Page 5 - Back to Bethlehem

PROLOGUE

The Book of Ruth begins with Naomi’s family who started
off in Bethlehem in the House of Bread, and because of a famine
they left the House of Bread in order to go to Moab to find bread.
They stayed in Moab ten years, and the record shows that it was a
very difficult ten years. Naomi loses her husband, and she loses her
two sons. Then, finally, in the land of Moab she hears that there is
blessing in the House of Bread. She heard that the Lord had visited
His people in Bethlehem. So when she hears that, her heart is
attracted and she begins her trek back to Bethlehem.

When she came back after ten years, she said: “I went out
full, but the LORD has brought me back empty.” When she left ten
years earlier she did not say, “I am leaving full.” When she left ten
years earlier she said, “I am leaving empty.” I am leaving because
there is no bread in the House of Bread. There is a famine here. But
after ten years she discovered that she had left full at the beginning.

You see, Bethlehem is a picture of Christ, the House of
Bread; the place of fullness. And sometimes, even though we all
start out in Bethlehem, when famine comes or things get a little
tough, we leave fullness (of course, we think it is emptiness) to find
fullness. When you leave fullness to find fullness, you only find
emptiness. God instructed this family for ten years in that truth that
there is only emptiness outside the House of Bread. In the House of
Bread, famine is fullness. Outside the House of Bread, abundance
is poverty.

There is no fullness outside the House of Bread. Fullness is
in Christ. It is not in Moab. It is not in Christian service and it is
not in Christian fellowship. Those things are wonderful in their
place, but they are not fullness. If you look for fullness in Christian
or spiritual gifts, you will only find emptiness. If you look for
fullness in scholarship and academics or even Bible knowledge, you
will only find emptiness. Fullness is in Bethlehem; it is in Christ; it
is in the House of Bread. Until we go back to Bethlehem, we cannot
begin to have that union with our heavenly Boaz that results in the
production of the Lord Jesus Christ. We need to go back to