Ruth 1:1-22 - Your People and God are Mine!

Ruth 1:1-22

Elimelech’s Family Goes to Moab

1 Now it came to pass, in the days when the judges ruled, that there was a famine in the land. And a certain man of Bethlehem, Judah, went to dwell in the country of Moab, he and his wife and his two sons. 2 The name of the man was Elimelech, the name of his wife was Naomi, and the names of his two sons were Mahlon and Chilion—Ephrathites of Bethlehem, Judah. And they went to the country of Moab and remained there. 3 Then Elimelech, Naomi’s husband, died; and she was left, and her two sons. 4 Now they took wives of the women of Moab: the name of the one was Orpah, and the name of the other Ruth. And they dwelt there about ten years. 5 Then both Mahlon and Chilion also died; so the woman survived her two sons and her husband.

Naomi Returns with Ruth

6 Then she arose with her daughters-in-law that she might return from the country of Moab, for she had heard in the country of Moab that the LORD had visited His people by giving them bread. 7 Therefore she went out from the place where she was, and her two daughters-in-law with her; and they went on the way to return to the land of Judah. 8 And Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, “Go, return each to her mother’s house. The LORD deal kindly with you, as you have dealt with the dead and with me. 9 The LORD grant that you may find rest, each in the house of her husband.”

So she kissed them, and they lifted up their voices and wept. 10 And they said to her, “Surely we will return with you to your people.”

11 But Naomi said, “Turn back, my daughters; why will you go with me? Are there still sons in my womb, that they may be your husbands? 12 Turn back, my daughters, go—for I am too old to have a husband. If I should say I have hope, if I should have a husband tonight and should also bear sons, 13 would you wait for them till they were grown? Would you restrain yourselves from having husbands? No, my daughters; for it grieves me very much for your sakes that the hand of the LORD has gone out against me!”

14 Then they lifted up their voices and wept again; and Orpah kissed her mother-in-law, but Ruth clung to her.

15 And she said, “Look, your sister-in-law has gone back to her people and to her gods; return after your sister-in-law.”

16 But Ruth said:

“Entreat me not to leave you,
Or to turn back from following after you;
For wherever you go, I will go;
And wherever you lodge, I will lodge;
Your people shall be my people,
And your God, my God.

17 Where you die, I will die,
And there will I be buried.
The LORD do so to me, and more also,
If anything but death parts you and me.”

18 When she saw that she was determined to go with her, she stopped speaking to her.

19 Now the two of them went until they came to Bethlehem. And it happened, when they had come to Bethlehem, that all the city was excited because of them; and the women said, ”Is this Naomi?”

20 But she said to them, “Do not call me Naomi; call me Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. 21 I went out full, and the LORD has brought me home again empty. Why do you call me Naomi, since the LORD has testified against me, and the Almighty has afflicted me?”

22 So Naomi returned, and Ruth the Moabitess her daughter-in-law with her, who returned from the country of Moab. Now they came to Bethlehem at the beginning of barley harvest.

Famine drives the beginning of the story of Ruth during the time of the judges in Israel.  Elimelech and his wife Naomi left the town of Bethlehem in Judah with their sons Mahlon and Chilion during the famine to avoid starvation.  They went to Moab of all places, longtime enemies of their people and idol worshippers as well.  Nonetheless, they went where there was food to survive there; unfortunately, the sons both married but both died after their father Elimelech had already passed.  Naomi was left alone to care for her two daughters-in-law, three widows in a pagan land that was foreign to Naomi the Ephrathite.  When the famine eased in Judah, she started back home at last to her own people of her own God but told her daughters-in-law to go back to their own families there in Moab when she left.  She wished God’s blessings on each of them and thanked them for their loving care for her and her sons they had married and been widow from.  They wanted to at least take her back to her people in Bethlehem, but Naomi thought of their welfare and how they would be not well received as Moabites in Israel, and she begged them to remain in their own land among their own people as she reminded them that she was too old to remarry and produce more sons to replace their husbands.  The one named Orpah kissed her mother-in-law and left, but the other named Ruth clung to her in devotion and gave her moving speech to say, “wherever you go, I will go; and wherever you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God, my God. Where you die, I will die, and there will I be buried.  The LORD do so to me, and more also, if anything but death parts you and me.”  She was committed to her mother-in-law in life to always dwell with her until death as if one of the people grafted into Naomi’s people.  This is an example for we who have been grafted into (Romans 9:6-7, 8, 11:17, Ephesians 2:11, 12, 13, Romans 2:28-29) the chosen people of the Lord in Christ to be under God’s grace, provision, and protection until we die, committed to Him and the body of Christ no matter the circumstances or treatment by others.  We serve the same God as the true Israel of God, the chosen people of His calling to the same inheritance in the Lord Jesus Christ, and find the same relief from spiritual starvation in eating of His body (1 Corinthians 10:16-17, 12:12, 13) together.  Naomi returned to Bethlehem with Ruth as a bitter woman after her extreme misfortune in Moab, but we look to the one born in Bethlehem two thousand years ago to see the bittersweet birth of the one who came to live and die for us as a sacrifice to fill our hunger in this spiritually dry and barren land (Psalm 63:1, Matthew 5:6, John 6:33, 35, 51) and rescue us from the futility of sin and its due punishment.  We are like Naomi and Ruth coming into the land of God at the harvest season (John 4:35), fruit of the gospel of deliverance from death as we were starving and facing a certain death apart from partaking of the true Bread from heaven, our Lord Jesus Christ who is the Son of God given for us from Bethlehem to lead us into the New Jerusalem that will come down from heaven for Him to live with us in hope.  He has led us out of the darkness of famine for Him and His word by the gospel into this everlasting and ever-satisfying hope.  Our Father God is His (John 20:17, Ephesians 1:17) and we are (Leviticus 26:12, Hebrews 8:10, 1 Peter 2:9) His people.  Oh, to know your people and God are mine and mine are yours!  How blessed we are, no matter the adversity of circumstances, dwelling with and in Him together!