Tyndale Chapel Podcast

DR. CYRIL GUERETTE: Oh, thank you. That was powerful, powerful worship today. Well, it seems that God, in His providence, has scheduled me to speak on the theme of hope on the morning after a bitter World Series record tying defeat and extra innings. I hope you're awake. Yet we await game four tonight with anticipation and hope. Go, Jays, go. Right?

We also await the first snowfall. Winter is coming. You know what? I actually love this time of year, it can be really bleak. It depends how you look at it, right? That's one of the things about hope. It's a perspective. You can start looking at it's getting darker, it's getting colder. We're anticipating just months of trudging through slop. Or you can look at it and realize that we're we're not yet bogged down by winter. We can have this hope for snow, this dream of a white Christmas, this excitement that can build up in us.

Now we know that the winter season, you know, has its own dangers. I can think back in particular, to two friends of mine that I was really close with in high school. They went on a skiing trip together to Colorado, and they got there, and they were quite good skiers. They were fairly fearless actually. They, you know, always did the most difficult hills, and it was simple for them. They're always looking for for new challenges. And so they're on this location, and they were watching this, but they were warned by the authorities, you know, don't go down the back end of the mountain. But what they saw was a lot of the locals started going down that way, and they looked, and they saw these tracks. And so they decided, "Okay, we're gonna go down the backside of the mountain". And so they took the plunge, and they went down the side of the mountain. They follow the tracks of the different skiers, and they came back next day, in the morning. In the evening, they came out and they're like, "Oh, that was awesome! That was the best skiing we've ever done." So they wake up in the morning, they're all excited, and they decided they're going to do it again, and they go down the backside of the mountain. But they didn't realize it had snowed, and so the tracks, these well worn tracks of the locals that had created past them, were gone. And they found themselves mid afternoon realizing that they were lost in the back end of the Colorado mountains.

In fact, it got pretty scary, and they were there, kind of wondering, and they were looking and kept trying to figure out where they would go. They didn't know, but a rescue team had been sent out to even find them, but they hadn't been found. And as the sun started going down, they recognized that they were in deep trouble. And so their kind of training kicked in, and they realized, "Oh, we got to do something". They dug a hole in the snow, and they lined it with different branches and and then they got in that little hole together, and they just like, huddled together like they never imagined they would do, since they were best friends in kindergarten or whatever, right? And they wouldn't have done it if it wasn't that their life depended upon it. And so they woke up the next morning, kind of groggy as soon as the sun started coming up and they realized how freezing cold they were, they had been frozen, basically. And they got up and they started trying to find a way out. And they went time after time, trying to find past. And finally they got to this one hill, and they were, they were done. They kind of just laid on the ground. They were like, "Okay, we'll just wait for people to come." And then one of them was said, "No".

Now I remember one of my friends, he was actually not religious. He told me a few prayers went up that night, and he said, "Let's do one more time". We're gonna go over that, over this next hill. And they went up the hill, and then they looked down below, and they saw the chalet below, and they skied down like zombies. They got to the bottom of the ground. They collapsed on the ground. They were taken to hospital. They had hypothermia. One of my friends had his toes blackened to the point where they had, you know, do some surgery and but they lived. They were on the Denver, Colorado TV, and they got the Dini Petty Show, that was a show back in the day here in Toronto, and and they became heroes to us because they didn't give up hope. In the midst of the darkness and the in the most dangerous of times they held on to hope because hope is a virtue.

Hope is what we call the fighter's virtue. It is something that keeps you going, even when it seems like all is gone, you push through and you keep hope. Hope is one of the greatest gifts that God has given to us as human beings, and hope has always been part of the story for every generation of God's people since the very beginning. And so today we're going to turn to the book of Ruth, and we're going to find an ancient story of hope.

It's a story of a young lady named Ruth and her widowed mother in law, Naomi. We're going to jump to chapter two, but I just want to say that it begins with the story of Ruth, who goes to Israel against all odds. Her husband has died, her sister in law has decided to stay there and try to find another husband in Moab, but Naomi says, "I'm going back to Israel. You guys stay here because it's the best chance you have." And Ruth is like, "No, I'm going with you. Your people will be my people. Your God will be my God. I have hope in God." And so it's a pretty amazing moment. They get back to Israel and they realize that they're in trouble, because in Israel, it's not easy to be widowed. And so they start to wonder what they're going to do, and the hope kicks in. Ruth says this, she says, "Let me go to the fields and pick up the leftover grain behind anyone in whose eyes I find favor."

