 Throughout my life, I've increasingly found that reading scripture in public isn't just about feeding our own spirits and minds. It's about rehearsing the mighty acts of God for God's glory. So let's think together about Ruth chapter 1, verse 22. But first, let's have some tea. So Naomi returned, together with Ruth the Moabite, her daughter-in-law, who came back with her from the country of Moab. They came to Bethlehem at the beginning of the barley harvest. This is one of my favourite little verses in the Old Testament, because it takes a situation which seems to be more or less without hope. And by the way the story is told, we realise as it goes on, that actually hope was built into it from the beginning. What's going on? There is this woman, Naomi, who's an Israelite, and she is married, but then she has sons, but her husband dies. Her sons marry women from the country of Moab, where she has gone because there is a famine in the land. So her husband dies, and then her sons die. And she has left a widow with two widowed daughters. And particularly in that country, that's really serious, because in most families in ancient Israel, you relied on the sons in the next generation to support you, both in ordinary life, but then particularly in your old age. So Naomi is left a bitter and sad woman. But she hears that maybe things are improving back home. Maybe the famine is over or soon to be over. So she decides to go back from the country of Moab and back to her own land. And she says to her daughters-in-law, you stay here, I'm going back home. And one of them says, OK, I'm staying here, but Ruth. Ruth decides she is going to stay with her mother-in-law. And she says, come what may. And there's a wonderful statement earlier in the chapter of Ruth's devotion to her mother-in-law and recognizing that the God whom her mother-in-law worships is a God who she, Ruth, wants to know and worship as well. But the situation is still pretty hopeless. They come back and they go back to where Naomi had come from, which is the town of Bethlehem. What's going to happen there? They don't know. They're basically without hope, but simply with this sense that the God of Israel is the one God who is worth hanging on to. And so the narrator says, artlessly so it seems to us, they came to Bethlehem at the beginning of the barley harvest. And if you know the story, and most ancient Israelites would hear this story again and again, probably read right the way through, not just in a few verses at a time. Bethlehem was the place and the barley harvest was the occasion where Ruth, to her own surprise, was to find a husband. And through that husband, she herself was going to have children and so Naomi was not, after all, going to be left bereft. So this little verse just sticks out and says to me, here is this situation of sorrow, of human tragedy and disaster, of apparent hopelessness, but built into the narrative are elements which are then going to do completely unexpected things and are going to result in an extraordinary outflowing of God's blessing because the Son who is born is going to be the ancestor of King David. And that's one of the reasons why the book of Ruth is where it is in the Bible, because Ruth becomes David's ancestors. And with this the purposes of God, which are going forward to places that neither Naomi nor Ruth could ever have imagined, were in place and were going ahead, even though they had to follow in faith when all seemed dark. So may God give you courage and hope to hold onto him when there seems to be no hope in human terms. And may he richly bless you with his hidden and yet to be revealed purposes. Amen. How is this passage speaking to you? Let us know in the comments. Like and subscribe or check out our other videos.