Choices

Chapter 3 - Choices
Ruth 1:11-17

Choices - Remembering the Promise

God's Story

God had already written His story. He crossed the line He had drawn, grafting in a strange people into His promise. She was a Gentile, a Moabite, an enemy to His people. How did anyone know that one day, when He laid His only Son, the Son of God, in the grave,  through His death, He would bring two nations together. The Gentile and the Jew. He Himself became their peace, made one and broke down the middle wall of separation. (Eph 2:14)

"That in the dispensation of the fullness of the times He might gather together in one all things in Christ..." Ephesians l:10

""...you should not be ignorant of this mysteyr, that blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in." Romans 11:25

"Behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone and rock of offense, and whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame." Romans 9:33

Israel's Story

Naomi sat empty hearted staring at the stones that covered the bodies of her loved ones. She had lain two sons and a husband in the ground in a strange land. Elimelech's line had come to any end. Israel slumped over her last hope, her sons. Surely they would bring her home to her land. She had been termed forsaken, desolate. (Isaiah 62:4) She was left for a period of time until the fullness of the Gentiles.  

Ruth's Story

I too am a forsaken woman. I hope no hope outside of the family I chose ten years before. I learned about their God, listened to their story and also turned away from my country Moab's god, Chemosh. I live in my country, but I am one without a country. 

Faith Lessons

There are choices to be made. Maybe the choice had been made ten years earlier when Ruth became the wife of Mahlon. Now he was dead and she was alone.

Would you act any differently if your husband lived or died?

Have you been reconciled to your choices you made?

Can you see ahead and trust something that could or could not be?

Principles in Relationships:

What can you do to make for a peaceable relationship between you and your spouse?

What if your choice meant leaving your own family and country? Could you do it?

How important is your faith? Is anyone more important than your relationship with God?

If so, who and why?

Can you continue to walk with some one who is not equal to your faith?

Are they turning their back on you or are you turning your back on them?

(Ruth means friend, Orpah means hind, back or stubborn.)

When we choose God, do we choose His family, Israel?

How do we see Israel's history? Can we make it ours and be a Gentile?

Chain of Events:

Ruth is a picture of the Church, the bride, the New Testament and redemption. Naomi, representing, Israel, is a picture of the old order passing away, the law fulfilled in Christ, which brought the disposition of grace.  

22: Corinthians 3:7-18 The passing away of the old order. What was written on stone now is written on hearts. What was glorious passed away for the ministry of the Spirit which was more glorious.

Ruth is the contemporary of Judges. Her story came about 1200 Bc. Judges extended over 350 years, from 1375 to 1050 Bc.  

Judges 2 is a miniature of the book of Judges. There were seven cycles of the same pattern that occurred in Judges. Five step cycle. 1. sin, 2. servitude, 3. supplication,  4. salvation, 5. silence.

 It is also termed as l. rebellion, 2. retribution, 3. repentance, 4. restoration, 5. rest  

 In Judges Chapters 16-21 comes before Chapters 3-15. It is not totally in chronological order.

Choices

Each has a choice

no matter how large or small,

Faith and courage is not a popular vote

reasoning and fear will seek its own,

Names speak of their owners

Ruth as friend

Orpah her back is shown

Naomi once pleasant and full,

Mara, now bitter and alone, Each will choose

as destiny will be determined

purpose will finish its course.

Hinges of choice will swing the door

open or shut

recording this moment as history

a small choice made

an entire life will find its course.

The Story

Choices

Chapter three

Ruth 1:11-18

Choices

Chapter three

Ruth 1:11-18

Ruth now stared into her husband’s sick eyes. Her husband was dying and had been for a long time. Her heart and mind went back ten years before, when she saw him for the first time.

He was such a gentle man, a caring man and a writer. She remembered that first night when the two parties meet at the Place of Refuge. Fear was among them. They could not trust each other; history between them was too violent from the past.

Ruth remembered that first long look when Mahlon looked up from his writing and stared at her. He was reading her eyes. “What was he looking for in my eyes?” Ruth questioned.

