Have you ever read parts of the Bible that record Miracles, and wished you could see one today?
Or, perhaps, you are thinking "I need a miracle!'
Do you think God is still in the business of doing miracles today?
If one looks around the world, and hears the many accounts from the mission field,
you will discover that the answer : "MUST BE YES."
What about you? At times we could all use a miracle?
Well miracles still happen. At times we all feel drained, depleted of every natural and normal resource, and a miracle is our only hope. Miracles are happening every day!
The problem is, we think of miracles as being major, earth shattering- events....... as feeding of a multitude, or parting of a major body of water. But not all miracles are on that scale.... and they happen every day.
God has miracles that are yet untapped.... unnoticed..... and unexperienced, just because we don't have the eyes of faith to see.
A man and his dog were walking on the beach when they came upon another visitor to the beach.
The owner of the dog was proud of his dog's newly mastered feat, so he said to the visitor, " Watch this!" Whereupon he tossed a piece of driftwood far out into the sea and the dog immediately ran on top of the ocean, fetched the wood, and ran back. The other man shook his head in disbelief.
The owner repeated the procedure twice. Finally he asked the visitor, " Did you notice anything unusual?" The man responded matter-of- factly: " Your dog can't swim, can he?"
We must have eyes of faith in times of tension and stress, that God wants to do miracles in our lives, especially in times of stress and tension, by His power. One of the best ways to be reminded of that is through the biblical accounts of God's working in people's life.
Paul wrote in Romans 15:4, " For whatever things were written before were written for our learning.
" For whatever things were written for our learning, that we through the patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope."
We see in the life of Ruth how God can miraculously turn "Tension" into triumph.
The book of Ruth is the story of a person who- in a short period of time had more stress than most will experienced in a lifetime, but she ended up experiencing a miracle.
One day a Jewish family moved to Moab in order to escape the drought in Israel. The two Sons married Moabite women, even though that was discouraged. One of the women was Ruth.
Life seemed to be going along pretty well for Ruth, then suddenly disaster struck. Both her brother-in-law and husband died.
What do you do when life seems to be crumbling around you?
Ruth was now a widow with no means of support.....
and her widow mother-in-law was going back to her people in Israel.
Naomi told Ruth that she was free to try to make a life for herself in her own country of Moab.
What could she do?
She could try to remarry, but sometimes individuals hold a dim view of those who marry "foreigners."
And besides, when Ruth became part of Naomi's family, she witnessed what it was like to serve God and not a bunch of Idols.
So she chose to leave her homeland, her birth family, her friends from child hood, and Go to a strange country with only one person she knew.
And Naomi, Ruth's mother-in-law, was not pleasant to be around. because of her own grief.
It was a time of real tension.......& the tension didn't ease when they arrived in Bethlehem.
Certainly Naomi was back home, but she and Ruth had no money, no food, no resources... and the fact that Naomi - a jew- had a Moabite daughter-in- law probably didn't help. But out of that tension,
God brought a miracle into Ruth's life....... just as He can ours.
RUTH'S miracle:
It we skip over to the end of the book, we see that.... Boaz a relative of Naomi's.... became Ruth's husband after he " just happened" to notice her gleaning in the fields.
They had a son, whom they called Obed, Obed had a son, whom he called Jesse. Of Jesse's sons, the youngest was David.
And of course, David became the greatest king of Israel and was in the lineage of Jesus.
Ruth is only one of two women listed in the NT genealogy of Jesus.
It was a miracle, and it wouldn't have happened if Ruth had not gone through the tough & tense times.
William Jennings Bryan wrote this about miracles: " Some skeptics say, " I can't accept miracles"
One may drop a brown seed in the black soil and up comes a green shoot.
You let it grow and by and by you pull up its root and find it's red. You cut the root and it has a white heart.
Can anyone tell how this comes about- how brown cast into black results in green and then red and white? Yet you eat your radish without troubling your mind over miracles.
