Seeking Comfort in Community

Assuring Hope
Jesus, the Promised Servant-leader

Ruth 1:1-7 (The Message)

  ^1-2Once upon a time—it was back in the days when judges led Israel— there was a famine in the land. A man from Bethlehem in Judah left home to live in the country of Moab, he and his wife and his two sons. The man's name was Elimelech; his wife's name was Naomi; his sons were named Mahlon and Kilion—all Ephrathites from Bethlehem in Judah. They all went to the country of Moab and settled there.
 ^3-5 Elimelech died and Naomi was left, she and her two sons. The sons took Moabite wives; the name of the first was Orpah, the second Ruth. They lived there in Moab for the next ten years. But then the two brothers, Mahlon and Kilion, died. Now the woman was left without either her young men or her husband.

^6-7 One day she got herself together, she and her two daughters-in-law, to leave the country of Moab and set out for home; she had heard that God had been pleased to visit his people and give them food. And so she started out from the place she had been living, she and her two daughters-in-law with her, on the road back to the land of Judah.

For Reflection  In those days no one was more alone, left to fend for herself than a husband-less woman.  And yet, Ruth seems to recognize the promise of God's community and returns with Naomi.  Risky business this!

The risk payed off, of course.  God's Grace is found in the community of believers.  Christians, like the early Jews, are incomplete without the Fellowship of the Holy Spirit, found in the community of believers.

Pray
that you will act on the promise of God's grace.  Pray that you will be confident in that Grace that you will assume risk in the name of God.  Pray that you, like Ruth, will live in the hollow of God's hand for ever.