Date: September 16, 2018
Title: "Offering Our Messes to God"
Dr. Jonathan Dent

Most of us as Christians, know the unwritten rule that we are to give our strengths, our gifts, our beauty or
attractiveness, our accomplishments, and our reputations to the LORD.  But then what do we do with our losses,
our faults, our sins, our addictions, our ugliness or repulsiveness, and our bad choices?  Psychologists often use
a scale (The Holmes and Rahe Stress Scale being one of these) with what they call stress points, to give a numerical
value to life events.  Note that these are numbers assigned to adults.

Death of a spouse= 100
Divorce= 73
Marital separation= 65
Imprisonment= 63
Death of a close family member= 63
Personal injury/illness= 53
Marriage= 50
Dismissal from work= 47
Marital reconciliation= 45
Retirement= 45
Change in health for a family member= 44
Pregnancy= 40
Gain a new family member= 39
Business readjustment= 39
Change in financial state 38
Mortgage= 32
Foreclosure= 30
Child leaving home= 29
Trouble with in laws= 29
Beginning/ending school= 26
Change in church activities= 19
Change in sleeping habits= 16
Vacation= 13
Major holiday= 12
Major violation of the law= 11

These stress points are meant to give perspective to our lives, and to inform us who are susceptible to illness of
various kinds.  They normalize many things that many of us go through. They give us breathing space to say,
before God, and in the depths of who we are:  “I’m going to make it. It’s going to be okay, even when everything
else screams the opposite.”

I’m simply here to say:  God has your number.  He knows what you are going through, what I am going through.  God knows
what we are going through as a church and as individuals and wants to address the losses in our lives.

Let’s turn to the book of Ruth to hear God speak.  Let us hear the Lord speaking in his Word to a woman desiring to
follow God and making sense out of her life.  Please note where we are in the Bible.

Now when I say, “Please note where we are in the Bible,” I believe it is serious, and I don’t assume your bible
knowledge and understanding.  I have a one-minute summary of the whole of the Bible, but I’ll leave that for another
time.  Let me give you the twenty second version of where we are in the Bible, in the book of Ruth.  Start now.  

There are ten sections in the canon or organization of the Scriptures.  Five Old Covenant sections where God begins
to meet humanity through a certain family and a certain people called Israel.  Then the New Covenant (Testament) is
where God meets everyone through Jesus Christ.  We are in the OT, the second section, the third book of the Historical
books, in the times of the Judges.  (22 seconds) How do we know that?  The book of Ruth tells us, kindly, in the first
chapter, first verse.  Do you know there’s only two Bible books with women’s names in the titles?  There is Ruth and
 _________ ? (Esther)

What do we know about Ruth?  She lived in the time of the judges, and if you read the book of Judges, you will note
the last phrase “it was a time when everyone did what was right in their own eyes.” (Judges 21:25)  Sound familiar?
Sounds like today, doesn’t it?  And relationship to God was low on the priority list. (also sounds like today)
Relationship to God was a low priority unless the neighboring countries began to militarily invade and make life
miserable.  Then they would pray.  Then God would lift up a leader, often quite flawed (think Sampson, not the Sunday
school version) and they found relief for a season, after they followed God’s leader.

Now in Ruth, we are introduced to Ruth’s family.  We find Ruth’s husband Elimelech (1:2) wanting to leave Bethlehem,
because of a famine there (1:1).  The irony is that the name Bethlehem means “house of bread.”  He goes east with his
family over the Jordan River to Moab, which is today is the modern state of Jordan.  They find food there.  The Scripture
doesn’t tell us much about Elimelech, except his name, meaning “My God is King,” and that he is of the family of 
Judah (1:2), the Ephrathites, you know that strange word we read every Christmas from Micah 5, but you Bethlehem
Ephrathah, are the one from whom the Messiah will come. We don’t know much about Elimelech, if he was following the
LORD at that point in his life or not.  We do know he loved his family, his wife and two sons enough to move and find
food for them. So the family leaves Israel and goes to Moab.  And all of a sudden, Elimelech dies. (1:3) Now let that
sink in.

Moving is hard enough.  We know.   We’ve rented eight times and owned six houses and lived in six provinces, from BC
to Nfld.  Moving is hard.  A new place.  Getting rid of stuff…or not.  It’s hard. Stress points.  But then Naomi’s
husband dies, which is the highest of the stress points.  This was now both the loss of her home, and the closest one
to her.  Let that sink in.

