CLING DON’T KISS

• DAY 146
• FEAR FILES: RUTH AND ORPAH
• SCRIPTURES: RUTH 1

And Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, “Go, return each to her mother’s house. The Lord deal kindly with you, as you have dealt with the dead and with me. 9The Lord grant that you may find rest, each in the house of her husband.” So she kissed them, and they lifted up their voices and wept. And they said to her, “Surely we will return with you to your people.” Then they lifted up their voices and wept again; and Orpah kissed her mother-in-law, but Ruth clung to her. 

Ruth 1:8-10, 14

The journey of life presents us with decisions. We will all get to a point in our journey where we need to make tough choices and in our text today, two women are faced with a critical decision that could affect their future. One named Ruth and another named Orpah

These women were blessed with good husbands and a loving mother-in-law but after years of being married they had no children. As we know, these kinds of situations always instigate different levels of mockery for women in those days and even today. Being a woman-in-waiting, I can only imagine how 10 years of waiting must have felt. Any small weight gain, bloating, headache the speculations start flying. Not to mention the annoying, well-meaning questions people ask. To top it off. They married strangers, so the level of societal gossip would have been unmatched. To go out in the streets would have been tough. In the midst of all this their husbands die and their mother-in-law wants to move.

A Chance Start Over

I will assume this to be good news for them. A chance to start over and live a new, fresh life in a land that they will not be mocked because no one knows their history. They Got their things and started the journey but along the way, Naomi changed her mind.

“Go back home to your people,” Naomi said, “no need for you to suffer with me. You have no need to be here anymore; neither do I. Perhaps, you might have some good fortune if you returned to your home”. Naomi’s intentions were noble but these women felt hurt by it. They wanted a new life in Judah. “Don’t send us back,” they said, “we want to go with you. We have said goodbye to everyone, we have parked all our things, we haven’t been part of our father’s house since we got married to your sons. Please, let us go with you” But Naomi insisted. And Orpah kissed her goodbye. But not Ruth.

Cling

This woman of courage was determined to move on from the life of mockery and pain she had had. “What would be the point of that?” Ruth must have thought, “I cannot go back now, I cannot give up, I have been through pain but I know there’s got to be more to my life than this. So I choose this God of Israel I have heard about, I choose a new start, I choose this uncertain future. I am not going back, Ma!” In today’s Nigerian lingo, she said, we die here. 

Beloved, your future has to be worth fighting for. You cannot settle for less. And can I tell you this? There will always be opportunities to settle. When you pack your things ready to leave your past, fear will come with logical reasons why you should not risk it. Don’t listen. A future in God is far better than any kind of past especially a past of pain and hurt.

God honored Ruth’s decision. She remarried an honorable man and ended up the grandmother of David and an ancestor of our savior, Jesus. What would have happened had she decided to leave instead? Maybe you wouldn’t be reading this today. So asked God to strengthen you to withsatnd the insistence of fear and hold on to the glimpse of faith that your tomorrow is better than your today.

Shalom