She still remembered his response, “It’s all about the stones.” 

Ruth didn’t blame anyone for their mistrust. That night when they first encountered Naomi and her husband and sons, none of them knew what to expect.

Her people were a violent people, greedy, self-serving and fighters. Mahlon’s people were not warriors, they didn’t know how to defend themselves. She had heard rumors when the Israelites came through Moab, just right after Israel crossed the Red Sea. Her people refused passage for the Israelites to pass through their country. That was over six hundred years ago, and they were still enemies. Their necks were still stiff towards each other.

Her people did not meet God’s chosen people with bread and water on the road when they came out of Egypt and also the Moabite King hired Balaam the son of Beor to curse his own people. (Deuteronomy 23:3,4)

Israel’s God had turned His back on Moab and Ammon and blessed His people because their God loved them. Her people’s god, Chemosh was as cruel as the people who worshipped him. He desired the sacrifice of their children, and the word “love” didn’t exist in a god made of stone.

Ruth continued to suck out the memories of the life of those days with Mahlon; he wrote upon parchment at night and read his writings to everyone who sat around the fire. He wrote about the Red Sea and how his people crossed over it on dry ground into the wilderness.

He wrote about Moses and Joshua. Moses led them through the hot burning wilderness. It still holds dry bones as evidence to that very day. Moses only saw Canaan from across the Jordan.

The Jordan River divided lands. It was not the waters that held them back that could not be crossed but boundaries in their hearts. They refused to believe and their God refused them from moving forward.

Mahlon had taken leadership after Elimelech’s death. Naomi grieved herself into a place of no return. Naomi was once a confident woman, she was the strength of her husband, but without Elimelech, Naomi had no fight left in her and no confidence.

She always thought they would return to their homeland, but not this way. Without her husband and two sons, she had no claim on the property left behind. She would go back as a beggar and a widow.  

Mahlon respected his mother’s grief. He felt her pain as deeply as a poet would. He wrote his and his mother’s feelings which he shared only with Ruth. Ruth began to understand the deep entrenched faith in a God who had promised them many things. He is a God who keeps His promises, Ruth pondered. 

Ruth’s sister Orpah stayed behind with Ruth when they first met at the crossing of Refuge. Ruth had given herself as surety as one to protect this wandering family. She knew her country and she knew her people. Orpah stayed only because of Ruth.

As time, Ruth and Mahlon came to be husband and wife. Their relationship was gentle and respectful. Their conversations were rich and deep of his forefathers and what they left behind. She knew the love of a gentle man who was like the God he worshipped.

Chilion and Orpah had a different kind of relationship. He was a complainer and refused to be comforted. Orpah was stubborn and was always looking back to her own people. She never wanted her current situation and stubbornly fought for her past. She stayed only because of Ruth but soon time would force her to think for herself.

Chilion died early, probably out of his own bitterness. It ate at him and Orpah continued to strive with him until he took his final breath.

Over the years Ruth served Naomi in her pain and now she was looking at the man she loved, who made her life rich. He taught her to understand his family’s traditions. She was saying goodbye to him. She reached down and kissed his cold lips. His hallow cheeks showed years of suffering of  a fragile body. Her fingers traced the lines on his face. All she had left was his writings. They had spoken of his heart and his wish to return to his homeland. She remembered the story about the stone in Gilgal. One day she might possibly see it.

Again stones were laid upon another one of Israel’s sons.

Naomi, Ruth and Orpah sat, staring into the distance. Orpah was facing Moab and Naomi and Ruth faced the Jordan. Ruth would have to be the strong one. Naomi had little life in her. Her grief had eaten away at her; Orpah’s bitterness ate away at her cold heart.

Naomi said quietly, “I have nothing for you. You need to return to your people and marry someone from Moab. You will find rest there.”

“We have been a part of your family all these years, my own people turned away from me when I denied their god,” Ruth refused Naomi’s offer. “We will go with you.”

“Turn back, my daughters, there is no seed in my womb that you might have a husband. I have nothing to go home to.  The hand of the Lord has gone out against me.”