The second chapter of Ruth, I have learned to look for hope. You look for it. Where is it? When you're in the middle of the darkness, when you're in the mountain, look for the gleam of hope. And she sees it. She sees it shining out of the word of God. Because there is in the word of God a law that gives hope to the poor and to the widows. And that law is that the farmers need to leave the gleanings of fallen barley, the fallen wheat on the ground for the poor so they have a little bit of hope in Israel and even a refugee, like Ruth, can take advantage of this. And so she says, I want to go out and do this. And as she gets out there, she decides to glean. And she puts her hope in the law of God itself, I'd say. And as she looks at her situation, she sees this hope is is there. And she steps out and, lo and behold, as she follows this little trail of hope, she looked for it and found it.

She walks out into the field, and she meets another ray of hope, and his name is Boaz. And Boaz is full of love and compassion. He obviously seems like a kind man, "a man of noble character", it says. He owns this this field, and as he sees Ruth. He asks who it is, and he hears the story, and he goes to her and says, "I'm going to make sure you're taken care of. What you're doing for your mother in law is amazing, and I'll make sure you have enough food for both of you." And so she returns home and tells the story to her mother in law, and Naomi also sees the gleam of hope, and we turn to chapter three. And in chapter three, it's pretty amazing, because what we learn is you don't just look for hope. You have to act in hope. You have to act on the hope that you see. Naomi says to her daughter in law, "Wash put on perfume and get dressed in your best clothes and go down to the threshing floor." So Naomi listens to her mother in law as she goes down. And I just want to point out, notice these two women are not waiting to see if this, you know, tremendous blessing they've already had in Boaz, turns into something bigger. No, no, they're going to take steps to make sure it turns into something bigger. They'll do whatever is in their power to act on the hope that they've received, and in accordance with the hope that they've received.

Hope is not just a feeling. Hope is something that reveals itself in actions. Acts of hope are some of the greatest stories in the entirety of the Bible. I mean in history, some of the best movies we have are movies where the character acts on the hope that they see. We can't just sit by idly and see what comes our way. We need to step out and just take a shot at something. Now I get it sometimes it might feel risky to step out. We don't want to be vulnerable, right? It's hard to make it look like you care, sometimes. We just keep a calm face on, but deep down, we do care. So let it out there and act on your hope.

In hope, I act idealist. I still think like a realist. I look at all this skubala. I know it's hard to heal this, but rather than forget it, let's actively regret it. Rise again like visionaries reject the apathetic. Now, acting on hope isn't easy, and chapter four, kind of shows this to us. Hope takes sacrifice, but it produces great joy. It takes sacrifice to step out after this awkward night of foot uncovering. I won't go to the whole story, but Ruth goes and lifts the blanket off Boaz's feet, and lays at the feet. And then he wakes up and he's a gentleman, and he says, "I'm gonna take care of you, but get out of here before everyone sees you. And this is going to be a good thing. I'm going to make sure I take care of everything." Boaz decides that he's going to lay everything on the line. He realizes that he wants to help Ruth even more. So he also decides to act on a glimmer of hope that is in the word of God. And this act of hope is what is called the kinsman redeemer.

The kinsman redeemer is something that was written as well to allow women who are in the exact situation as Ruth to be able to move forward. To have someone within the family of her husband step in and allow her to have children in the name of her husband, so that that name will carry on. Now we know that this isn't an easy thing. We know this because when Boaz goes to talk to the man who's even closer than he is to be a kinsman redeemer, and he tells him about the land. The guy's like, ding, "I want the land, yes, please." He's like, "Oh, and you have to take the lady." And he's like, "Oh, wait a second, if I take this, this means that my children don't get that." Boaz didn't care. He was willing to take a sacrifice. He wanted to do what was right. He was okay with allowing another man's name to be placed upon the child. And Boaz acts out, and he ends up taking the sacrifice, notice though, he knows the sacrifice that Ruth is making. He says, "Like you can get someone way younger, someone way better." And she wants someone of noble character, someone who acts in hope and love and what comes from this, the sacrifice of Boaz, the sacrifice of Ruth, but great joy, a celebration. The whole community celebrates. She celebrates.

This is a beautiful picture that comes into this, a woman of noble character and a man of noble character coming together under the law of God to have the joy of marriage. Now this joy of marriage just doesn't, you know, change their lives. It does change their lives, but it changes the lives of everyone in history. For because of this marriage, we know that they don't even just get to enjoy their own lives together, that their grandson will eventually become King David. This act of hope became the Living Hope of all humanity when King David's great, great, great, great, great, great, great grandson, I don't know how many greats it is, but becomes the Savior of the world. Jesus Christ, giving His life and sacrificing His life because He had the hope that the Father and His plan would work to save all of us. So that's a beautiful thing. This little act of hope from a refugee woman and a farmer turns into the salvation of the world. So look for hope, act in hope. Sacrifice for hope and reap joy. Now, how does this apply?

