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Cameron Presbyterian Church engaged in a value-forming exercise at our Annual Congregational Meeting, and determined four values that will guide us in 2017: compassion & caring, faith, serving and support. Each Sunday in February, I will focus on one of these values.
February 26, 2017
Ruth 1:8-22, 4:13-17
Ruth 1:8-22, 4:13-17
8 Naomi
said to her two daughters-in-law, “Go back each of you to your mother’s house.
May the Lord deal kindly with you, as you have dealt with the dead and with me.
9 The Lord grant
that you may find security, each of you in the house of your husband.” Then she
kissed them, and they wept aloud. 10 They said to her, “No, we will return
with you to your people.” 11 But Naomi said, “Turn back, my daughters, why will you go
with me? Do I still have sons in my womb that they may become your husbands? 12 Turn back, my
daughters, go your way, for I am too old to have a husband. Even if I thought
there was hope for me, even if I should have a husband tonight and bear sons, 13 would you then
wait until they were grown? Would you then refrain from marrying? No, my
daughters, it has been far more bitter for me than for you, because the hand of
the Lord has turned against me.” 14 Then they wept aloud again. Orpah kissed
her mother-in-law, but Ruth clung to her.
15 So Naomi said, “See, your sister-in-law has gone back to her
people and to her gods; return after your sister-in-law.”
16 But Ruth said,
“Do
not press me to leave you
or to turn back
from following you!
Where
you go, I will go;
where you lodge,
I will lodge;
your
people shall be my people,
and your God my
God.
17 Where you die, I will die—
there will I be
buried.
May
the Lord do thus and so to me,
and more as
well,
if
even death parts me from you!”
18 When Naomi saw that she was determined to go with her, she
said no more to her.
19 So the two of them went on until they came to Bethlehem. When
they came to Bethlehem, the whole town was stirred because of them; and the
women said, “Is this Naomi?” 20 She said to them,
“Call
me no longer Naomi,
call me Mara
[which means “Bitter”],
for the Almighty
has dealt bitterly with me.
21 I went away full,
but the Lord has
brought me back empty;
why
call me Naomi
when the Lord
has dealt harshly with me,
and the Almighty
has brought calamity upon me?”
22 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.
So
Boaz took Ruth and she became his wife. When they came together, the Lord made
her conceive, and she bore a son. 14 Then the women said to Naomi, “Blessed
be the Lord, who has not left you this day without next-of-kin; and may his
name be renowned in Israel! 15 He shall be to you a restorer of life and a nourisher of your
old age; for your daughter-in-law who loves you, who is more to you than seven
sons, has borne him.” 16 Then Naomi took the child and laid him in her bosom, and
became his nurse. 17 The women of the neighborhood gave him a name, saying, “A son
has been born to Naomi.” They named him Obed [which means “worshipper”]; he
became the father of Jesse, the father of David.
The
other night, I curled up with my chamomile tea and a novel, and began to unwind
from the day in my favorite way. I’m reading a book called Ireland by Frank Delaney[1], and
it is an inventive and incredible tale of that emerald isle. Like only happens
with the best of books, I felt myself getting pulled in, as I read each
paragraph with more speed than the last. Books are the best down time for me.
But,
I’ll tell you a secret: we pastors don’t often get total down time. Though I
was curled up with Fifi, tea and a book, a little part of my brain was doing
what it does every week: ruminating on the coming text to preach on. And so,
when I read a particular paragraph of my novel, I immediately stopped, wrote it
down, and connected it with our Ruth story for today.
Here’s
what was written, when describing an adventurous expedition by sea:
“We do well to
remember dolphins. If a dolphin ails, then others come alongside and nudge him
gently through the waters; because a dolphin must keep moving in order to keep
breathing. We all have need of our dolphins alongside us from time to time.”
Now,
I’ll be honest, I had no idea I’d be talking to you about dolphins today! But
what a perfect description of our value of support: gently keeping one another
moving so we can keep breathing. It’s easier said than done.
For
Ruth, keeping her mother-in-law Naomi breathing after the loss of her son meant
one word: clung. We hear that Orpah kissed Naomi goodbye, but not Ruth. Ruth clung to her. This Hebrew word is used
rarely in the Old Testament, but nearly always it’s describing the way skin clings
to bone. This is not holding hands; this is not a pat on the back; this is not
an awkward half hug. No, Ruth clung
to Naomi in her grief, like how our skin clings to our very bones, and she refused
to let go.
Naomi,
showing that common fear we have when we’re suffering (being a burden to
others), told Ruth to go. Leave. Live her own life. But Ruth said no. She
stayed with her, journeyed with her.
It’s
a testament to the depths of Naomi’s grief that when she came to Bethlehem, sorrow
had so etched its painful lines on her face that those who knew her best didn’t
even recognize her. She was changed, not really able to keep breathing, and she
named herself Bitter. But – and this really is the point of the whole story –
she was not alone.
Ruth
was her dolphin, nudging her, clinging to her, keeping her breathing. And then
Boaz was their dolphin, feeding them, welcoming them, loving them. The women
survived, and in this great fairy tale of the Bible, the same people who were
shocked and didn’t recognize Naomi in her grief later gave her a new name: “blessed
by God,” and named her grandchild “worshipper.”
We
all need our dolphins, and you better believe Ruth needed Naomi just as much as
Naomi needed her. That’s what makes life worth living: having someone, anyone,
who needs our support.
Now,
these past few weeks as I’ve preached on the values you chose for 2017 – compassion
& caring, faith and service – I’ve usually ended those sermons somewhere
along the lines of “now get out there and do something!” (We preachers don’t
have that many new tricks, after all.)
But
not today. Today, I’m not going to tell you all the ways you should be supporting each other. I’m not
going to give you steps to cling to one another in times of sickness and
sorrow.
Today,
I simply want to say this, and for you to really hear it: you are so, so good at this. Churches four times our size try to
create entire programs to replicate the sort of support our church organically
gives, and it’s not the same. By the grace of God, this is your greatest gift
as a church. You come to each other’s rescue. You cling to each other, like
flesh clings to bones, and you don’t let go. Not when a scary diagnosis comes.
Not when healing comes. Not when grief and sorrow come. Not when fear and
loneliness come. Not when change and uncertainty come. You never let go.
Support
isn’t just a value you put up on a white board at a meeting; support is who you
are, with your every breath. I want us to own that. Celebrate it. Be grateful
for this work of the Spirit among us. So, let’s do that now: I invite you to turn to
a neighbor for just a couple of minutes and share a time you have been
supported by this church. Or if you prefer, you may also sit and quietly think to
yourself about when you felt supported here.
A Time of
Sharing
There
are plenty of ways to think about our church in terms of who we’re not, and if
we’re honest, it’s sometimes much easier to dwell on the negative and do that.
This year, I don’t want you to define yourself by who you’re not. I want you to
rejoice in who you are: a family who
supports each other, clings to one another like skin to bones, and keeps each
other breathing even into life eternal.
And
if someone ever asks you what Cameron Presbyterian Church is all about, just
make them curious and say: “With God’s help, we are each other’s
dolphins.” Amen.
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