The two sisters embraced each other. Ruth knew what she must do and Orpah knew she couldn’t go on.

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

Naomi stopped speaking. She knew Ruth was determined to stay with her and she was secretly glad. She also knew the hard trip ahead and possibly the asterisking chide of her countrymen. But it was still her homeland, it was where she belonged.  

Choices

Workbook questions– Chapter 3

1.     Why do you think Ruth was so determined to follow Naomi? _________

2.     Do you think it was hard for Orpah to go back to her people and leave Ruth? ______________________________________________________

3.     Do you think there was a risk with either choice? __________________

4.     Could Ruth have gone without a risk of how it was going to be? Moab was feared and hated by Naomi’s people in Canaan. They didn’t know Ruth and didn’t know Ruth’s intentions. 

5.     There was no promise of anything. No land, no seed, no home, no security. Why was she going with Naomi? __________________________

6.     Would you have gone if you were in a place as Ruth? _______________

7.     Could Ruth have changed her mind if she didn’t like the way it was going in Bethlehem? _____________________________________________



Hopelessness

Ruth 1:2-5

Hopelessness

                                  
God's Story

The Proud lady Israel had produced many sons of greatness. Her family lineage began with Abraham, who God promised to give a great nation. Now their leader Joshua was dead. With no leader, the children soon lost their dreams and took matters into their own hands. Then came the judges and the children forgot the covenant the Father had made with them. . Israel was God's wife. He had woed her in the days of youth. He had with drew his blessing from them. Famine of soul and destitution of knowledge of God became their condition.

Israel's  Story
Lines crept onto the face of  Israel just at did ontNaomi's. She was changing from young to old. She has now laid in the grave two sons and a husband. She was in a strange land and she was alone.  Stones were laid on the ones love, as heavy stones crushed her heart.

Naomi's Story
This strange land stoled her seed from her. She had wandered for ten years with her husband, now there was no place for her. They left their land and that they owned.  The widow weeped with her two daughter in laws. She had nothing to offer them.

Faith Lessons
As death was silencing the bodies of her loved ones, stones were speaking loud and clear. "How did we got off the track?" I should have convinced Elimelech to stay. What if we would have stayed.?We would still be alive, Who do I trust anymore?
Who will step up and deliver her?

Principles in Relationships: The Soul and her situation
Was it right to be angry with her situation?
Who can she blame? She could blame her husband, God, the land of the enemy, the famine.
Is the answer in the midst of her?
Can she lift her head from the grief and sorrow and recognize her answer?
Was God there at the graves? If he was, why did it happen?
Was it because Elimlach had done wrong, or God had a plan which was far beyond their imagination? God will use the natural to accomplish what He does in the spiritual.
In order to teach them His providence, He had to teach them their need. Their true need was to learn the difference of self-sufficiency and God-sufficiency.
Stones were a vital sign. Joshua  (Joshua 24:21,27) said about the stone." This stone shall be a witness unto us; for it hath heard all the words of the Lord which he spake unto us..."
When Israel crossed Jordan, they were told for each 12 tribes to leave 12 stones in the water and bring one out and place it for an alter. What and why does thast speak of Israel?
Chain of Events:    Naomi was in Moab for ten years. God was blessing Bethlehem again. "The Lord had visited His people by giving them bread." Ruth 1:6

Hopelessness



Three lonely graves lie side by side

death claiming unlived years

of Israels' sons.

Distrust, sickness, and curses

ruled these sleeping men

as they gave their lives to enemy soil.

No apologies made to weeping widows

rubbing them of future arrows

shooting forth children

to the next generation.

Each woman stood side by side

silent at the graves

A bond of grief held them tightly,

questioning the darkness of dark

the bitterness of bitter

the hopelessness of hopeless

a walk of new pain.

But God is light and

His heart of love

continually beckons their faces to turn.

Hope is waiting in His hand

new life is on its way.

