Day 26: Your God Shall Be My God (Ruth 1:16)
Today’s Passage: Ruth 1:16
I start this ending reflection with the above title because it is perhaps a cornerstone quote from the lips of Ruth, for whom this book of the Bible draws its name.
Ruth clings to her mother-in-law. Aside from any jokes about the relationships between daughter-in-law and mother-in-law, Ruth’s actions are stunning. Its outcome—that she is the great grandmother of King David and in the linage of the Savior of the World, Jesus Christ—could never have been foreseen by this Moabite.
Reflect back to the threefold prayer offered in 4:14-17. It was answered beyond their wildest dreams.
Yet my theology says God knew this outcome. He was not surprised.
One of the points of reference when I started reading Ruth this time around, was of God’s overarching involvement and providence in His world, and with His people.
I know this is theologically true, yet I don’t daily live that way. I too often let the highs and lows of my day toss me to-and-fro. Could reading Ruth help me?
I started my reading of Ruth with this specific aim in mind—I wanted to consider how someone facing a difficult life lived out their faith.
To do that I wanted to “set the table” so to speak regarding three situations.
First to establish the bleak national and international situation of Ruth’s day, she lived in the “days that the Judges ruled”. The mood of our own day seems rather bleak.
Second to note when we live in a dark world, our world gets even darker if we process our own personal struggles solely through the lens of our personal biography, and outside the purposes of God. I tend to process life in a way that makes “everything about me, and only me”.
Third to ask if we actually trust God. To over and over again consider how Naomi, Ruth, and Boaz seemed to trust Him. On the other hand, I know the theory in my brain, but I find my heart daily troubled, especially in my professional position.
I come to the end of Ruth reminded/encouraged, and yet challenged.
I am reminded and encouraged because of all the times I saw God acting. I have to calibrate my mind and heart regarding time. They were in Moab for many years. They walked many miles from Bethlehem, only to some years later turn around and walk back.
Through it all:
We saw Naomi process her life, the bad and the good, as having God’s complete involvement through His hesed.
We saw Ruth’s commitment to this woman of faith, Naomi, and over the course of her life it became her faith.
We saw Boaz not only obeying the Law, but going beyond it.
And because we stand on the outside looking in, we can be stunned that Naomi, Ruth, and Boaz had no idea that they were part of the linage of Jesus. The holy men who, led by the Spirit of God to include this book in the “Jewish Bible” had no idea.
Yet God did—His providence is supreme. Not one atom of the universe is beyond His reach. I expect that Ruth did not understand the expanse of The One True Living God when she proclaimed that Naomi’s God would be her God.