PENTECOST 8
July
12-14, 2025
Pastor
Timothy J. Spaude
Text:
Ruth 1:1-19a
“LOYAL LOVE”
1.
Received
2.
Reflected
3.
Rewarded
CHESED. It’s a Hebrew word. Say it with
me. CHESED. In your Bibles it gets translated many different ways. Love.
Kindness. Faithfulness. Mercy. Lovingkindness. Faithful love. The reason for
this is the simple Hebrew word has much more meaning to it than just one
American English word can communicate. And the reason it is so hard is because
it first and foremost is the word used to describe God’s love for people. That
love is so far above what you and I can legitimately and consistently show to
other people. It’s not Toyota love, based off of their old commercials, “I love
what you do for me.” That is a reasonable type of love that flows from sinful
people and is really selfishness. I’ll love you as long as you are doing what
pleases me. It’s not the butterfly feeling that attracts guys to girls and
girls to guys so they describe themselves as being in love. It’s God’s kind of
love. It shows in His commitment to people even though they disobey Him, let
Him down, think of Him last and themselves first. God’s love gives. It gives
what people need. It’s an unconditional love and that’s what makes it so hard
for people to emulate. Hard. But not impossible. So my best rendition of CHESED
is loyal love. A commitment to a person and their needs that you keep doing
because you are loyal and faithful and that they will see as kindness or mercy.
All of the words of God that we have listened to so far pointed us to this
love. The Good Samaritan. Seriously. Who does that? That is clearly a picture
of our God’s love. The reading from Galatians highlighted the sinful
nature/Holy Spirit battles we all know too well. Do I use my free forgiveness
to build relationships on my selfishness or God’s kind of love? Then the
reading from Ruth. It did not hide the hurt that God allows His people to deal
with or the difficulties they may face in relationships. More importantly, it shows
God’s people can show loyal love.
The book of Ruth starts out with trouble
for and by God’s people. There was a famine. No food. A man named Elimelech took
his wife Naomi and sons, Mahlon and Killion to Moab. Bad choice. God had told
His people to avoid the idol worshipping neighbors. More trouble. Naomi’s
husband Elimelech died. Now her two sons would need to provide for her. But
they married Moabite women, again, forbidden by God because idol worshipping
wives generally led to idol worshipping Israelites. More trouble. Both sons
die. Big trouble. Back then property and means of income generally was attached
to the husbands and son. Widows who did not have sons to inherit or support
then were at great risk, most likely destined to be beggars.
But in all of this, God’s loyal love was
at work! Naomi was a recipient of God’s loyal love. A famine was something God
regularly used to call His Old Testament people to repentance when they
strayed. Loyal love. Naomi and her husband had disobeyed God and put the entire
family’s faith at risk by moving out of the Promised Land and intermarrying
with Moabites. But God did not treat her as her sins deserved, instead He
preserved her and worked in her life to get her back home. Loyal love.
And then Naomi reflected that loyal love.
Back then she had every legal right to make her son’s widows stay with her and
support her. Just the way it was back then. But Naomi does not do that.”
But Naomi said to her two
daughters-in-law, “Go back. Both of you return to your mother’s house. May the
Lord show you kindness as you have shown kindness to the dead and to me. 9May
the Lord grant that each of you finds security in the house of a husband.” Loyal love. The daughters in law want to
stick with Naomi. But Naomi thought of the needs of her daughters in law. The
most likely outcome if these women went with Naomi would be they would be
beggars supporting Naomi until they died and no self respecting Jewish man
would want to marry them. So Naomi set them free. As a recipient of God’s loyal
love Naomi reflected loyal love.
One daughter in
law, Orpah, with tears agreed. The other named Ruth did not. “But Ruth said,
“Do not urge me to abandon you or to turn back from following you. Because
wherever you go, I will go, and wherever you make your home, I will make my
home. Your people will be my people, and your God will be my God. 17Wherever
you die, I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord punish me
severely and double it if anything but death separates me from you.” Ruth,
a recipient of loyal love reflected it herself. But did you notice whose loyal
love Ruth had received? Naomi’s yes, but also the Lord’s! God had used the
sinful decision of moving out of Israel and marrying non Israelite women for
the good. Ruth knows and believes in the Savior God, the God of loyal love.
I think we’re
starting to see how this works. Those who receive God’s loyal love reflect that
to others. You and I are recipients of God’s loyal love. Think back in your
life. Have you made any bad choices that put your faith in Christ at risk? Any
times you can think of where you trusted in yourself with all your heart and
leaned not on God’s understanding instead of they way it’s supposed to be?
Think of how we can easily think of worship as something we have to do, a
chore. What slap in God’s face! But how does He respond? Loyal love. Knowing
full well what you and I would do with His grace God gave Jesus anyway. Each
day His mercy is new, He keeps forgiving, keeps providing, keeps preserving,
keeps working all things for good. We are recipients of CHESED, God’s loyal
love.
That enables us
to reflect it to others. And we won’t have to look hard for these
opportunities. God will place them before us. Every relationship you have with
other people is an opportunity to show loyal love, love that seeks to give to
the needs of others. It may not be as dramatic as putting your future means of
support at risk like Naomi did or leaving everyone and everything you know
behind like Ruth did, but you will have opportunities to meet the needs of
other people God places in your life. Probably the hardest ones are the closest
relationships. The closer the relationship the more it hurts when we sin
against each other and let each other down. And when we are hurting it is hard
to show loyal love. Hard, but not impossible. God takes care of that.
I don’t know if
you realized it or not but when God tells you to do something hard He gives you
what you need to do it. One of the ways He helps us is to bless our efforts. I
use the word reward but you need to understand it. A reward is something someone
gives you for doing what you should do anyway. It highlights the generosity of
the giver, not the action of the recipient. So for instance, if your dog runs
away, I find it and return it to you I have done nothing special. It is what
every person should do. If you give me a reward for that, you are special. God
is special and He rewards loyal love. Just look at Naomi and Ruth. “When
Naomi saw that Ruth was determined to go with her, she stopped urging her. 19Then
the two of them traveled until they arrived at Bethlehem.”
Bethlehem. Know
anything about that little town? You’re right. It’s where Jesus was born. If
you read the rest of the book of Ruth you will find out that God rewarded these
ladies’ loyal love by placing them into the ancestry of our Savior Jesus. They
are both grandma greats to Jesus! Now obviously since Jesus has already been
born, none of us are going to get that honor. But we can set aside our fears
that we will be taken advantage of, used or not appreciated when we strive to
show loyal love. God will bless it!
Just as He has
done your whole life, showing you CHESED, a love so loyal that it takes half
the dictionary to describe. You have it. Reflect it. And God will take care of
the reward. Amen.
