Why was Ruth so loyal to Naomi?

(2) This is what we have in the next sub-section. Naomi, hopeless as to herself, yet drawn by her affections, sets her face to return to Bethlehem from the country of Moab. But she is unbelieving and bitter of soul, and manifests that strange self-contradiction which, in such states, is so common an experience. Herself on her way back to the land of which she had heard that Jehovah had visited His people to give them bread, she sees nothing for her daughters-in-law but that they must return to their people and to their gods, and prays Jehovah to give them rest, each in the house of a heathen husband! This is the confusion of a darkened soul; for in darkness all is confusion. All that she is clear about is the ruin in which she is, and she can give counsel of nothing but her despair. Orpah, after a faint resistance, goes back; but with Ruth neither precept nor example can avail to turn her heart from the pursuit of what appeals to her with a power above all difficulties. It is truly with the heart that man believeth; and how manifest is the heart in that touching devotion of her's! "Entreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God."

This is not the language of natural affection simply: that stops short of this last. And where this can be said, though it may come in in a subsidiary way, yet it cannot be a secondary thing. The faith of Ruth is, indeed, a beautiful thing to contemplate; and a striking proof of how that which God has planted can flourish in the midst of contrary circumstances and oppositions of all kinds. How little does Naomi here commend her God of whom Ruth speaks! The famine in Bethlehem, mocking it as the "house of bread"; the withdrawal of Elimelech, denying what his name expressed; his death; the Moabitish marriages, one of them her own; then the quick widowhoods; now the mother-in-law's appeal to go back, as Orpah had gone back, to her people and her gods: this is all we know of her surroundings, but which of them is favorable to faith? Ah, it is God that favors it and upholds it; and all the opposition only rouses it into a passion of longing and resolve. There might be little encouragement: was there not all the more a deep and deepening necessity, which found only in Israel's God the possibility of satisfaction, if not yet the satisfaction itself? Could such longing go without satisfaction, or could He who alone could meet it be a dream, or afar off from the need created?

The Effects of this Report. When the gospel is received into the heart by faith, it always leads the soul to God, because it reveals God's love to us. It is indeed the gospel of the grace of God. It unfolds His glorious attributes; shows forth His gracious character; testifies of His love and mercy to lost sinners; and proclaims life and pardon to the dead in trespasses and sins. When the heart has been opened by the Holy Ghost to receive this good report, it at once attracts the soul to God, and produces confidence in Him. A thorough change of mind thus takes place, so that God is no longer judged to be a hard master, and an austere man; but He is seen to be most gracious and merciful, full of love and compassion, and abundant in goodness and truth. Thus it was with Ruth. The good report, that "Jehovah had visited His people with bread," at once enabled her to turn from idols to serve the living and true God. So truly, so decidedly, was her heart attracted to the Lord God of Israel, that when her sister turned back, and she was earnestly besought to take the same course, her unhesitating and steadfast response was, "Intreat me not to leave thee … for thy God shall be my God." This is a very important point to contemplate, for the human mind may be in a certain way exercised about religion and religious things, short of a spiritual birth; but unless the glory of God be seen in the face of Jesus Christ, unless God's character be known as the sinner's Saviour, there can be no sincere turning to God, no confidence in Him, no power to walk in the truth for His glory. But when the death of Christ is beheld by faith, as God's provision for dying, guilty, helpless sinners, and preached to every creature by the Saviour's own command; when the sin-burdened conscience hears the Most High God saying, "Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord; though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool;" then the soul finds rest in the bosom of God Himself as a sin-hating and yet a sin-pardoning God. The love of God is now shed abroad in the heart; our faith and hope are in God; "we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ;" "we love Him, because He first loved us;" and the happy soul exclaims — "How can I sink with such a prop As the Eternal God, Who bears the earth's huge pillars up, And spreads the heavens abroad? "How can I die while Jesus lives, Who rose and left the dead? Pardon and life my soul receives From mine exalted Head."

Naomi then was left with her two sons: "And they took them wives of the women of Moab: the name of the one was Orpah, and the name of the other Ruth." And thus they continued to dwell for about ten years. After this the sons died also, when the woman Naomi, hearing that Jehovah had been pleased to give His people bread in His own land, turns back in her heart, lays the case before her daughters, and sets forth for the land. It was then that a most interesting difference comes out; for one of the daughters, though not without natural affection and hence unwillingness to leave her mother-in-law, lets us see that she had no faith in the God of Israel, and accordingly drops behind. Ruth for an opposite reason shines, and so much the more because of lowly unconsciousness of anything as to herself. The liveliest affection to her mother-in-law, and the faithful remembrance of the dead, were there, but above all the mighty attraction of the God of Israel. All these wrought powerfully in the heart of Ruth; and so she in the happiest manner tells out the purpose of her soul to her mother-in-law. Her portion is taken for ever with Naomi. As she said herself — for there are no words capable of expressing the truth so well as those that her heart poured forth with God before her eyes — "Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God: where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried: Jehovah do so to me, and more also, if ought but death part thee and me." Out of the abundance of her heart did her mouth speak; and what so sweet as this devotion to the living God, not to speak of the dead, where it could be unlooked for? If Orpah shows us the failings of nature, Ruth certainly the power of grace.

By her outspoken and uncompromising decision to accompany Naomi (Ruth 1:16-17), Ruth showed what was working deep down in her heart. She believed that Jehovah was God in Israel, and with her mouth she openly confessed that Naomi's God was her God, thus fulfilling the two conditions of the righteousness of faith, concerning which Paul speaks in Rom. 10:9-10.

