessing. Chapter one. She gets the blessing of the place by submitting to the order of God's house. If you notice, we didn't talk about it, but in First Corinthians where we read in the the House of God is the main subject up to the middle of chapter 10.
And then the Lord's Table is taken up.
In the middle of chapter 10 and then in the 11Th chapter, the Lord's Supper is taken up, but there's something in between and it speaks of the subjection of the sisters. I so well remember our brother Albert Hales speaking about that. Such a help to me. He says the secret to maintaining the Lord's Supper and the Lord's Table in its proper place.
Is subjection.
Otherwise, it seems like this thing about the head coverings is out of place. But what's the point? The only way to be maintained in the path of blessing is subjection and obedience. Naturally we don't like that, but that's the path of blessing. You know, when we get home.
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There won't be any differences between male and female. The lessons learned will be lessons we'll have for all eternity. But at the present time there are distinctions that God makes and their distinctions for His glory and for our blessing. So we have the blessings of the place. And then in chapter 3 we have something else.
Something also that our brother Wayne alluded to. The blessings are a nice thing.
We've been speaking about many of the blessings, but look what Ruth said. At least, Naomi says in Chapter 3.
When Naomi, her mother-in-law said unto her, My daughter, shall I not seek rest for thee, that it may be well with thee? And now is not Boaz our kindred, with whom maiden, with with whose maidens was? Behold, he went with barley tonight in the threshing floor. Wash thyself therefore, and anoint thee, and put thy raiment upon thee, and get thee down to the floor. But make not thyself known unto the man until he have done eating and drinking in it shall be.
When he lieth down with thou, shalt mark the place where he shall lie, and thou shalt go in and uncover his feet, and lay thee down, and he will tell thee what thou shalt do. And she said unto her, All that thou sayest unto me I will do.
I think what we have here is not simply the place of blessing as we had in chapter one, not simply the blessings of the place of our position and as we have in chapter 2, but we have the blesser himself. This is the real secret of Christianity, isn't it? Not simply.
To seek what the Lord has to give, but to learn to walk in communion with the Lord Jesus himself.
Remember when I was first married, somebody handed me a book by a physician who is also a marriage counselor. I don't read a lot of that kind of thing, but that book was helpful to me. And this marriage counselor brought out four terms that are used for love. The first, of course, was agape, and he said many people missed that. He said, people come into my office, like Bob was saying the other day, and they say I'm not in love with my spouse anymore.
And he explained the truth of agape, that it's a love of commitment. It's not an emotion. The emotion will come if there's the right commitment. And and then thirdly, he said there's the word in the Old Testament, ahava, and that embraces something a little differently. It's a general word, but another thing it embraces is romantic love.
And in a sense, that's what we have here. Who can read this book of Song of Solomon?
And not see that there's romantic love there, the attraction in that case between a remarkable man and a unremarkable woman, we might say. But the Lord has drawn us after him with those cords. And this is the real secret of Christianity, is it not? Let's just hold her finger there. And our time is short. But let's turn to Philippians again.
We don't need a risk list of laws and rules like we've been saying, but the secret spring for the Christian.
The true love is the secret spring, and this is what we have, for instance, in second in the Philippians chapter 3. Notice what the Apostle Paul says in verse 7.
But what things were gained to me? Those I counted lost for Christ? That was past tense, wasn't it? Perhaps when he was a young man he made a great decision, and now he comes into the present, years later.
Yeah, doubtless, and I count present tense all things but loss for the Excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but done that I may win Christ and be found in Him.
Not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Jesus Christ, The righteousness which is of God by faith, that I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable under his death, by any means I might attain under the resurrection of or from among the dead.
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Not as though I had already attained either, were already made perfect.
But I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus. It's that love that draws us, and the more we learn of Him, the more we realize that everything else in the world is but done compared to the Excellency that's in Christ Jesus.
Our Lord. And so in this chapter we have that side of a hava, I think.
First, the place of blessing. Second, the blessings of the place. Thirdly, the blesser himself. A wonderful truth that is the great secret of Christianity, to walk in the Lord's presence. And it's interesting.
To that, she finds out we don't have time to read through it, but she finds out when he wakes up. Not only does she desire to have him as as as her companion.
But He desires to have her as His companion. The more we learn, the more we walk in the Lord's presence. We find how much He loves us and cares for us and wants to walk us, to walk and His company and grow in His presence. Blessed be His name. That right, Matt? He likes to say that.
Blessed be his name. Now we have chapter 4.
Blame is just about gone. I like this chapter. I think we get something else turned if you would just put your finger here and turn over to Romans chapter 12.
We have a word that's used only once in scripture as I understand.
But it brings an interesting perspective to this theme of love, the subject of love.
Romans chapter 12 and verse 10.
Be kindly affection 1 to another with brotherly love. Well, that brotherly love is phileo, that emotion, that love of friendship between 1:00 and another believer. But what's that word kindly affection mean? Well, this man who wrote this book that was given to me some years ago.
He said it's the love of belonging. It's Stargate is the Greek word, or at least it's the word that's based on.
That word be kindly affection, he said. It's like an old shoe. I remember my parents passed away here several years back.
And they had lived in that house for, if I remember, some 40 years, and my brother told me about going to that house one day when the other people had moved into it. It had been sold, said, you know, it seemed awfully strange. I had to knock on the door. Never happened before.
He used to just walk in that store gate. It's the love of belonging. That's a wonderful thing, stability and the love of belonging. The Lord Jesus loves us. He wants us to walk in his presence to get the great blessing, but He also wants us to be a blessing. I think that's what we have in this chapter.
Ruth now becomes a blessing. She almost disappears. Really.
But she becomes a blessing. Let's just look at the end here.
In verse.
Verse 15 of Ruth chapter 4 and verse 15 And he said under under the And he shall be under thee, Speaking of of the child that would be born. He shall be under thee a restorer of thy life, and a nourisher of thy old age for thy daughter-in-law.
Which loveth thee, Which is better to thee than seven sons hath borne him. This is what the woman said to Naomi. One mark of a mature Christian is joy.
It's a sad thing to see a Christian come to the end of his life and not to be able to finish his course with joy. And that be our prayer that we would be able to finish our course with joy. We know of some that it's not true. It's a sad thing. But the Lord wants us, his mature believers, to be joyful believers and He will give us that joy.
If we keep close to him now look at this also.
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Verse 16 And Naomi took the child, and laid it in her bosom.
And became a nurse unto it. And the woman, her neighbors gave it a name, saying there is a son born to Naomi. And they called his name Obed. What's Obed mean? Means worshipper. So not only is the Christian pathway when walked in the Lord's presence a joyful path, it's also a pathway of worship.
The Lord deserves that worship. It's the overflow of the heart to the one who loves us.
Has given himself for us. And then finally I wanted to read verse 17. He is the father of Jesse, the father of David. What's Jesse mean means gift. There's service involved too. Service. So there we have joy, we have worship and we have service.
We think together.