0:00:00 - 0:00:20 I wanna talk a little bit about route three just briefly. Um It's, it's a story that's recounted often, but I'm not sure we apply it in all the ways we could or should there's a little section there where Ruth show up, shows up to Boaz and, and essentially argues that he should marry her and he invoked 0:00:19 - 0:00:43 , she invokes the law of Moses which, which prescribed that if a widow, if a, if a widow's husband died without her having a son, the nearest kinsman had a duty to marry her so that she had a chance of having a son. And this was to compensate her for what she gave in marriage because the trade was her 0:00:43 - 0:01:03 youth and her everything for security to be taken care of, for life by her husband and to be set up with sons to take care of her after her husband died. So you might hear all that and, and just kind of gloss over and say whatever. We don't live the law of Moses and, and we have uh welfare and equal 0:01:03 - 0:01:25 rights and whatever, whatever. So we don't need to do stuff like this. Ok. Fine. But there's a principle here that is higher than that. And that should be understood and is vital to live even today. And at any time. So what is that, that is the principle of acting for the benefit of the world because 0:01:24 - 0:01:48 that's what Jesus would do in your place. And I want to extract two applications of that here. One is a willingness to step up and pay the price when no one else will. That's what Boaz said he would do in the story when Ruth says, can you marry me? Because, and I'm paraphrasing, can you marry me because 0:01:47 - 0:02:11 you're my next of kin. He says, hold up, wait a minute. Uh He says, look, you've got uh someone closer than me. And so I have to check with him first. Wow, I just saw someone set up an epic slip and slide down like the side of a mountain. That's crazy. Ok. Um There's a nearer kin and I have to check 0:02:11 - 0:02:30 with him first. And so he does and the guy says I'll pass and then it's Boa's duty. And so he's willing to step up even though he's not the nearest kinsman. And even though this other guy should have done it, and the reason he turned it down, we we're not told there could be good reasons. So the law 0:02:29 - 0:02:51 of Moses prevented a man from taking a second wife if it would reduce the benefits to the first wife. And obviously there are a whole lot of situations where that would be the case. A man would have to be quite well endowed financially and emotionally and everything else in his life if, if, uh, in order 0:02:50 - 0:03:14 to take on a second life without, um, encumbering the first. But, um, there are also some less glamorous reasons why he would have turned it down. Uh, a lot of people then and now would see caring for a widow as a burden. And um, you know, it's quite something and legally the kid wouldn't be his so that 0:03:14 - 0:03:37 it's just a lot of extra uh challenges in life and you'd have to be selfless to do that. So we don't know why he passed it up. But in our lives, people pass up opportunities to do better things all the time. It's a constant in the lives of most people and they just kinda, it's like when I was in the 0:03:37 - 0:03:57 army, uh you learned really quickly never to make eye contact. When someone asked for a volunteer for something, you just kind of as, as, as subtly as you can look at the ground and hope someone else raises their hand. One of my buddies, we had this game we would play where he'd always be. He was quick 0:03:56 - 0:04:13 on the draw. So he usually got me with this, but he'd grab my sleeve and pull my arm up in the air every time they asked for a volunteer. And I wasn't paying attention and half the time they got me. So anyway, that's what most people are like, or like my buddy and they just hope someone else could volunteer 0:04:12 - 0:04:32 , uh, or they volunteer someone else for them because they don't want to do it. And we shouldn't be like that if we have the ability to do good. That's what God expects from us. And it's not something we should do. Begrudgingly. John says, if we love the Lord, then it's not grievous, we don't find his 0:04:32 - 0:04:51 commandments grievous because we know that he loves us and everything he asked us to do leads us to something better than what we have 100%. There's no exception, doesn't matter how nasty it seems. And so that's on the one side, the other thing that we can extract from this, the other side is principal 0:04:50 - 0:05:18 and this might surprise you or be new. We should not take the goodies if someone else is willing to do it. So I don't know. But I have a feeling that Boaz really liked Ruth that cause that this wasn't the beginning of the story. He had