Well, after a one week hiatus because of a street-clogging snow storm, I'm ready to reflect on BE's fifth week, dealing with the image of God to the goyim (a prejorative term referring to the "nations").  This week we have two downloads that you might find interesting:

• This pdf of the Book of Ruth was the worship bulletin this week (the date is the 12^th, we ended up doing it on the 17^th).  It's broken up into reading parts, we read a chapter and then did a meditation on it.  It was a lot of fun - and some of the ladies were just about falling out of their seats when I told them what "uncover his feet" really meant.  This was imposed and made into a tabloid booklet - very fun.
• The video corresponding to week five's work out asks the question, "What persons or organizations do you think are doing the most to show kindness to others in this area?"

Before I get into my reflections let me say again, I'm so happy that people are continuing to download BE and I hope it's been useful for you!  If you are using it, why not log in and drop by the forums to let us know how it's going.  I'd love to hear suggestions, critiques, and ideas for the leader's guide to make this more useful to others.

Now, on to this week... 

Let me start by saying how pleased I am at the number of people who haven't dropped out of BE.  In fact, people have missed weeks and, rather than trying to slide under the bar, they've gone beyond my expectations for keeping with the movement.  That's really encouraging - we'll see where we are by the last week, because that'll show me how many who are involved "got it," but as of right now I'm encouraged.  This has been a good thing (and preaching sermons on evangelism is fun).

Week five has the longest reading of the devotional, the entire book of Ruth, but we broke it down into parts and read it almost like a play (I used the God's Word Translation for this,  it's a terrible site but a decent translation.  In the past I've used the New Living Translation for stuff like this, but I wanted something different - and, yes, I had permission from the publisher).  It always amazes me how breaking scripture into these "parts" makes it come alive for Americans - it fits into our mind-set (get the Gospel of John film if you're wondering about this).

What's so neat about this book for me is how the idea of chesed (covenant-loyalty, loving-kindness, kindness, faithfulness) is central to the book.  The necessity of caring for family, the call to "cling" to the people to whom you are bound, and idea that this is somehow bound up in what it means to be sharing God's image make this book come alive for me.  Ruth, a Moabite, not only recieved this loving-kindness, she demonstrates it - and in the same way, for me at least, shows and beholds the image of God in the town of Bethlehem.  People generally read this as a story about a loyal daughter-in-law, and it is, but it's so much more than that.  Ruth speaks to the very fabric of what Israel's society was supposed to be about - and the, ahem, "earthy" ends to which people would go to see that their family would not pass from Israel.  If you've never read it, read it again.

 The "two way street" aspect of Ruth is one of the reasons that it was selected for this chapter.  People who are attempting to live a life of evangelism need to understand that they might have as much to learn as they have to teach.  The way I'm starting to see it is that we don't bring Jesus to people as much as we go out and meet Jesus where he already is - and we point to him among the people.  I think Ruth shows this type of thing happening.

The reading of Ruth during worship turned out very good.  I loved being able to do short meditations with the congregation because it made me feel like we were going through the story together (as opposed to me being up in front being the only one talking).  I also got the feeling that telling the whole story in one shot helped people understand the meaning of Ruth a lot better than if we'd broken it up into chapers and verses.  We certainly opened people up to the true meaning of chapter three!

We're now done with the Tanakh, CrossPoint has already been through the first of the New Testament weeks - now we get to tie all of this directly into the Christian faith and see that the New Testament wasn't so much an innovation as it was a revolutionary application of what it meant to be God's people.

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