The Story



Hopelessness

Chapter 2

Ruth 1:2-5 

(Holding to the Stone)

The Moabites, one man and two women approached the Place of Refuge. They dismounted and make a place for their mules and themselves for the night.

Naomi, her two sons and Elimelech crouched silently watching and listening to the words of the visitors. Naomi stood upright and showed herself to them. A she walked towards them, under her breath she was calling on Jehovah. “Spare us, Jehovah. Give us favor.”

Ruth was the first to stir. She looked up; there was a kindness in the eyes of the slowly approaching woman. Naomi continued to walk towards them. Naomi spoke. “We have traveled a long distance. We come from Bethlehem; there is a famine in our country. We have nothing to give, but our friendship and trust.”

“I’m Ruth, this is my sister, Orpah and Prince Hedak. Please join us.” Ruth looked over at the Prince, he restlessly nodded. He knew Ruth had a way of diplomacy which she learned from her father, King Eglon. He was summoned to escort this head strong girl. He knew better than try to convince her any differently.

“Thank you,” said Naomi, “Do you mind if I invite my sons and my husband?”

Ruth again looked at the Prince, then nodded to Naomi. “Yes, please do so. This is a Place of Refuge. It is common ground. We honor it.”

Naomi looked to the trees and motioned for her family to come. It was unheard of, the Moabites and the Israelites coming together in friendship.

.

“Where are you going,” Naomi inquired of Ruth

“We are just coming back from the place where my father was slain. He lies dead at the hand of one of your people.” Ruth offered her pain. “I am traveling to the country side for awhile with my sister and one of the king’s men.”

Naomi curiously asked. “How did it happen? We have served your father, King Eglon for eighteen years. My nation is weak. Our people have sin against our God, Jehovah. He has strengthened your country against us.” (Judges 3:13)

Ruth guarded her words; she was talking with the enemy. Her heart was breaking. Her father was dead by the hands of this people. “It was Ehud! Ehud had a double-edged dagger, he fastened it under his clothe on his right hand. He was bringing a tribute to my father. He tricked my father.”

Naomi continued to look into Ruth’s eyes. “How did he trick him?”

Mahlon broke into the conversation, “It was about the stones.”

Ruth looked over at Mahlon. There was something interesting about him. He sat quietly writing on some parchments. “What is it about the stones?”

“This is what I heard.” Mahlon continued. “Ehud and his companions left the palace. He had taken a tribute to King Eglon. When he reached Gilgal,  he remembered the stones, sent his companions home and went back to the palace.”

“What about the stones?” Orpah chimed in. “News travels slow. One piece of information comes from one traveler and a tidbit of speculation comes from another.”

  

“I am so sorry for your loss.” Naomi was apologizing for her country Israel. “I understand your pain. We too have lost so many of our people to the famine.”

“The stone images at Gilgal are a reminder to our country.” Mahlon looked up from writing. “When our people crossed the Jordan, Jehovah commanded the priests to take a stone, one of each tribe, and place all twelve stones in the Jordan and bring out one stone from the middle of Jordan and place it in the promise land and build an alter.” (Joshua 4:19)

Elimelech remained quiet but when they spoke of the stone, he propped himself up as if new life had been breathed into him. “I remember when we swore by the stone. Joshua placed a large stone under an oak for a sanctuary of the Lord. Then Joshua said, ‘Behold this stone shall be a witness to us, for it has heard all the words of the Lord which He spoke to us. It shall therefore be a witness to you, lest you deny your God.’” (Joshua 24:26,27)

Elimelech’s words were alive which came from his weak body. He continued, “We lived under the elders of Joshua after Joshua died; now our land is under the hand of judges and our people have rebelled. Ehud judges and he is our second judge. Famine has come to us because of the evil of our people.”    

Ruth leaned into hear Elimelech. “Your history and your stories are rich. You are a gentle people, our people are harsh, cruel and violent. There is hate in their hearts.”

“I heard the story of when my people refused passage to Israel and your God turned against us.” Orpah spouted out. We are related in an odd sense.”

“Yes, Lot is Abraham’s nephew. Abraham fought for our great father Lot. We heard the stories of Sodom and Gomorrah and how he escaped from the burning city.