seen things and made comments about how uh how good of a woman she 0:05:18 - 0:05:40 was with their brief interactions. He, he saw some light in her and I don't know, she may have been young and pretty or whatever. I don't know, maybe he was into whatever she was. Um But it is possible and I think likely I think you can make an argument from the text that Boaz wanted to marry her. And 0:05:40 - 0:06:06 yet his very first response was hold on. I know that you have someone closer, uh, in kinship than me. And so we gotta give that guy a chance first. So this comes back to not taking the last donut. And there's more to that principle than, than seems by the brief expression. Sometimes if the important 0:06:06 - 0:06:32 thing is to be able to divorce yourself from the situation, see your own situation externally to, to actively impede the bias to inflate value that comes to you rather than to others. The natural man prefers benefit to self over benefit to others. But we have to get to the point where we can gauge benefit 0:06:31 - 0:06:58 universally without any bias to ourselves. And this goes both ways. So on the one hand, yes, if objectively, it would, it would result in greater joy for some other person to have the last doughnut, you will go out of your way to make sure that's what happens. But on the other hand, if you would get 0:06:58 - 0:07:26 more joy out of eating that doughnut, you should, you should. So what boaz did was he said, man, this is a good woman. But if this other guy can see that and value it and is in a place to receive it, I'd rather he received that than me. And I know that she'd be taken care of and everything else. So it's 0:07:25 - 0:07:50 no loss to her. But in this case, it would probably be better for him if she were with him and, uh, he turned it down. And so that, that's the shocker here, I think, because I'm not sure many people think like that and they think, you know, what's the greatest value that could come out of every dollar 0:07:49 - 0:08:18 I spend, irrespective of whether I'm involved or not. What's the value of the time I spend? Um irrespective of if, if um I'm there or not, right? Um You could probably apply this to many specific situations beyond what I could list out here. So I invite you to think about this because it's important 0:08:17 - 0:08:45 . I will say finally that going back to the last doughnut thing, um you might think that uh it is, it is more noble to prefer the benefit of others over your own benefit. And it is, but it's one of those things that you really shouldn't fake and if you do, you're going to regret it. So what do I mean 0:08:45 - 0:09:04 by this? Let's say that you think that you're an all star athlete and you're gonna go run a marathon, but you have a train and it turns out you're out of shape and you're just delusional, but you really think that you're a marathon runner. So you go and do it and you end up getting hurt, right? Obviously 0:09:03 - 0:09:27 , it would have been better to recognize that that's not what you're all about and live according to how you really are. It's like that. It's like that because the truth is that God wants the greatest joy for all people in summation, for the, for the longest duration possible. And if we are really serious 0:09:27 - 0:09:50 , when we pray and we say thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven, we have to get off our butts or our knees. If we're praying and actively think about how he would prefer things to be. And then think about every little thing we could do to bring it closer to that outcome. This is what it means 0:09:49 - 0:10:12 to stand as a witness for Christ at all times. You can't do that without doing what I'm saying. You can't because witness, if you look up the Greek, it's not a word that just means to say something, it means to demonstrate, to be a witness of Christ. It's not enough to say, I believe in Jesus. OK. That 0:10:12 - 0:10:40 means a lot of things to a lot of people. And most of the time it doesn't mean anything meaningful, valuable. It's another thing to say, I demonstrate Jesus that is a very, very, very high bar and it's one he, he commands us to reach for and, and maybe you think about that in particular ways to get you 0:10:40 - 0:11:05 started and that's a great start. So the next time you have something good in your life or you see some opportunity, think who might appreciate this more than me, who might do more than this than with this, than I would and try to get that person to get on it. But if they don't, and if they won't step 0:11:05 - 0:11:16 up and do the things that the Lord would do in your place and let's make the world more like it would be if he were the one possessing each and every one of us.