Page 131 - BACK TO BETHLEHEM

and lives are dry and fruitless and defeated, and hearts are
broken.

The first step, the first spiritual event, if we are going to
become an oasis in the desert, is returning to the place of
fullness, coming back to Bethlehem, coming back to where we
were when we first got saved. That is how the book of Ruth
begins – in the place of fullness. You can never be an oasis
until you begin there. Moab just represents everything outside
of Christ. It can be good, it can be bad and it can sound quite
spiritual. Anything except Jesus is Moab.
Bethlehem, “The House of Bread”, is a picture of our
Lord Jesus Christ. Fullness is not a goal; fullness is the starting
point. In this book, fruit is the goal. We are moving toward the
production of the Lord Jesus Christ and giving Him to the
world, but it all starts in fullness. There are a thousand and one
reasons we leave fullness and go to Moab. Maybe we try to
find fullness in spiritual gifts or in Christian service or in
Christian fellowship or in education or in the world. We leave
fullness and all we find is emptiness. But once we come back,
that is the beginning of the oasis in the desert.
Elimelech and Naomi and their two sons Mahlon and
Chilion left the place of fullness because of a famine, because
they said there was no bread in the House of Bread. They did
not understand fullness and they went off to Moab, and they
spent ten years in Moab and shed a lot of tears in the land of
Moab. Naomi loses her husband, and she loses her two sons.
Then, God finally opened Naomi’s eyes and she heard that the
Lord had visited His people in Bethlehem. She lifted her head
toward Bethlehem, and saw the visitation of God and that there
was blessing in the land of fullness. So, she decided to go back
to Bethlehem. As soon as she purposed in her heart to go back,
God already began turning the curse into a blessing, and it was
at that point that Naomi led Ruth, her daughter-in-law, to the
Savior.
Now, Naomi was not planning to lead Ruth to Christ.
You see, when you lead somebody to Christ you usually do not
say to them, “Go back to your gods.” You usually do not use