My family Devotions

This week in my family devotions we have been reading the book of Ruth. In chapter one we are introduced to Ruth, a Moabite woman who marries into a Jewish family in the years before the kings of Israel. Then tragically, all the men in the family die. We don't know how or why, but the ladies are left as widows.

The highlight of chapter one is when Ruth's mother-in-law attempts to send her back to Moab and her family and culture of origin. Ruth responds firmly by saying, “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God."

In chapter two Ruth and Naomi (the mother-in-law's name) move back to Israel and they meet one of Naomi's deceased husbands relatives, a man named Boaz. The highlight of chapter two is when Boaz watches Ruth work all day in the field and learns of her choice to move to Israel. he says, “I’ve been told all about what you have done for your mother-in-law since the death of your husband—how you left your father and mother and your homeland and came to live with a people you did not know before. 12 May the LORD repay you for what you have done. May you be richly rewarded by the LORD, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have come to take refuge.” Boaz not only noted that she helped her mother-in-law, and chose their nation, but that she had chosen the Lord! She had chosen to take refuge in the Lord our God.

How determined has your choice to follow the Lord been? Ruth left everything she knew, everything comfortable, all logical possibilities for advancement, her family religion, to follow the Lord. She struck out on a fools errand, to befriend a widow who had no claim to money or property, no leverage to provide Ruth another husband and no source of income. Let's make our determination to follow the Lord complete! Don't regret what you leave behind. Don't fear the unknown future. Trust the Lord.