Narrative Lectionary Key Verse for Today
“Where you go, I will go;
where you lodge, I will lodge;
your people shall be my people,
and your God my God. ”
NL Daily Devotion for Sunday, October 13, 2019
by Dr. Kimberly Leetch, Clergy Stuff
Main Idea: Ruth and Naomi both made difficult decisions from impossible choices; Ruth’s love and loyalty toward Naomi blossomed into unexpected blessings.
Naomi had lost a great deal. First, her homeland when famine forced her family to move in Moab. Then she lost her husband. And then her sons. She had nothing left, or so she thought.
Ruth and Orpah had also lost a great deal. They were Moabite women who had married Israelites. Already they had lost the identities of their childhoods. Then they lost their husbands. Now they were faced with losing their mother-in-law, too. Orpah saw what she could regain by returning home. Ruth chose instead to stay with her mother-in-law, even though it meant losing out on the opportunity to remarry within Moab. Ruth left everything behind to follow Naomi back to Naomi’s home.
All these women were faced with impossible choices. Each option held gains and losses. What makes Ruth’s story so compelling is that she made her choice more for the benefit of Naomi than for herself. Truthfully, there was nothing in Naomi’s homeland for Ruth (or so she thought). But Naomi had very little prospects for survival as a widow in a patriarchal land. With Ruth’s youth and beauty, she at least had another person to care for her, to provide food, and to protect her from the dangers of isolation. In a delightful turn, we will learn later, God did have greater plans for both women, none of which would have been possible if not for the difficult decision Ruth made to stay.
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