This applies in many areas in life. We see it, you know, a couple couple of them in the book of Ruth. And I'm going to kind of point out that I think it can apply to us, as you know, students, especially, but also faculty. First of all, one of the hopes that we can have is a hope for healthy relationships. There's a brokenness everywhere in our world. If we learn to look for hope and act in hope and sacrifice, we can find a joy in healthy relationships. Now, some of you I know, come to university and you are wondering like, "God, do You have someone for me?" That's not easy. I've been there. I remember waiting and wondering and questioning and begging and getting angry with you know, all the things. "Lord, where's my Ruth?" And this is the thing, if you hope in God, He will provide. He will provide. If you are meant to find that person to enact a new story of hope and love with your marriage, then God will provide a way, keep hope. Keep hope. And this applies to relationships.

Maybe you have strained relationships with parents or or children, or, you know, professors with teachers and students like whatever the strained relationships are, there's hope. You need to look for that glimmer of hope and act on it. That's what forgiveness is. Isn't forgiveness an act of hope? Also, we can hope for our future security in God. Notice how Ruth trusts the God of Israel. Now nowhere, by the way, in the book of Ruth does it say, "God did this and God did that". It's all like, "God be blessed and you be blessed." It's all kind of the story is told. And you know, God's hovering there the entire time His name is blessed by them. They're doing it because of God. They're they're acting on the laws of God. And what we see is that you cannot trust in yourself or anyone else for hope and security. Trust in the Lord, He'll work it out.

You know, some of you at school, you're going, "How am I going to do this? It's getting hard. It's the middle of semester that that professor's work is just really difficult. I'm worried about this paper." Trust in God. Maybe you're running like, "How am I going to get a job when I get out of here? What am I gonna do? Economy's tanking. How can I ever buy a house?" Trust in God." How will I ever cover my expenses?" Do not worry. Worrying cannot add a single day to your life. Naomi and Ruth were in a bad spot, but they kept hope, and they trust in God, and they allowed Him to feed them, to house them, and to care for them. For the rest of their lives, He provided.

And finally, there's a hope that we see for an eternity of joy, future joy, but not just kind of future, their own future, eternal future. The hope that that these people had wasn't any hope. It was a hope in God Himself. It was a hope that He would provide. They talked about being blessed by God over and over again. Ruth says, "I will worship this God." And they point to a future hope. This hope of the child between Boaz and Ruth ends up being the hope of Jesus. Ever since Abraham, the people of Israel have been hoping for an answer to humanity's problems, to the sin problem. Israel is waiting and hoping that God would give them a land. He would give them descendants, temples, prophets and Messiah. And when Jesus appears on the scene, He claims, "I am the hope you were looking for." He preached a message of audacious hope at a graciously spacious scope. The blind, who hoped to see life, could see the blue sky with their own two eyes. The deaf, who had hoped to hear the beautiful music of the wind in the willows, listen to the crickets when in bed hit their pillows. The crippled and lame, who walked again, had hoped and they ran into the ripples and the waves the water.

So, we know summer is long gone, and the deadlines are piling up, and there's turmoil all around in our economy and our country, we need to remember that God gives hope. Whatever is happening if it's happening here at the university, if it's happening at home, it's happening at church, if it's happening out in the streets, God can bring peace, joy, love and hope. Winter is coming. Have hope. Maybe think of it this way. Christmas is coming. Have hope. Jesus is coming back. He's coming back someday to make all things right, and He can help make things in your life right, right now, and just like Ruth, we get to be part of the world's hope in Jesus. Amen? Let me pray.

Lord, we here at Tyndale, hope in You. We trust in You. You are our kinsman redeemer. Let us be gleaners. Lord, may we look for the hope that You have given us in each situation, a way out of temptation. May we act on the hope that You put in front of us, Lord. May we not just sit by but take it by the hand and follow You in your plan. And may we remember that all of this points to December, to Christmas, to Jesus, coming to earth as a human, dying on a cross for our sins and freeing us from sin and evil powers. And so we proclaim today a hope in Jesus Christ. Help us, Lord God, live this hope out, Amen. Lord, bless you and keep you. Lord, turn His face towards you, be gracious to you. Lord, shine the light of His Son, Jesus Christ upon you and grant you peace, for we are His Church. Let us live it out this week. Go in peace.