"Yes, I to the end shall endure,
As sure as the earnest is given;
More happy, but not more secure,
The glorified spirits in heaven."
I used to think I should never be able to sing that hymn. It was the
sauce, you know. I might manage to eat some of the plain bread, but I
could not dip it in that sauce. It was too high doctrine, too sweet, too
consoling. But I thank God I have since ventured to dip my morsel in it,
and now I hardly like my bread without it.
I would have every trembling sinner partake of the _comfortable_ parts
of God's Word, even those which cavillers call "HIGH DOCTRINE." Let him
believe the simpler truth first, and then dip it in the sweet doctrine
and be happy in the Lord.
I think I see the gleaner half prepared to come, for she is very hungry,
and she has nothing with her; but she begins to say, "I have no right to
come, for I am not a reaper; I do nothing for Christ; I am only a
_selfish gleaner_; I am not a reaper." Ah! but thou art invited to come.
Make no questions about it. Boaz bids thee; take thou his invitation,
and approach at once. "But," you say, "I am such a _poor_ gleaner;
though my labor is all for myself, yet it is little I win by it; I get a
few thoughts while the sermon is being preached, but I lose them before
I reach home." I know you do, poor weak-handed woman. But still, Jesus
invites thee. Come! Take thou the sweet promise as he presents it to
thee, and let no bashfulness of thine send thee home hungry. "But," you
say, "I am _a stranger_; you do not know my sins, my sinfulness, and the
waywardness of my heart." But Jesus does, and yet he invites you. He
knows you are but a Moabitess, a stranger from the commonwealth of
Israel; but he bids you come. Is not that enough? "But," you say, "I owe
so much to him already; it is so good of him to spare my forfeited life,
and so tender of him to let me hear the gospel preached at all; I cannot
have the presumption to be an intruder, and sit with the reapers." Oh!
but he _bids_ you. There is more presumption in your doubting than there
could be in your believing. HE bids you. Will you refuse Boaz? Shall
Jesus' lips give the invitation, and will you say him nay? Come, now,
come. Remember that the little which Ruth could eat did not make Boaz
any the poorer; and all that thou wantest will make Christ none the less
glorious or full of grace. Are thy necessities large? His supplies are
larger. Dost thou require great mercy? He is a great Saviour. I tell
thee that his mercy is no more to be exhausted than the sea is to be
drained. Come at once. There is enough for thee, and Boaz will not be
impoverished by thy feasting to the full. Moreover, let me tell thee a
secret--Jesus _loves_ thee; therefore is it that he would have thee feed
at his table. If thou art now a longing, trembling sinner, willing to be
saved, but conscious that thou deservest it not, Jesus loves thee, and
he will take more delight in seeing thee eat than thou wilt take in the
eating. Let the sweet love he feels in his soul toward thee draw thee to
him. And what is more--but this is a great secret, and must only be
whispered in your ear--_he intends to be married to you_; and when you
are married to him, why, the fields will be yours; for, of course, if
you are his spouse, you are joint proprietor with him. Is it not so?
Doth not the wife share with the husband? All those promises which are
"yea and amen in Christ" shall be yours; nay, they all _are_ yours now,
for "the man is next of kin unto you," and ere long he will take you
unto himself forever, espousing you in faithfulness, and truth, and
righteousness. Will you not eat of your own? "Oh! but," says one, "how
can it be? I am a stranger." Yes, a stranger; but Jesus Christ loves the
stranger. "A publican, a sinner;" but he is "the friend of publicans and
sinners." "An outcast;" but he "gathereth together the outcasts of
Israel." "A stray sheep;" but the shepherd "leaves the ninety and nine"
to seek it. "A lost piece of money;" but he "sweeps the house" to find
thee. "A prodigal son;" but he sets the bells a-ringing when he knows
that thou wilt return. Come, Ruth! Come, trembling gleaner! Jesus
invites thee; accept the invitation. "At meal-time come thou hither, and
eat of the bread, and dip thy morsel in the vinegar."
III. Now, thirdly--and here is a very sweet point in the narrative--BOAZ
REACHED HER THE PARCHED CORN. She did "come and eat." Where did she sit?
Note well that she "sat beside the reapers." She did not feel that she
was one of them. Just like some of you who do not come to the Lord's
Supper, but sit and look on. You are sitting "beside the reapers." You
fear that you are not the people of God; still you love them, and
therefore sit beside them. If there is a good thing to be had, and you
cannot get it, you will sit as near as you can to those who _do_ get
it. "She sat beside the reapers."
And while she was sitting there, what happened? Did she stretch forth
her hand and take the food herself? No, it is written, "HE reached her
the parched corn." Ah! that is it. None but the Lord of the harvest can
hand out the choicest refreshments of spiritual minds. I give the
invitation in my Master's name, and I hope I give it earnestly,
affectionately, sincerely; but I know very well that at my poor bidding
none will come till the Spirit draws. No trembling heart will accept
divine refreshing at my hand; unless the King himself comes near, and
reaches the parched corn to each chosen guest, none will receive it. How
does he do this? By his gracious Spirit, he first of all _inspires your
faith_. You are afraid to think that it can be true that such a sinner
as you are can ever be "accepted in the Beloved"; he breathes upon you,
and your faint hope becomes an expectancy, and that expectation buds and
blossoms into an appropriating faith, which says, "Yes, my beloved is
_mine_, and his desire is toward _me_."
Having done this, the Saviour does more; _he sheds abroad the love of
God in your heart_. The love of Christ is like sweet perfume in a box.
Now, he who put the perfume in the box is the only person that knows how
to take off the lid. He, with his own skilful hand, opens the secret
blessing, and sheds abroad the love of God in the soul.
