You Can't Run Away From
Problems
By Warren W. Wiersbe
(Ruth 1:1-5)
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| The First Edition Cover Page |
Two
mighty forces are at work in the world today. One force is pulling everything
apart, while the other force is seeking to put things back together again. Sin
is the destroyer, but Jesus Christ is the builder.
So many people need to put their lives
together today! Their lives and homes are being pulled apart, and their jobs
are in jeopardy. For these people, everything seems to be crashing down around
them. They are falling apart physically, mentally, socially, financially and,
most of all, spiritually. In the Old Testament book of Ruth, we have a vivid
account of two widows—one young and the other old—who were able to put their
lives together and find happiness and fulfillment in the will of God.
In
chapter 1 of Ruth, everything is falling apart. Naomi and her family made some
mistakes. People today are making these same mistakes. Let me survey the first
chapter for you, and then we will look at the first mistake that Naomi and her
family made and the reasons behind it.
Ruth
1:1-5 reveals the family's first mistake. They
were trying to run away from their problems. Bethlehem-Judah was
experiencing a famine. Naomi, her husband and two sons packed up and went to
Moab to avoid the famine and other problems. But in Moab they only found more
problems!
The
second mistake that Naomi made was trying
to cover up her disobedience (vv. 6-18). She tried to send her two
daughters-in-law back home so they would not come to Bethlehem with her and be
evidence that she had disobeyed God. First, she ran away from her problems, and
then she tried to cover her sins and hide them.
The
third mistake that Naomi made is found in verses 19 through 22. She became
bitter against God. Ruth went back to Bethlehem with Naomi, but Naomi was a
bitter woman. The name "Naomi" means "pleasant," but she
was not at all pleasant! She said, "Call me not Naomi, call me Mara; for
the Almighty hath dealt very bitterly with me" (v. 20). The name
"Mara" means "bitter." It comes from the same word as
myrrh, the bitter perfume that was used for embalming.
If
you want to destroy your life, then make these same three mistakes: try to run
away from your problems, try to cover up your disobedience, and become bitter
against God. I guarantee that if you will take these three steps, your life
will begin to fall apart.
"Now
it came to pass in the days when the judges ruled, that there was a famine in
the land. And a certain man of Bethlehem-Judah went to sojourn in the country
of Moab, he, and his wife, and his two sons. And the name of the man was
Elimelech, and the name of his wife, Naomi, and the name of his two sons,
Mahlon and Chilion, Ephrathites of Bethlehem-Judah. And they came into the
country of Moab, and continued there. And Elimelech, Naomi's husband, died; and
she was left, and her two sons. And they took themselves wives of the women of
Moab; the name of the one was Orpah, and the name of the other, Ruth; and they
dwelt there about ten years. Arid Mahlon and Chilion died also, both of them;
and the woman was bereft of her two sons and her husband" (vv. 1-5).
The
scene is now set. A famine has come upon the people of Israel. Instead of
trusting God to provide, this family chooses to pack up and go to Moab. They
decide to run away from their problems rather than facing them.
Why
do people try to run away from their problems? Let me suggest several possible
reasons.
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| Indian Edition Cover Page |
Living by Sight—Not by Faith
One
reason why this family ran from their problems is because they were living by sight and not by faith. In comparing their life
in Bethlehem with life in Moab, they made the mistake of only looking at the
situation from a human point of view. When they looked at Bethlehem, they only
saw hunger and pain, while Moab appeared to be the land of plenty.
From
God's point of view, their decision was wrong. Moab was a heathen land, and the
Moabites worshiped false gods. They were the enemies of God and of Israel. God
had said in Deuteronomy 23:3, "An Ammonite or Moabite shall not enter into
the congregation of the Lord; even to their tenth generation shall they not
enter into the congregation of the Lord forever."
The
Ammonites and the Moabites were the descendants of Lot as the result of an act
of incest (see Gen. 19:30-38). When Lot was delivered from Sodom, he and his
daughters lived in a cave. His daughters made him drunk and then committed
incest with him. The sons born to these women became the fathers of the nations
of Ammon and Moab, and these nations became the enemies of the people of God.
From God's point of view, Elimelech and his family were leaving home and going
to reside with, and depend on, the enemy.
The
name "Bethlehem" means "house of bread." Judah can be
translated "praise," while Ephratah means "fruitful."
Bethlehem was called Bethlehem-Ephratah. As this family looked at the
"fruitful house of bread," they could only see famine and barrenness.
The sound of complaining filled the land of "praise." Elimelech said
to Naomi, "The wisest thing we can do is leave." If you are living by
sight and not by faith, difficult situations look hopeless to you. Running away
seems like the best solution.
Why
didn't they just trust God? God had made it very clear in His Law that if His
people obeyed Him, He would bless them. We are told in Deuteronomy 28 that
famines were a discipline from God. God promised to send the harvest, the rain
and the sunshine—all that was needed—if His people would obey Him. Instead of
running away, the people should have run to God, bowed down, confessed their
sin and asked for His forgiveness.
