Ruth The Caregiver - Sermon Ii: A Caregiver Who Took The Initiative Series

RUTH: WOMAN OF DEVOTION – SERMON II: A CAREGIVER WHO TOOK THE INITIATIVE

Ruth 2:2-7

Ruth has been considered through the centuries as one of the greatest women of devotion in the Bible. Her devotion as a caregiver has stood out in our minds so much so that those beautiful words of commitment spoken by Ruth to her mother-in-law Naomi have been used worldwide in religious wedding ceremonies.

“Entreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee; for wherever you go I will go; and where you lodge, I will lodge; thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God; where you die I will die, and there will I be buried.”

These words were spoken at a time when both women had suffered the loss of the men in their lives; and they had a decision to make about where they would go and what they would do. There was no coercion on the part of either of them, although Naomi did encourage Ruth to stay in her own land of Moab rather than go with her to the land of Palestine.

Without hesitation Ruth made the decision to go to Bethlehem with her mother-in-law purely and simply based on the love the two women had for each other.

In the book of Ruth, we read that when Naomi returned to Bethlehem, the people asked, “Is this the Naomi that we knew?” No doubt being away for more than a decade along with her tragedies had changed Naomi.

Tragedy always changes the people who are affected by it; but also, there are times when tragedy changes the people who have only heard about it happening to someone else; and all too often we sometimes get the notion that we ourselves are exempt from suffering. Yet, as was the case with the Virginia Tech tragedy not to mention other tragedies like 911, the nation and the world are deeply affected by tragic events.

In the case of Naomi, the tragedies were personal; she had lost her husband and two sons; Ruth had lost her husband who was one of Naomi’s two sons. So, both women shared a common grief, and they needed to have someone to lean on as they worked through their grief; Naomi was fortunate to have her daughter-in-law take on the role of caregiver as long as she lived.

It is understandable, though, that Naomi was still so grief-stricken that she told the folks who noticed a change in her that they should no longer call her Naomi – a Jewish name that meant “pleasant” – because she was now living a life that was anything but pleasant. Instead, she said call me Mara – another Jewish name that meant “bitter”. Naomi had gone through some bitter experiences; so that’s the way she felt – bitter.

One of the changes in attitude that any of us has to deal with when our lives are turned upside down - declining health or the death of a spouse or anything else - is the choice we all have to make as to whether the unwanted experience is going to make us “bitter” or “better”. Oftentimes, it happens with most of us the way it did with Naomi; at first we tend to be bitter; but as time goes by and we come to grips with the reality that life goes on, we tend to feel better – if we want to!

You can choose to stay bitter about the curves that life throws you; or you can make the better choice of asking God to work through your situation to bring about something good. God is in the business of turning negatives into positives.

It’s difficult for us to come through a bad experience better rather than bitter, but it’s doable; it all depends on our attitude. If we are willing to cast all our cares on the One who truly does care for us – the Lord God our creator and redeemer – we shall experience relief from grief.

But it is also the case that, like Naomi, if we allow someone sent into our lives as a gift from God – in Naomi’s case Ruth – to become a part of our lives and to assume the role of God’s helper, or caregiver, we will most likely find ourselves on the receiving end of a blessing in our time of need.

Now, it just so happened that Naomi and Ruth arrived in Bethlehem at the beginning of the barley harvest. It was time for folks to go out into the fields and reap the harvest.

Ruth was not one to sit around and wait for good fortune; no, she got up and took the initiative; she joined the poor people of the area by going into the fields as a gleaner. This means that she followed the reapers and picked up the grains of barley that the reapers had left behind.