Every so often God will reveal to me something new in the scriptures. Not newly written of course, but a new revelation within scripture I've probably read a hundred times. One of those times happened recently while reading the story of Ruth. Typically the focus of Ruth for me has been her faithfulness to Naomi and the fact that Boaz took care of her. But this particular time my focus became HOW Boaz took care of her. If you recall, Ruth had no one to care for her and her former mother-in-law, Naomi. So she took to the fields to work among the women there. I would recommend you read Ruth Chapter 2 but pay particular attention to this part of the chapter:
“At mealtime Boaz said to her, “Come over here. Have some bread and dip it in the wine vinegar.” When she sat down with the harvesters, he offered her some roasted grain. She ate all she wanted and had some left over. As she got up to glean, Boaz gave orders to his men, “Let her gather among the sheaves and don’t reprimand her. Even pull out some stalks for her from the bundles and leave them for her to pick up, and don’t rebuke her.” So Ruth gleaned in the field until evening. Then she threshed the barley she had gathered, and it amounted to about an ephah. She carried it back to town, and her mother-in-law saw how much she had gathered."
What Boaz did for Ruth probably differs from what we often would feel lead to do for someone in need. Boaz did not give her barley that was gathered already. Nor did he give her barley that had already been threshed. Instead he had work left for her to do to allow her to take care of her mother-in-law and herself.
There were two takeaways I got from this. First, taking care of those in need doesn't always mean giving them what they need. Instead it can mean providing them the opportunity to get what they need if they are capable of doing it themselves. Countless times I see people with their cardboard signs saying they will work for food. We drive past them believing that they don't want to actually work but that they want a handout instead. So rather than asking them to help wash windows or mow a yard or mend something that is broken we travel down the road with our self righteousness buckled into the seat beside us. Perhaps God doesn't want us to give them a handout, but perhaps God doesn't want us to ignore them either. Just giving them the benefit of the doubt is all they really need.
My own personal mantra has been that I don't mind helping people in need, but I refuse to help needy people. Sometimes we don't get the breaks. Sometimes life throws us a curve while we were sitting on a fastball. I've been there. You've been there. The encouraging word, a meal, a hug, or just someone to listen to is often all we need to get through. Other times we need that handout to get us right again.
Recently I have had the opportunity to help a family in need. They are deep in debt and saw no sign of getting out. But they didn't come to me asking for a handout. They realized that their position was caused by their mistakes. They wanted help to not make those mistakes again all while doing the right thing and cleaning up after themselves. Rather than mope about how bad things were they began to see that, with a lot of hard work, they could get out of this mess. And I'm proud of the progress they've made in just a few months. By allowing them to gather for themselves they received value for their work.
My second takeaway is how we oftentimes don't recognize those opportunities when God gives them to us. We ask for food on our table so He gives us a job. We ask for His help in finding a mate and He shows us a Sunday School class to join. We ask for so many things and, when He gives us the opportunity to do the things necessary to get what we ask for, we ask Him why He doesn't want to answer our prayers.
Perhaps we should ask Him for direction and for the wisdom and ability to recognize those chances when they present themselves. Finding your mate, your job, your house or that big stack of money you've been looking for may be easier than you first expected. Seeking first His kingdom would be a great starting point. Then asking God for the opportunity to bless others and for His help in recognizing those opportunities when they show up should be a daily prayer. After we ask Him to use us to bless others then we can ask Him to recognize the path to the blessings He has for us.
I don't know why this revelation of scripture came to me or who else it might have been for, but I do know that it was meant for more than just me. I pray that it sits well with you and maybe even makes a difference in how you look at life. I know it has mine. And He has begun a good work in me. And He will continue to perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.
