Ruth 1:19-22 GETTING BACK Ruth had just made one of the great confessions of faith in all of the scripture. This young Gentile woman was committed to do the will of God. It makes no difference to God where a person is from, or what their creed or culture is. The fact is made plain in the word of God that "He that feareth Him (God) and worketh righteousness is accepted with Him." God was with Ruth, the stranger, when she was gleaning in the fields, and with Esther, a young Jewish woman, in the city. He guides the gleaner and overrules the king on the throne. Wherever you are, God is at work on behalf of His people. Faith is obeying God in spite of the consequences; not in spite of evidence. Ruth points the way to an exciting, dynamic faith. Her faith wasn't the kind that puts feet in the water and expects the river to stop flowing, or to throw a tree into bad water to make it fit to drink. He faith was demonstrated in her commitment to serve God by serving Naomi and being with her until death and burial. It is not common in our day to see such genuine devotion as Ruth declared in plain words to Naomi. Instead of commitment to others, the normal now is to "self-awareness, self-esteem, self-fulfillment, self-confidence and pleasing myself." It doesn't cross the mind of very many people except in an emergency that it is normal Christian living for us to pay a cost that other people may benefit at our expense. Integration doesn't happen when we put our own good and self-interests before that which can bless others.
We all are prone to making mistakes when we think a particular action will be to our advantage. As a result of unbelief in the promises of God in times of problems, the inclination is to run away from them rather than face them and deal with them the best way we can. In faith we know that God is "able to do above all that which we ask or think." Many of God’s people now, like in Ruth’s day, live in unbelief and disobedience and are not enjoying God’s blessings. We are living in a harvest time even though there seems so little fruit being gathered from the great harvest field. Famine is a time of discipline in which our faith is both tested and strengthened. Part of the problem is that we think we deserve all we can get because "we earned it." Self-sacrifice is what God wants from His people and in order for this to be real we will commit ourselves to serving others with genuine commitment. Unbelief moved Elimelech to walk by sight, not by faith, and so he left the house of bread at harvest time. In making that decision he was majoring on the physical, not the spiritual, and consequently did not honor the Lord. We can't really run away from our problems because the basic cause of our problems is our lack of faith in God and our disobedience to Him. The consequences may be last a long time and may even be fatal.
Another common mistake is deception in which we try to hide our mistakes. We ask God for some blessing on our labor, family and those things for which we think we have a right, but I have to ask myself, "Am I a blessable person?" Can God trust me? I ask for souls to be saved but am I a shepherd who can be trusted with the "lambs?" When He gives me more finances than I really need, am I one who He knows will use this kind of blessing for the proper things in a right way? Naomi was trying to cover up and finally faced the fact that her only hope was to get back to where God wanted her to be. Orpah had given up, so she returned to the place she was before God had brought her to a person who could be a potential blessing to her. Ruth was prepared to stand up against the pressures brought against her, and frankly and openly confessed her faith. Deception has a way of undermining even our own concept of ourselves and seeks to give us excuses for our mistakes.
We can’t control all the circumstances of life, but we can control how we respond to them. Nine tenths of our unhappiness is a result of selfishness. It is a mistake to blame God for the trials and difficulties that comes to us in life and when the mistake of allowing bitterness to take root in our lives, we not only make serious damage to our own selves, but that "root of bitterness defiles many." Naomi came to the place in her life where she knew it was right to return to Bethlehem. The path she chose to walk led her to go back to Bethlehem. She knew it was time to turn her back on Moab even though it took time to clarify her plan. Her decision in turn had an influence on Ruth and her decision to go with her mother-in-law. If we ever leave the place, we know was right because of problems, for a place that is more conducive to our lifestyle or ambitions, we need to remember we will affect others who may live and die there. On the other hand, when we choose to return to the place we left, there are others who will wonder why we make this choice and they may return with us. The place in which Naomi and her husband chose to lodge, was not the place where the Lord was with His people. They had left a prosperous place in which there was a temporary problem and found the consequence of that choice was that she lost her family. We learn from Ruth the value of personal integrity in her commitment to Naomi, and we learn from Naomi the value of our personal testimony even though we may feel ourselves to be a failure.
However, God in His grace brought to pass a remarkable turn of events that brought a remarkable young woman to express her faith in a remarkable statement of faith. This in turn led Ruth who loved her mother-in- law, Naomi, to a different country and to different people she chose to love. All she knew about the people of God was in one person, Naomi. Because of walking by faith, she met the reapers (young men); gleaners (poor people); Boaz, a wealthy kinsman, and furthermore the whole village came out to meet Naomi and Ruth. These people were the people of the Lord and they accepted her in spite of the differences of nationality and background. This then was the plan she chose to live by: faith - going to a place she had never been; to live with people she did not know; to trust God to direct her life; take the little steps and the big steps when they came. The principles of living by faith do not change and when we practice them ourselves, we will find our gracious Father is there to guide, strengthen and have fellowship with us as we walk in the light with Him.
The commitment of Ruth to Naomi contrasts Orpah fading away into the distance with Ruth's stated commitment to Naomi. Orpah was not condemned for going away. She just did what was normal and acceptable to the society in which she lived. Ruth did that which was extraordinary by resisting the pressure to do what everyone else expected similar to the way peer pressure is exerted today. Her stand and statement are an example to us to not allow ourselves to be pressured to go for the second or third best no matter who applies that pressure. In spite of Naomi's urging, Ruth stayed firm and her stated commitment left no grounds for misunderstanding what she meant. We should never let the appeal to the pressure of society to change our minds from our commitment to God. Social pressure and pressure from Naomi that was almost in the form of a command did not dissuade Ruth from her devotion both to Naomi and to God. Real devotion has a way of saying what we really mean in a way that is not misunderstood nor vague.
Ruth's firm stand took place when she made a firm statement. Clarification wasn't necessary for Naomi to know what she meant. She told Naomi of her own plans and was not about to acquiesce to Naomi's normal plans for her. Openness has great value when communicating with others when it is tempered with thoughtfulness and spoken with gracious words. Christians can't be everything to everybody in every situation. Compromise to please others is not acceptable if it is based on human opinion. Our work, our family ties and our ambition are not wrong if it does not take away our devotion to the Lord and commitment to Him and His people. The expense of energy is legitimate when it is expended in fellowship with God and His revealed will. Ruth burned all her bridges in one statement that not only committed her to Naomi until she started a new life, but even to death and burial. She made that commitment and carried it out. Her plain stated words stopped all weeping and wailing. The silence that came over them confirmed the power of her commitment. Total commitment stops all objections, arguments and underhanded innuendos when it is true and genuine. When that is the case, then it is free of dispute and the challenges that may be thrown against the commitment are useless. Whether we like it or not, we leave heart-prints when our words are precise, meaningful and appropriate to a situation. Just like we leave fingerprints behind us wherever we go, so one who has committed themselves to another and to being faithful leave an indelible impression that cannot be negated. To have our commitment to God printed on our hearts is of far greater value than have ink printed on our skin.