Courtney Gilmore Don’t ask me to leave you and turn back. Wherever you go, I will go. Wherever you live, I will live. Your people will be my people, and your God will be my God. Wherever you die, I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord punish me severely if I allow anything but death to separate us!
Ruth 1:16-17
These words are often recited at weddings, and though it is a perfect vow to make to our spouse, Ruth said these words to her mother-in-law. When she joined herself to her husband, she not only committed to him, but to his family and his God. Even after he died, she refused to leave Naomi or the Lord. Even though her sister-in-law ‘s husband had also died, and she went back to her family and her gods, Ruth followed Naomi to Israel, made it her home, and followed the Lord all of her life. As a matter of fact, Ruth was the great-grandmother of King David!
Naomi told Ruth to go back to her people and her gods like her sister-in-law Orpah, which presented a sharp contrast between the two daughters-in-law. As soon as I saw it, I thought, I want to be like Ruth. On the surface, it made sense for them to go back to their own families, find a husband, and have children. But then I realized that Orpah also went back to her own gods. Her whole life – everything she did, the people she hung out with, the place where she lived, and everything she believed in was dependent on her husband.
The Joining of Two Lives
This, too, is honorable on the surface. They had made a life together. I can relate. I married my husband 27 years ago when I was 18 years old. My whole adult life has been wrapped up in him. I’ve been a Gilmore longer than I was a Lilljedahl.
After our children graduated high school, I followed him away from our hometown to his new job. I had lived just down the road from my parents since the day I moved out of their house. Now we are only a couple of hours away, but it feels far to me. I spent the first 40 years of my life in that town, and I miss it. But that place wasn’t my home. My home is wherever I live with my husband. My life is wrapped up in him and I think that’s good.
From the beginning of the creation, God “made them male and female.” “For this reason, a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” So, then, they are no longer two, but one flesh.
Mark 10:6-8
Temporary or Permanent Commitment
But what struck me, is how differently these two women reacted after their husbands died. One seemed to completely abandon everything she had previously committed to, whereas the other stayed fully devoted. Ruth had adopted her husband’s family as her own, her husband’s people as her people, and most importantly, her husband’s God as her God. But Orpah, not only went back to her family and her people, but she went back to her gods.
Orpah went back to her old life as if she never left it. But, when faced with her old life or her new, Ruth seemed to realize she had nothing worth going back to. She had fully adopted her husband’s family, people, and God as her own. First, they had been his, then they were theirs, and now they are hers. Naomi was still part of her family. She was not going to abandon her. But, more importantly, Naomi’s God had become her God, and she could not leave Him.
This made me think about what I would do if something happened to my husband. I might go back to my hometown, or I might stay right here. I’m not really sure. We have not lived in this town for very long and I’m not fully established. But what I do know is that my commitment to the Lord will not change. I accepted Him as my Savior many years ago and He is the Lord of my life. My parents and my husband may leave this earth before me and my children have already left my home, but my God will forever be my God.
Going Through the Motions
In the beginning, your God may have been your parent’s God, or your spouse’s, or your friend’s. But eventually, you must adopt Him as your own. We all must ask ourselves: Do we go to church, give money, pray, and outwardly do what God says because that’s what we were taught? Do we just feel obligated? Is church just what you do on Sunday morning, and you don’t want to meet that offering plate empty handed, so you go through the motions and you appear godly, but your heart isn’t in it?
You pay tithes… and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice, mercy, and faith. These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone… You are like whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness. Even so, you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside, you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.
Matthew 23:23, 27-28
Dead men’s bones sounds like zombies, mechanically doing what they should without a heart to care, doesn’t it?
So, maybe you are just going through the motions every Sunday. Or maybe you pray before meals and at bedtime just because it’s your normal ritual. Maybe you recite the “Lord’s prayer,” “God is good, God is great,” or “now I lay me down to sleep,” but they are just empty words. They’ve become so routine that you don’t realize what you are saying or who you are saying it to.
When you pray, do not use vain repetitions as the heathen do. For they think that they will be heard for their many words. Therefore, do not be like them. For your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask.
Matthew 6:7-8
Adopt Him As Your Own
So, ask yourself this: If your children were grown, and your spouse was gone, would you still go to church, give, pray, or read your bible? Would you still obey God’s rules or feel free to finally do what you want? Do you have a personal relationship with Him? Do you see His importance in your life? If you were suddenly left alone with no outside pressure, would you choose God, or would you seek out the life you had before Him?
At one point, the people told Jesus that some of the things he was teaching were really hard to take, and some of the people quit following Him. So, He turned to the twelve disciples and said, “Do you also want to go away?” Peter’s reply echoes in my ears after seeing Ruth’s reaction to going back to her old gods. He said:
Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. Also, we have come to believe and know that You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.
John 6:68-69
So, once we really know God for who He is, there is no way to turn away from Him. If Jesus is who He says He is, then there is no one else. He is the only One with the words of life, the only One that we will never, ever be separated from. Our relationship with Him is eternal!
Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man who trusts in Him! Oh, fear the lord, you His saint! There is no want to those who fear Him. The young lions lack and suffer hunger. But those who seek the Lord shall not lack any good thing.
Psalm 34:8-10
There is No Lacking in the Lord
Naomi thought since she lost her family, she was more lacking in her return than when she left only lacking food. But she had not lost Ruth, and she still had a home to return to. Whether she felt like God had dealt her a bitter hand or not, her people still knew who she was. She was Naomi, the sweet woman that moved away and had come finally home.
Ruth may have moved away from her own family, but she’d joined a new one. She left Moab to find a new home and be part of a new community. Ruth may have lost her husband, but she had not lost her God. She had found a better God in Israel than she could have ever returned to in Moab, and she was devoted to Him.
I hope you too have adopted God as your own, that you have your own personal relationship with Him, and that you have devoted the rest of your life to Him. When you do, your life will never be the same! You will see that there is nothing worth ever going back to.
If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. Old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new.
2 Corinthians 5:17
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