And while we are on the subject of death:  why do some live so long and others don’t (my Mom lived to 95), her brother
and her father lived only into their 50s.  And some live less than that and yes, I’ve been to children’s funerals, due
to illness, cancer and accidents.  I don’t have answers.  You know that.  I do know life is a gift and often as a gift,
marred by the brokenness of humanity and this life.  We weep with those who weep and laugh with those who laugh.  And we
trust the LORD together.  Where you’ve lost someone, draw near to Him who has conquered death, experienced death,
reversed death and introduced us to the resurrection by his own, and to the life to come, based on his evidence.
Jesus.  Trust him for your death.  And trust him for the loss of your loved ones. Trust him when loved ones have lost
ability or health or when you have lost ability or health.  I know some of the pain you are going through.  But your
path I only walk beside.  It is the Lord who knows you, and your loved ones better than you know yourself.  But if I
can pray with you or listen, please be assured of my making time to be with, as you and I are able.

Losing someone to death or loss of health, or simply the loss of your pastor Dan to retirement, and his illness is hard.
And I don’t have any explanation for why it has happened the way it has happened or the timing of how it has happened.
But if you are sensing or feeling that loss—admit the loss to the Lord, offer it up to Him.  I appreciated Dan’s 
ministry, when I visited here.  Many of you have as well.  Many of you came to the Presbytery meeting where his
retirement was approved.  Thank you to those who spoke.  Thank you to all who were present and I know more would have
been there in a different season or time.

As we offer our losses to the LORD, we simply wait to hear his comfort, Jesus’ care, God’s mercy and blessing.  We read
from Ephesians 1, because we are reminded there that in Jesus Christ, we have adoption as children of God, adoption,
redemption, bought with the precious blood of Christ, and the forgiveness of our sins.  These are true riches in this
life, greater than any stuff we own or money, or bitcoin or cryptocurrency or other financial instruments.  We have
assurance of moving from life to life through death, all of us who trust Christ, an amazing promise, fully trustworthy
and also that of a great reunion, mentioned in John 14, in God’s great house with many rooms.  There it is in the golden
city with the pearl gates just to let us know what is gold here is paving stone there.

So Naomi, Ruth’s mother-in-law, turned to God.  But it got worse.  The boys married foreign women, Moabites,
(which is not specifically forbidden by Deut. 7:1-3).  Then the boys died (within ten years, 1: 4 - 5).  And for a mother
in Israel, blessed with two sons, she must have felt she was the under the curse of God.  “Why me?”  Later, she would
ask people to call her “Mara” or “bitter.”  So she clearly acknowledged her need and we are called to do the same today.
She didn’t “fake it until she makes it.”  She simply said it the way it was.  And Scripture doesn’t give us a picture
of her turning against God.  She and we are encouraged to bring how we really are before the Lord.  Please note:  We are
not encouraged to come before God the way we think we should be and try to be like that.  No.  We come as we are,
forsaking denial as we are able.  Receiving ministry as we are.  Telling the truth, about our feelings, our sins, our
messes—the stuff we don’t understand, alongside what we do understand.  Offering up our messes to God means telling the
truth about ourselves to God, and describing the mess to Him as best we can.  Not he doesn’t know.  It is an exercise in
bringing all of who we are to God for His work, transformation and mercy.

Someone of our counseling teachers used to say, “Maturity is measured by how well we deal with our losses.” (Repeat)
In the grieving process, denial, anger, depression, bargaining and acceptance do occur.  These are normal.  But we need
to have people to listen to us, to care and love and be with us.  I understand the local RC parish Divine Infant is
offering a course in processing grief.  And if I can help, please talk to me or make an appointment with me through the
church office, through Arlene.

On top of Naomi’s losses and her bitterness, she has to admit to her girls (her daughter-in-laws), that she really has
nothing to offer them.  Neither of them conceived through those ten years, and their husbands may have been ill through
those years as their names Mahlon and Chilion may mean “weak or sickly.”  The text doesn’t tell us.  The text only gives
us the sense of tension as Naomi forces herself to say goodbye to her only remaining children. Now I’ve only recently
acquired sons-in-laws who are racially different from us, i.e. generationally from China and Kenya/Uganda.  So I only
have the slightest ability to empathize with Naomi and her Moabite daughters-in-law.  But we do sense Naomi is looking
for her girls’ best, as God is looking for ours.  But I am getting ahead in the text (1: 8-9).

What have we learned from Ruth, chapter 1, verses 1 – 7?  In the midst of serious losses, let us turn anew to the LORD.
Let us bring ourselves as we are, with the messes in our lives, acknowledging our need and opening ourselves anew to God.
In Jesus, we have a hope and a future, sometimes difficult for us to see, except by faith and trusting him.  And such a
future is there.  Cry anew to the Father for your life, your family’s, your church and don’t avoid talking to Him about
the messes, for life always comes with messes.  Just look at infants, if you need to know about messes.

Let us pray.