Home Is Where the Heart Is

The five women in Matthew’s genealogy: Ruth
A Series on Advent
 (Click on the link below to read the verses.)
Ruth 1; Matthew 1:1-17 

[In Matthew’s genealogy of Jesus, the Messiah, there are five women mentioned. All of them were in some sense outsiders. In this Advent series we will be looking at these five women to gain a better understanding of “the word who became flesh and made his dwelling among us”.]

  

In 1962, Elvis Presley released a song from the movie soundtrack of Kid Galahad titled, “Home is Where the Heart Is”. Here are the opening lyrics.

 

Home is where the heart is

And my heart is anywhere you are

Anywhere you are is home

 

These words have never been truer than for Ruth.

 

¹ In the days when the judges ruled, there was a famine in the land. So a man from Bethlehem in Judah, together with his wife and two sons, went to live for a while in the country of Moab.     NIV

 

The “man from Bethlehem” soon died leaving his wife Naomi with her two sons, who later married Moabite women. Ruth was one of them. After living in Moab for ten years, both of Naomi’s sons also died, this time leaving Naomi alone with her two daughters-in-law.

 

When Naomi learned that the Lord had brought good crops to her people in Bethlehem, she decided to go back and told her daughters-in-law to return to their homes. In a very emotional scene, one of them did so. But Ruth refused. Her home was with Naomi, and she made this pledge to her.

 

¹⁶ But Ruth replied, “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. ¹⁷ 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!”          NLT

 

This wasn’t an easy promise for Ruth to make. She wouldn’t be going to some utopian life in Bethlehem. Naomi, as a widow without any sons, had no means of support. As for Ruth, she was from an enemy foreign land with foreign gods and, like Naomi, she was a widow without a son. But, return they did.

 

Once they arrived, the only food source that they had was for Ruth to glean from a barley field. It belonged to Boaz. As it turned out, he was not only a land owner, but also a relative of Naomi’s. In those days, that meant that he was a guardian redeemer.

 

The Hebrew word for guardian redeemer is a legal term applied to someone who has the responsibility to redeem a relative who is in serious difficulty. This could mean paying for their property so that it stayed in the family. Or it could mean marrying and providing a son who would inherit the property.

 

Although this concept seems very strange to us today, the origin can be found in the book of Leviticus. For Naomi and Ruth, it was literally a godsend. Boaz eventually married Ruth and they had a son named Obed who later had a grandson named David who was a distant ancestor of Jesus the Messiah.

For Ruth, the saying “home is where the heart is” meant being with Naomi and trusting in the God of Israel. Just like Ruth promised Naomi that she would always be with her, so the Lord promises you and me the same thing.

 

Copyright 2023 Joseph B Williams

www.lifelinebasketball.blogspot.com

 

 

Find Your Mount Sinai

A Series on God’s Call to Ministry

1 Kings 19:1-18

(Use the link below to read the verses.)

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1%20Kings%2019%3A1-18&version=NIV;NLT

[Preface: How do you know what your calling in life is? Will you know from a big bang experience? Or will it come quietly, almost imperceptible? Will you be inspired by the stories of a visiting missionary; or a book that opens your eyes to the needs of a specific people group; or from your own life experience? This series is about God’s call to ministry for your life; what it means or doesn’t mean.]

The devil is in the details.

As a young, single man, I worked as a painter for several years. Outdoor painting was the worst because it involved scraping off the old paint. Flecks of paint would fly into my eyes; I’d scratch my knuckles on the wood siding; and I would do all this in the heat and humidity of the summer while thirty feet up in the air.

But the details were critical. You had to pay attention to the details to prepare the surface properly in order for the final product to look good. If you didn’t, then somebody would say, “Look, you missed a spot”. The devil is in the details.

Besides house painting, this saying is true in many aspects of life. It’s true in your marriage, your work, your ministry and your faith life. The “details” of life can push back to the point where you want to give up; you want to quit. That’s what happened to Elijah.

Elijah had recently faced off with 450 prophets of Baal in a fire burning contest. He decisively won the contest, and proceeded to have the prophets killed. Queen Jezebel wanted revenge, so she threatened Elijah’s life! He immediately ran away.

⁴ Then he went on alone into the wilderness, traveling all day. He sat down under a solitary broom tree and prayed that he might die. “I have had enough, Lord,” he said. “Take my life, for I am no better than my ancestors who have already died.”      NLT

Eventually, he went to Mount Sinai; the same place where Moses met the Lord in the burning bush. While there, Elijah hid in a cave and the Lord came to him and spoke to him. Not through the wind or the earthquake or the fire… but through a still small voice.

And after the fire there was the sound of a gentle whisper. ¹³ When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. And a voice said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” NLT

Elijah was called to be a prophet of the Lord. He had experienced many miraculous events in his life. And yet, he lost sight of his calling; lost sight of his prophetic purpose; lost sight of the Lord… the devil is in the details.

Actually though, that isn’t true. The truth is, that God is in the details. He has a plan for your life; he’s always at work in your life and he loves you unconditionally. 

So go ahead and find your Mount Sinai. Spend some time alone with the Lord. Let him speak to you in a still small voice.