But Jesus does more than this; he reaches the parched corn with his own
hand, when he _gives us close communion with himself_. Do not think that
this is a dream; I tell you there is such a thing as speaking with
Christ to-day. As certainly as I can talk with my dearest friend, or
find solace in the company of my beloved wife, so surely may I speak
with Jesus, and find intense delight in the company of Immanuel. It is
not a fiction. We do not worship a far-off Saviour; he is a God nigh at
hand. His word is in our mouth and in our heart, and we do to-day walk
with him as the elect did of old, and commune with him as his apostles
did on earth; not after the flesh, it is true, but after a real and
spiritual fashion.
Yet once more let me add, the Lord Jesus is pleased to reach the parched
corn, in the best sense, when _the Spirit gives us the infallible
witness within, that we are "born of God_." A man may know that he is a
Christian beyond all question. Philip de Morny, who lived in the time of
Prince Henry of Navarre, was wont to say that the Holy Spirit had made
his own salvation to him as clear a point as a problem demonstrated in
Euclid. You know with what mathematical precision the scholar of
geometry solves a problem or proves a proposition, and with as absolute
a precision, as certainly as twice two are four, we may "know that we
have passed from death unto life." The sun in the heavens is not more
clear to the eye than his present salvation to an assured believer; such
a man could as soon doubt his own existence as suspect his possession of
eternal life.
Now let the prayer be breathed by poor Ruth, who is trembling yonder.
Lord, reach me the parched corn! "Show me a token for good." "Deal
bountifully with thy servant." "Draw me, we will run after thee." Lord,
send thy love into my heart!
"Come, Holy Spirit, heavenly Dove,
With all thy quickening powers,
Come, shed abroad a Saviour's love,
And that shall kindle ours."
There is no getting at Christ except by Christ revealing himself to us.
IV. And now the last point. After Boaz had reached the parched corn, we
are told that "SHE DID EAT, AND WAS SUFFICED, AND LEFT." So shall it be
with every Ruth. Sooner or later every penitent shall become a believer,
every mourner a singer. There may be a space of deep conviction, and a
period of much hesitation; but there shall come a season when the soul
decides for the Lord, and cries, "If I perish, I perish. I will go as I
am to Jesus. I will not play the fool any longer with my _buts_ and
_ifs_, but since he bids me believe that he died for me, I _will_
believe it, and will trust his cross for my salvation." Whenever you
shall be privileged to do this, you shall be "_satisfied_." "She did
eat, and was sufficed." Your _head_ shall be satisfied with the precious
truth which Christ reveals; your _heart_ shall be content with Jesus, as
the altogether lovely object of affection; your _hope_ shall be filled,
for whom have you in heaven but Christ? Your _desire_ shall be satiated,
for what can even your desire hunger for more than "to know Christ, and
to be found in him." You shall find Jesus charm your _conscience_, till
it is at perfect peace; he shall content your _judgment_, till you know
the certainty of his teachings; he shall supply your _memory_ with
recollections of what he did, and gratify your _imagination_ with the
prospects of what he is yet to do.
"She was sufficed, and left." Some of us have had deep draughts of love;
we have thought that we could take in all of Christ, but when we have
done our best, we have had to leave a vast remainder. We have sat down
with a ravenous appetite at the table of the Lord's love, and said,
"Nothing but the infinite can ever satisfy me," and that infinite has
been granted us. I have felt that I am such a great sinner that nothing
short of an infinite atonement could wash my sins away, and no doubt you
have felt the same; but we have had our sin removed, and found merit
enough and to spare in Jesus; we have had our hunger relieved, and found
a redundance remaining for others who are in a similar case. There are
certain sweet things in the Word of God which you and I have not enjoyed
yet, and which we cannot enjoy yet; and these we are obliged to leave
for a while, till we are better prepared to receive them. Did not our
Lord say, "I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear
them now"? There is a special knowledge to which we have not attained, a
place of intimate fellowship with Christ which we have not yet occupied.
There are heights of communion which as yet our feet have not
climbed--virgin snows of the mountain of God untrodden by the foot of
man. There is yet a beyond, and there will be for ever.
A verse or two further on we are told what Ruth did with her leavings.
It is very wrong, I believe, at feasts to carry anything home with you;
but _she_ was not under any such regulation, for that which was left she
took home and gave to Naomi. So it shall be even with you, poor
tremblers, who think you have no right to a morsel for yourselves; you
shall be allowed to eat, and when you are quite sufficed, you shall have
courage to bear away a portion to others who are hungering at home. I am
always pleased to find the young believer beginning to pocket something
for others. When you hear a sermon you think, "My poor mother cannot get
out to-day; how I wish she could have been here, for that sentence
would have comforted _her_. If I forget everything else, I will tell her
that." Cultivate an unselfish spirit. Seek to love as you have been
loved. Remember that "the law and the prophets" are fulfilled in this,
to love the Lord your God with all your heart, and your neighbor as
yourself. How can you love your neighbor as yourself if you do not love
his soul? You _have_ loved your own soul; through grace you have been
led to lay hold on Jesus; love your neighbor's soul, and never be
satisfied till you see him in the enjoyment of those things which are
the charm of your life and the joy of our spirit. Take home your
gleanings for those you love who cannot glean for themselves.
I do not know how to give you an invitation to Christ more pleasantly,
but I would with my whole heart cry, "Come and welcome to Jesus." I pray
my Lord and Master to reach a handful of parched corn of comfort to you
if you are a trembling sinner, and I also beg him to make you eat till
you are fully sufficed.