Men are not distressed by miracles in the dining room-- they reserve them all for religion.
RUTH'S means.
We need to learn something else from this story.
Many other people in the Bible went through hard times, and they don't see a miracle.
What made Ruth different? Why did her tense times result in a miracle?
FIRST, she made a commitment to God that was stronger than her commitment to her birth family..... to her childhood friends ..... and to her country.
When Naomi told her not to ask her to go, and said, "For wherever you go, I will go, and wherever you lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God." (Ruth 1:16)
Ruth's commitment to the living God was the first step.
The "second thing" that she did was to keep on doing the daily things that were necessary.
She could have sat around and felt sorry for herself, for that was the model that she had in Naomi, but instead she went out into the fields to follow after the harvest hands, picking up leftover kernels of grain.
It was menial work and a lonely task, but it had to be done, and she did it; and that help her to keep her focus.
Winston Churchill, "Prime minister of Great Britain, had a political career that was full of ups and downs. Three times it seemed his life in service to his country was over; three times he bounced back.
His last public speaking engagement was a commencement at a university. Churchill needed help to walk to the podium, and when he finally got there, he held on to the lectern and stood silent for what seemed like an eternity.
Finally he raised his head and said: " Never give up. Never give up. Never give give up."
That was all!
Churchill walked slowly to his seat and sat down amidst total silence. Suddenly the audience erupted in great applause; what more did they need? Here was a man who lived what he preached!
Ruth never gave up,
The third aspect of turning a mishap into a miracle was out of Ruth'e control.
She had what was called a "kinsman-redeemer."
Property in the land belonged to her father-in-law's family, and since there were no male heirs left in that line, the closest relative had the opportunity to assume ownership of the property.
However, according to the Israelite law of the time, if a man married and died before he had children, the closest male relative could take the widow as his wife.
When Ruth & her situation came to the attention of Boaz, he was second in line for her husbands property. He went to the first in line and gave him the opportunity to expand his land holding,
But he didn't want the obligation of taking Ruth as wife.
So he released Ruth to Boaz, the one next in line. Now you may be thinking: That was a nice story about Ruth, but what does that have to do with us today? Many people today are in the midst of stress and tension and they can use a miracle, and like Ruth, they have a redeemer, his name is Jesus Christ, but for some reason they don't go to him? Ruth received her miracle because she had a commitment to God, because she continued on doing what God wanted her to do, and because she had a kinsman-redeemer. How do we appropriate a miracle in our life and make stress work for us?
The first thing to do is pray..... not a whiny, why me, type of prayer. It should be a prayer of faith, a prayer of commitment, a prayer that reflects a belief that we have a big God.... One who is able to work miracles in the midst of the stress and tension of life. Turn over the situation, and leave it in His hands. Romans 8:28 tell us that God: " God causes all things [ that includes whatever tension you are going through] to work together for good to those who love God, those who are called according to his purpose.']. In verse 29 we hear God's purpose for you and me? For whom he did know, he also predestinate to conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren, and see what God's purpose in having to be molded into the image of Jesus Christ.
And what is that? First consider the "Fruit of the Spirit" in Galatians 5:22-23. When we choose to look to see God at work, especially in us and our attitude, then we begin to see his miracles.
As we learned from our study of Ruth, we should be faithful and persevere in doing the little day-by day tasks to which God called us.
During a Monday night football game between the Chicago and the New York Giants, one of the announcers observed that Walter Payton, the bears running back, had accumulated over nine miles in a career rushing yardage. The other announcer added: " and that's with someone knocking him down every 4.6 yards!
When we persevere....when we keep going.... that's when we begin to experience God's miracles.
some of the greatest miracles take place when we are going through times of stress.
So remember Ruth and gain hope, hope to hold. Pray with wisdom and persevere in the practice of obeying God in daily things of life. [ And watch out, for a miracle is on the way, that will bring "Glory to God!"] Amen!
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