All Things New

“Do not urge me to leave you or to return from following you. For where you go I will go, and where 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. May the LORD do so to me and more also if anything but death parts me from you.” [1]

Bitcoin was introduced at a price of zero when it was introduced in 2009. It had jumped all the way to nine cents by July 17, 2010. The price had jumped to a peak of $29.60 by June 7, 2011. By the way, Bitcoin reached an all time high of $67,549.14 on November 7, 2021. Did you ever consider investing in Bitcoin when it was first offered at a price of zero dollars? Had you done so, you would be fabulously wealthy today. A similar story could be told of Microsoft shares or Apple shares.

Or how would you like to be James Howells. Howells is a 35-year-old IT engineer from Wales who began mining the cryptocurrency in 2009. He was cleaning his office in 2013 when he threw away the hard drive with over 7500 bitcoins which grew to be worth over 280 million dollars! Since that time, the man has sought permission to dig through a dump site in which he believes the hard drive was dumped. [2]

It is all well and good to speak of financial opportunities, but other opportunities have come to each of us. It might have been that handsome man who once showed such interest in you ladies, and he went on to become an industrial titan. Or it might have been that gracious girl who once shared a soda with you men, and she went on to be a brilliant jurist or an accomplished scientist. I would suppose that each of us can look back at opportunities recognised just a little too late, saying, “It might have been.”

Maybe it was the opportunity to keep your mouth closed before you spoke. You didn’t know all the details, but you weighed in anyway. The repercussions of that one moment damaged relationships you valued and created an incredible mess in the lives of others. Now, you can only look back in regret, thinking of what could have been.

Opportunities come to each of us; but too often these opportunities are ignored. We can’t predict the future; we are too often incapable of understanding the consequences of our failure to seize opportunities as they arise. There is a time to receive the life that the Saviour offers each of us. It is to be hoped that each person would say to the Master, as did Ruth to Naomi, “Do not urge me to leave You or to return from following You. For where You go I will go, and where You lodge I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God.”

There is a powerful truth revealed through these verses—a truth that can benefit any of us. That truth is that the transformation that accompanies faith in God brings newness to our lives. Or perhaps for those of us who are in the Faith, we could say that the truth speaks of the opportunity for us to begin to walk with the Master as we know we should, it is the opportunity for us to begin to walk in Christ’s power.

Naomi repented of her sin, and as consequence of her determination to return to her roots, Ruth experienced her own challenge. How would she respond to the new challenges as the old relationships were loosened and new horizons stretch before her? The life she had known was forever gone, and now a new world stretched before her. What happened in Ruth’s life is what happens in our lives when we begin our walk with the Risen Saviour in the power provided by the Spirit of God.

Naomi made the decision that she would no longer pursue her husband’s dream, but she would accept responsibility for making her own decision. Whether embracing Elimelech’s vision or not, she had acted in submission to his vision as he forsook his heritage to emigrate to Moab. Now, however, Elimelech was dead, as were Naomi’s sons, Mahlon and Chilion. Naomi was on her own, and she made the difficult decision to return to her roots. She was no longer following her husband’s dream; henceforth, she would make a future for herself.

I understand the danger inherent in arguing that a wife must be responsible for her own decision rather than embracing her husband’s decisions. Though a husband and a wife are to be a team in this life, we must not forget that each enters heaven as individuals. Each person is responsible before God for her or his own decision. Because this is true, husbands and wives must communicate with one another and make the effort to be united in their decisions. Husbands do bear the ultimate responsibility before God for family decisions, but the husband that does not consider his wife or solicit her participation is a fool. Likewise, the wife who rebels simply because she bought into the modern fantasy of “the strong woman,” is a fool.