The Grey

In the 2011 movie The Grey, Liam Neeson plays John Ottway, a sharpshooter at an oil rig in Alaska[i].  Ottway has been hired by the refinery to keep bears and beasts from attacking oil workers during their shifts. Flying home on a two-week leave, the team’s rickety plane hits a storm and crashes, leaving eight survivors.  The movie takes a pessimistic view of life and faith, as one by one, predatory wolves or circumstances kills off each of the men. 

In a closing scene, Ottway, whose past adversity has led him to reject God and religion, cries out a profane, last ditch Hail Mary of a prayer:

Do something. Do something... [expletives deleted] Do something! Come on! Prove it! Earn it! Show me something real! I need it now. Not later. Now! Show me and I'll believe in you until the day I die. I swear. I'm calling on you. I'm calling on you!  

He looks to the sky for a rescue.  But there will be no rescue today.  Ottway makes a last, certainly futile, stand against the wolf pack.  

Naomi and Ottway represent two responses to God because life hasn’t gone the way they thought it should.  And honestly, if Naomi had died sooner, who’s to say she would not have left things as Ottway?    My post of the other day, My Friend Vicky, is a case in point.  God is God whether like you the hand you’re dealt or not.  It’s what you do with it that matters.  Die in peace or die angry and bitter.[ii]  The story is not over for Naomi, nor is it over for you.  

It was no accident that Ruth ended up at Boaz's field.  And the same Lord works sovereignly and carefully in all your life’s details, especially when it’s least apparent. 

As in our own lives, the hand of God is more implicit than explicit in Ruth.  Even so, God is no less intimately involved in Naomi’s life – or yours – than when he parted the Red Sea or raised Jesus from the dead.  Throughout the book of Ruth you can find subtle references to the power and control of God:

1:2 – Elimelech means "my God is King" 

1:6 – "the Lord visited his people" 

1:20, 21, negatively – "the Almighty has made my life very bitter...the Lord has caused me to come back empty;" 

4:13 -- "the Lord gave to [Ruth] conception." 

It is precisely at a place like chapter 2, verse 3 that you might be tempted to give things up to chance, to fate. The English Standard Version reads, "…she happened to come to the part of the field belonging to Boaz."     The Hebrew literally reads, "it chanced from her chance that she went out and gleaned..." 

Friends, this was no accident.  The author has prepared us for Boaz in verse 1.  A good translation might be, "It just so happened” that Ruth ended up in the field belonging to Boaz, recognizing that there had in fact been no accident at all.  To paraphrase one scholar, the book of Ruth shows the same view of reality as the rest of the Old Testament, that God holds absolute sway over the affairs and actions of his world.  Do you believe that He does?  He happens to whether you believe it or not. 

The same Lord works sovereignly in all our lives, especially when it’s least apparent. 

As you try to find God in your own life, be confident that the Lord is intimately involved in every event of your day, both the good and the bad, the big and the small, and that he can work redemptively in every circumstance. 

Aren't two sparrows sold for a penny?  Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your father.  And even the very hairs of your head are numbered.  So don't be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.

Jesus in Matthew 10:29, 30

As he does with Ruth, the Lord sovereignly cares for you, especially when it seems least likely, and all the while without visible dramatic intervention. Do you believe that He does?  We can’t prevent heartache and pain.  But what we can do – what you can do and I can do – is cooperate with a loving God who can use painful events in our lives and work them for good in our hearts. 

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[i] The movie was filmed in Smithers, BC in actual weather conditions and without the use of Computer Generated Imagery (CGI).   

[ii] Another of my pet theories is that as people age, they care less what people think, and their true character emerges.  Some seniors are filled with peace and it shows, and others are grumpy old men (or women).