When
you start living by sight and not by faith, then you will start running away
from your problems and sins instead of trusting. God to help you overcome them.
You will try to find an easy way out of a difficult situation.
Living for the Physical—Not the Spiritual
A
second reason why people run away from their problems is because they are living for the physical and not for
the spiritual. Some people may argue, "Well, these people had to
live!" I would rather be hungry in the will of God than full and satisfied
out of the will of God.
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The
first temptation that Satan presented to the Lord Jesus was a choice between
the physical and the spiritual. Our Lord had just spent 40, days fasting in the
wilderness, and He was hungry. Satan said to Him, in effect, "Since you are
hungry, turn these stones into bread." If the Father in heaven would have
said to His Son, "Turn the stones into bread," Jesus would have done
it. But the Father had not given Him that commandment. Jesus answered,
"Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out
of the mouth of God" (Matt. 4:4). Jesus did not succumb to the temptation
to put His needs before the will of God.
I've
often heard people say, "Well, a person has to live." While it is
true that we must live in the will of God, it is not true that we must live—no
matter what the cost. It is far better for us to be poor and hungry in the will
of God than to have all the comforts of life apart from the will of God.
This
was the mistake that Esau made. He despised his God-given birthright. Esau had
been out in the field hunting and came home famished. Jacob was making some
delicious stew, and Esau sold his birthright for a bowl of it. He put his
physical desires before God's plan for his life.
When
you begin putting the physical ahead of the spiritual, you start living to
please yourself. You begin to think that the most important thing in life is to
be comfortable, not to be conformable to the will of God. What if our Lord
Jesus Christ had put the physical ahead of the spiritual? What if He had been
more concerned about His own comfort and pleasure than about doing the will of
God? Where would we be today?
Living for the World—Not the Lord
A
third reason why people make the mistake of running from their problems is
because they are living for the world and
not for the Lord. The Word of God says, "Now it came to pass in the
days when the judges ruled" (Ruth 1:1). We have already discovered that
the Book of Judges is the book of "no king." At least four times in
the Book of Judges we read: "There was no king in Israel" (17:6;
18:1; 19:1; 21:25). Twice we read: "In those days there was no king in
Israel; every man did that which was right in his own eyes" (21:25; see
also 17:6). Naomi and her family were living in an era of anarchy. The popular
argument was "Everyone is doing it! Why shouldn't we?" But: the fact
was that everyone was not doing it! Boaz did not go to Moab. He stayed where he
was, and God later used him to rescue Naomi and Ruth.
When
the situation became difficult in Bethlehem, Naomi and her family made three
wrong decisions: (1) they decided to leave Bethlehem; (2) they decided to go to
Moab; and (3) after Elimelech died, Naomi allowed her two sons to marry women
from Moab. In Ezra 9:1 and Nehemiah 13:1 you find both Ezra and Nehemiah
protesting against the Jews who had married women outside the nation of Israel.
The
problem today is that people are conforming to the world with its rebellious
atmosphere and attitudes. When you start running away from your problems, you
are living for the world and not for the Lord. Your excuse becomes
"Everybody is doing it!" And you start doing what is right in your
own eyes.
Ignoring the Source of the Problem
A fourth reason why people run from their
problems is that they ignore the real
source of their problem—their own heart. When Naomi, Elimelech and their
two sons went to Moab, they took their
problem with them. What was their problem? The spiritual deterioration in
their hearts. They were the problem. They were proud because they believed they
could manipulate and manage their own lives and do a better job of it than God
was doing.
The
source of every problem is inside, not
out-side. The heart of every problem is the problem in the heart. We blame
circumstances, and we even blame God. But when you reach the root of the
problem, we are the ones who are to blame. We doubt God and disobey His Word.
We put the world and the flesh ahead of the will of God. We think we can run
away. But the Word of God makes it clear that when you run away, you take your
sinful heart right along with you. That's why you can't run away; that's why
running away only causes the problems to increase. You may be in a new location
and have a new situation, but you still have the same old heart. You will
repeat the same old mistakes. Ralph Waldo Emerson used to say that a change in
geography will never overcome a flaw in character.
Naomi
and her family traveled the 50 miles from Bethlehem to Moab, and it was a trip
that took them out of the will of God. They planned to sojourn in Moab just for
a while, but they tarried there for ten years. Everything fell apart. The
fruitful fields of Moab became a cemetery for Naomi's husband and her two sons.
Instead of having hope, Naomi became hopeless. God had to discipline this
family to bring Naomi back where she belonged. It never pays to rebel against
God.
Unfortunately,
Naomi still had not learned her lesson. We will see that she made another
mistake. She tried to cover up her sins and blame other people. Hebrews 12:11
says, "No chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous;
nevertheless, afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto
them who are exercised by it." Naomi had to learn to surrender to the
discipline of God and stop running away.
(An adaptation from the book "Put Your Life Together -Studies in the Book of Ruth.)
Source: Back to the Bible Intl.
Confident Living Magazine, Secunderabad.
Copyright:: Back to the Bible (1985)
