Kingdom Bearers
Amanda MacQuarrie
October 31, 2021
Add to Favourites
Listen to this daily worship
Ruth 1: 1-18 (NIVUK)
1 In the days when the judges ruled, there was a famine in the land. So a man from Bethlehem in Judah, together with his wife and two sons, went to live for a while in the country of Moab. 2 The man’s name was Elimelek, his wife’s name was Naomi, and the names of his two sons were Mahlon and Kilion. They were Ephrathites from Bethlehem, Judah. And they went to Moab and lived there.
3 Now Elimelek, Naomi’s husband, died, and she was left with her two sons. 4 They married Moabite women, one named Orpah and the other Ruth. After they had lived there about ten years, 5 both Mahlon and Kilion also died, and Naomi was left without her two sons and her husband.
6 When Naomi heard in Moab that the Lord had come to the aid of his people by providing food for them, she and her daughters-in-law prepared to return home from there. 7 With her two daughters-in-law she left the place where she had been living and set out on the road that would take them back to the land of Judah.
8 Then Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, ‘Go back, each of you, to your mother’s home. May the Lord show you kindness, as you have shown kindness to your dead husbands and to me. 9 May the Lord grant that each of you will find rest in the home of another husband.’
Then she kissed them goodbye and they wept aloud 10 and said to her, ‘We will go back with you to your people.’
11 But Naomi said, ‘Return home, my daughters. Why would you come with me? Am I going to have any more sons, who could become your husbands? 12 Return home, my daughters; I am too old to have another husband. Even if I thought there was still hope for me – even if I had a husband tonight and then gave birth to sons – 13 would you wait until they grew up? Would you remain unmarried for them? No, my daughters. It is more bitter for me than for you, because the Lord’s hand has turned against me!’
14 At this they wept aloud again. Then Orpah kissed her mother-in-law goodbye, but Ruth clung to her.
15 ‘Look,’ said Naomi, ‘your sister-in-law is going back to her people and her gods. Go back with her.’
16 But Ruth replied, ‘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. 17 Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me.’ 18 When Naomi realised that Ruth was determined to go with her, she stopped urging her.
It can be easy to think that God is only revealed to us through tried and tested signs and symbols … but sometimes God takes the ordinary everyday things of life and transforms them… pointing us to something bigger, making them a window, an opportunity to glimpse the divine — God’s mercy, justice, grace and love.
These are the moments which give our lives new meaning…
And it’s not always in the easiest of times either… sometimes it’s the thorniest, the grittiest most uncomfortable of times where we discover the pearl of great wealth…
The immeasurable beauty of God’s love for us!
Think of Naomi…
When her son first brought home the foreign girl he’d fallen for, could Naomi have known the gift that Ruth would become in her life?
In the hardest of times Naomi is truly blessed as this young foreign widow promises her elderly mother-in-law “where you go, I will go and where you stay, I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried”
So reminiscent of God’s promise to God’s people throughout time — Never to leave us, nor forsake us!
God used Ruth to bless Naomi richly, bringing her hope, and a future in the shape of her great great grandson David, the King of Israel.
Often God uses the people in our lives to be the bearers of the Kingdom…
Who in your life is a blessing or is used by God to speak to you or teach you something of God’s love and compassion for you?
Why not give thanks to God for them now?
PRAYER:
Eternal Surpriser,
Thank you for the new ways you continue to speak to us or touch our lives,
And for those around us whom you use in our lives:
Helping us, teaching us, smoothing our rough edges and loving us with your everlasting love.
Enable us to see the treasures of your Kingdom in the stuff of everyday,
And to recognise you in the folks around us.
Amen
Login to comment.