“Those who sow in tears shall reap with joyful shouting. He who goes to and fro weeping, carrying his bag of seed, Shall indeed come again with shouts of joy, bringing his sheaves with him.” Psalm 126: 5-6
“For where you go, I will go , and where you lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God. Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried.”
Ruth 1: 16-17
Is anyone curious about how a Gentile woman was honored by having a whole book in the Hebrew Scriptures named after her? What was God thinking?
It was the times of the Judges, when there was no king in Israel; and when everyone did what was right in his own eyes. ( Very much like it is today in our own world. )
In Bethlehem, there was famine in the land. Naomi and her husband, Elimelech, went in search for food for themselves and their boys, because there was no bread in the “house of bread”, which is what Bethlehem means.
They settled in the land east of Judah , in Moab.
And there was bread in Moab, but the price was exorbitant, for with it came the devastating grief over the next ten years of the death of Elimelech and the subsequent death of their two sons. Through a river of tears, Naomi and her two Moabite daughters-in-law started on their way back to Bethlehem, for they had heard that there was no more famine there.
Now Ruth had been observing her mother-in-law’s life. She admired the courage and grace she saw in Naomi during the death of her husband, and noted the personal impact the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob had in her life. Unlike their idol Chemosh, the fish god of the Moabites, also known as “the destroyer”, with his implacable demands, Naomi’s God wanted to “tabernacle” with His people and care for them. Naomi had rehearsed the exodus of her people with her daughters-in-law, from slavery in Egypt and how their God had wonderfully wrought a great deliverance from the Egyptians by the blood of the Passover lamb. How God had personally led His people through the desert wilderness in the form of a pillar of cloud by day and pillar of fire by night. How different was the God of Naomi! There was no comparison to the self-serving Moabite god Chemosh. Ruth saw the same strength exhibited when Naomi lost her sons later on, and Naomi’s silent witness, more than anything she had said, was seed sown in good, prepared ground, in Ruth’s heart..
Naomi’s testimony moved Ruth to say, against her mother-in-law insistence that she return to Moab along with sister-in-law , “…Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God.”
God had the Gentiles on His mind all along. Abraham was a Gentile before the Lord called him out from Ur of the Chaldeans.(Gen.12:1-3) “ Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.” (Rom.4:3-4) And so it was with Ruth. Long before Peter’s vision in Acts 10 when the Lord’s voice said, “What God has cleansed, no longer consider unholy”, God has always been concerned for the heart. Ruth, like Abraham, and like her great grandson King David, were people after God’s own heart. The world awaited the arrival of Ruth’s descendant, according to the flesh, the Messiah—Jesus Christ.
When we take the bread and the fruit of the vine in communion, we are acknowledging that here “there is no distinction between Gentile and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, brave and freeman, but Christ is all and in all.” Col.3:11
Every soul redeemed is a cause for joy. Naomi didn’t know it at the time, but the tears and the life she had sown through Ruth, culminated in an armful of blessing to Naomi, in her present, immediate circumstance. For the world, Bethlehem was truly once again “the house of bread”in a much larger sense. The Bread of Life that was born on that first Christmas Eve would later declare in His manhood, “I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me will not hunger, and he who believes in Me will never thirst.” (John 6:35). That is worth a shout of joy, in any generation!
Question To Think About:
1. Who can you say in your personal life that you’ve influenced for Christ, just as Naomi did for Ruth?
“For where you go, I will go , and where you lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God. Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried.”
Ruth 1: 16-17
Is anyone curious about how a Gentile woman was honored by having a whole book in the Hebrew Scriptures named after her? What was God thinking?
It was the times of the Judges, when there was no king in Israel; and when everyone did what was right in his own eyes. ( Very much like it is today in our own world. )
In Bethlehem, there was famine in the land. Naomi and her husband, Elimelech, went in search for food for themselves and their boys, because there was no bread in the “house of bread”, which is what Bethlehem means.
They settled in the land east of Judah , in Moab.
And there was bread in Moab, but the price was exorbitant, for with it came the devastating grief over the next ten years of the death of Elimelech and the subsequent death of their two sons. Through a river of tears, Naomi and her two Moabite daughters-in-law started on their way back to Bethlehem, for they had heard that there was no more famine there.
Now Ruth had been observing her mother-in-law’s life. She admired the courage and grace she saw in Naomi during the death of her husband, and noted the personal impact the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob had in her life. Unlike their idol Chemosh, the fish god of the Moabites, also known as “the destroyer”, with his implacable demands, Naomi’s God wanted to “tabernacle” with His people and care for them. Naomi had rehearsed the exodus of her people with her daughters-in-law, from slavery in Egypt and how their God had wonderfully wrought a great deliverance from the Egyptians by the blood of the Passover lamb. How God had personally led His people through the desert wilderness in the form of a pillar of cloud by day and pillar of fire by night. How different was the God of Naomi! There was no comparison to the self-serving Moabite god Chemosh. Ruth saw the same strength exhibited when Naomi lost her sons later on, and Naomi’s silent witness, more than anything she had said, was seed sown in good, prepared ground, in Ruth’s heart..
Naomi’s testimony moved Ruth to say, against her mother-in-law insistence that she return to Moab along with sister-in-law , “…Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God.”
God had the Gentiles on His mind all along. Abraham was a Gentile before the Lord called him out from Ur of the Chaldeans.(Gen.12:1-3) “ Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.” (Rom.4:3-4) And so it was with Ruth. Long before Peter’s vision in Acts 10 when the Lord’s voice said, “What God has cleansed, no longer consider unholy”, God has always been concerned for the heart. Ruth, like Abraham, and like her great grandson King David, were people after God’s own heart. The world awaited the arrival of Ruth’s descendant, according to the flesh, the Messiah—Jesus Christ.
When we take the bread and the fruit of the vine in communion, we are acknowledging that here “there is no distinction between Gentile and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, brave and freeman, but Christ is all and in all.” Col.3:11
Every soul redeemed is a cause for joy. Naomi didn’t know it at the time, but the tears and the life she had sown through Ruth, culminated in an armful of blessing to Naomi, in her present, immediate circumstance. For the world, Bethlehem was truly once again “the house of bread”in a much larger sense. The Bread of Life that was born on that first Christmas Eve would later declare in His manhood, “I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me will not hunger, and he who believes in Me will never thirst.” (John 6:35). That is worth a shout of joy, in any generation!
Question To Think About:
1. Who can you say in your personal life that you’ve influenced for Christ, just as Naomi did for Ruth?
Posted in Sowing In Tears