Elimelech spoke again and silence fell on the lips of the others. “Joshua was a great leader. He followed after Moses, but after he died, our country came under the rule of judges. We have had forty years of rest then everyone turned to their evil ways. Away from Jehovah, and He turned away from us and allowed your country, the Moabites to bring us down.”

“It’s all interesting. My father’s servants found him dead. They wondered who did it.” Orpah questioned.

Ruth immediately hushed everyone with her strong assertive way. “My people want revenge, but I want to find a safe place to grieve. That’s why we came here for the night.” It is the only safe place.   

“What are you writing?” Ruth inquired.

“Oh, about the trip from Bethlehem to Moab. To this Place of Refuge.”

Elimelech reclined on a blanket and Naomi pulled another blanket close around him. “My husband Elimelech took sick at the beginning of our journey. It could be hopelessness. He has never left his homeland before, now we have no choice.”

Mahlon was just finishing staking the mules, and pulling off the last of the supplies. Mahlon, in his gentle way, bowed, taking off his dusty hat, he placed his hat to his heart as if to say, “Thank you”

Mahlon and Ruth stood looking at each other, then Mahlon  looked to his brother, “This is my brother, Chilion”. Chilion turned to look at the visitors. He was rougher in appearance and also in manners.

The night finally rested in peace, words between them gave them assurance that no one needed to be fearful. Formality and stiffness began to lose its hold. The prince sat quietly. He was a man of authority and was listening and calculating everyone’s move. He slept with his dagger but even he found serenity among new friends.

Early morning Elimelech coughed and his weak body caved in to the chronic persistence of heaving and spitting up blood. Overhead vultures were summoned by a taste of death. “We must stay here until Elimelech is better.” Naomi said. She knew it was just a matter of time. He could not travel any further.

Ruth poured a hot drink and gave it to Naomi. “Take this and give it to your husband to drink, this will help. I will stay behind and give you safe passage into Moab.”

“Thank you so much, Ruth. How can I repay you?” Naomi questioned.

Elimelech called for Mahlon. “Come here son. I pass my blessing to you. Take care of your mother and brother. Take your mother back to Bethlehem as soon as the famine has lifted. Remember the stone, remember our people in this strange land. Guard your heart from the gods of this country.”

Ruth continued to help Naomi. Elimelech’s body lay lifeless. Naomi reached over and kissed the man she knew intimately. The memories of their love gathered up into Naomi’s eyes. “He’s gone. My beloved Elimelech is gone.”

Ruth cried, not only for her pain but for Naomi’s.

Mahlon reached down and tore his mother’s body away from his father. “Do not fear, mother, I will take care of our family. Let us bury father here in this place of peace.”

As Mahlon and Chilion reached for the stones from the river bed, the others carried them to the place in the trees. Naomi wept over Elimelech’s grave. Naomi lifted up her eyes and prayed. “Jehovah God, have mercy on us. How long will you deal harshly with us? How long will this pain persist?”

Naomi felt alone. She and Elimelech had many year, they had two fine sons and land in their country. They had no part of this strange land except the grave of her dead husband. She embraced one of the stones that lay atop her husband. His last words were, “Remember the stone.”

“I will.” Naomi thought.

Study Lesson  Chapter 2

1. After reading Judges 3:12 - 30 explain what was going on during this time. _____________________________________________________________________

2. What brought the famine to their homeland? _________________________________

3. Can you see a pattern of behavior and blessing and rejecting from Jehovah? _____________________________________________________________________

4. Were their blessings determined on how they were as a people? ___________________________________________________________________

5. Read Joshua 4 and Joshua 24 and determine how valuable the stones were. What did they represent? ___________________________________________________________

6. How does it coordinate with the New Testament Stone? _______________________

7. When we look to the Stone, what happens? _________________________________

8. Look for scriptures that coordinate with this period of time and how it deals with the whole picture of Israel. There is history, law and relationships. How can you put this into its place in history?  _________________________________________________________________