What did Ruth see?

Two young widows are faced with a choice, stay with their families, with what is familiar or go with their mother-in-law to a strange country.  Now life had dealt them a hard hand.  Naomi, her husband and 2 sons had moved to Moab.  First, Elimelech, Naomi's husband died..  It was just Naomi and her sons.


Then her sons meet and married two women from Moab, Orpah and Ruth.  Things seemed well for 10 years but then both sons died.  Naomi had lost her husband and both of her sons.  She wanted to go home!  She wanted to go back to her country.  At first Orpah and Ruth said 'we are going with you'.  But Orpah's resolve was not that strong.  They started on their way and Naomi told them in Ruth 1:8 - Go, return each to her mother's house: the LORD deal kindly with you, as ye have dealt with the dad, and with me.  She kissed them and told them to go back.


Orpah and Ruth said in 1:10 - 'Surely we will return with thee unto thy people.' But Naomi had a strong argument for them to go back to their mother's home.  They were still young, they had the chance to marry again but in her country who would they marry?  Naomi loved these girls, you can see it in her heart felt plea for them to do what is best for them from a human perspective.  You can see it by the way she wept as they had to make this choice.  She didn't tell them to go back because she didn't want them with her, she told them to go so they could have a future.  She was setting them free from the vows of family now that her sons were dead. 


At this point they were all weeping,  these women loved each other.  They had spent 10 years as family, whatever they chose at this point they were going to be leaving some of their family behind.  Either they left Naomi to travel on alone or they left the family that had given birth to them and raised them.  There were no easy choices here.  Orpah kissed her mother-in-law and turned to go back to her family.  I'm sure that as she turned to go Orpah looked back to Naomi several times.


But Ruth clung to Naomi, and said in verse 16 "Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for wither thou goest, I will go: and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: they people shall be my people, and they God my God:'  Ruth had seen something in Naomi, I'm sure that Orpah saw it too.  But for Ruth what she saw was enough to convince her that she should seek the God of Naomi.


As I read this story, I'm reminded of the story of Agrippa in Acts 26, in verse 28 Agrippa said to Paul 'Almost thou persuades me to be a Christian.  Agrippa was so close yet he walked away, just as Orpah did.  They were within steps of receiving what God had but in that last second they chose what the world offered.  They decided that the known was better than faith.  They may not have realized that is what they were doing but is what they did and both their stories are told in the scripture.


But how much more blessed is the story of Ruth!  She saw and believed.  She stepped into the unknown because she had seen God through her mother-in-law.  She had seen love, unconditional love from Naomi and that love led her to be in the lineage of our Savior.


We don't know today what God has for us to do, what His call may be or whose life our following Him may impact.  But it will have an impact.  We have no control over the choice they make once we have that impact, our job is to show His love.  But each day our prayer should be make me a light, let my impact lead others to receive and grow.