Ruth's intense devotion to Naomi arose not only because she was the mother of Mahlon, her deceased husband, but because she was a representative of that people redeemed by Jehovah out of Egypt and established by Him in the land of Canaan. Accordingly, she boldly declared that henceforward neither in life nor in death would she be separated from Naomi and Naomi's God. "Whither thou goest I will go .… where thou diest will I die, and there will I be buried," said the young widow.

It was to Naomi in her sorrow that Ruth clung, and for the love of her who had passed through "Mara" she said: "Entreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge; thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God: where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried: the Lord do so to me, and more also, if ought but death part thee and me." Ruth 1:16-17.

When she made this memorable decision she knew nothing of Boaz, type of Christ in His present position of power, nor of the place of favour and exaltation that awaited her. The love of Naomi controlled her and she was satisfied, be it noted, not to dwell and to live, but to "lodge" and to "die" with Naomi. She embraced the path of strangership for the compensation that she found in the pleasantness of Naomi's company.

The days of the judges, to which times the book of Ruth relates, were difficult days, marked by constant failure on the part of God's people. Elimelech and his wife Naomi, discontented with the condition of things in the land, went down to Moab. Discontent and weakness amongst the people of God results from lack of appreciation of God's purpose and of what is centred in Christ; and when these things cease to attract the heart there is always a movement towards the apparent advantage of man's world. The result of every such movement is disappointment, sorrow and death. In such circumstances Ruth shines. She was by birth a stranger to the commonwealth of Israel, but in her affection for Naomi she says, "Thy people shall be my people." There was nothing outwardly attractive in those people, but evidently her heart had been won in some way by Naomi and she "clave unto her." Again the opportunity to return is presented, but "she was steadfastly minded to go with her," and her committal is perhaps more remarkable and more far-reaching than any other. Her name means "friendship," and she is minded to be friendly with the people of God. She is prepared to cast in her whole life with God's people, and to be completely committed to the sphere where God's inheritance was to be found. The words she used are worthy of careful notice, "And Ruth said, Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee; for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge; thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God; Where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried; the LORD do so to me, and more also, if ought but death part thee and me," (Ruth 1:16-17).

Then she said, ".....thy people shall be my people"; what a decision this is. She refuses the people of Moab and their gods, and their opposition to God, and she says, 'I want to be with the nation of Israel, I want to be with them.' I believe that Naomi would quietly talk over the wonderful things that God had done for the nation of Israel right from the time of their sojourn in Egypt, their journey through the Red Sea and through the river Jordan, the mighty victories that He secured by the judges He raised up, and also some of the prospects of Israel so glowingly portrayed by God in various pronouncements to His servants. All this, I believe, Naomi would have made known to Ruth.

Now said Ruth, 'I want to be connected with this kind of people; people following after God, who have experienced the help of God, who obviously joy in the things of God, I want to be connected with this people. It means refusing my people, I cannot have a share with the people of Moab and a share with the people of Israel at the same time, I must make a clean cut and be finished with Moab and her idols.' That is a very solemn thing, a very solemn step to take. That was her decision. If you like, she was 'burning her boats', there were no half measures. I can assure you dear friends, there is no joy in the Christian life with one foot in the world and the other in the Christian company; it just will not work, there is a pathway of separation that has to be followed. Do not think separation is an ugly word, it is a privileged word, it is a privilege to be clear of the vile and wicked, evil things that are in this world. It is a privilege to be away from that kind of thing, and at the other end of the spectrum, all that man boasts of in his culture and in his attainments, to be free from it all and to have a desire to be found with the people of God walking in humility and obedience. So she gave up her people, but she found a better people in the nation of Israel.

Then she said, (and I believe this is the real kernel of her decision, this is the real heart and centre of it), ".....and thy God [shall be] my God". The gods of Moab, I believe, were many, the God of Israel was one; but that one God was the true God. How like the Thessalonians Ruth was, "they turned to God from idols, to serve the living and true God, and to wait for His Son from heaven" (1 Thess.1:9-10). They made a complete cut. We were reminded this afternoon about the solemn statement in 1 John 5:21, "Children, keep yourselves from idols". The principle of idolatry is an affront to God, it is an affront to His majesty, it is an opposition to His affections, and He wants His people all for Himself; and Ruth says, ".....and thy God [shall be] my God". She made this definite decision, she was cutting herself of from all the gods of Moab, and finding her joy and centre in the one true God.

Finally she said, "Where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried; the Lord do so to me, and more also, if anything but death part thee and me." I believe, in simple words, she said, 'I am going to go right on to the end. There is no giving up, no turning back; I have made my decision, I have cast in my lot with you, your people and your God, and I am determined to go on.' There are tremendous pressures against the people of God today. Oh, what a great decision this is for each one of us, to say in spite of all that is against us and all that we feel, 'We are going to keep going on, and we are going to work and pray and have our desires centred in the one great God'. Now I know that some of the pressures are very great, and thank God we have a High Priest above who knows every one of them (Hebrews 4:14-5:10). He has been through it all; as a Man down here He has tasted the bitterness of opposition, He has tasted the sorrows of the Christian pathway, He knows it all, and because He knows it all, He is competent to know and encourage those who are passing through the same circumstances. He does not guarantee to remove them but He gives strength and courage and help that they might be borne, and that a testimony might be rendered to His God. How thankful we are for the priestly grace and help of our High Priest.

“Do not intreat me to leave thee, to return from following after thee; for whither thou goest I will go, and where thou lodgest I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God; where thou diest will I die, and there will I be buried. Jehovah do so to me, and more also, if aught but death part me and thee!” (vv. 16-17). To accompany Naomi, to walk with her, live with her, and die with her who was the only possible link with God and His people for Ruth: this was the longing of this woman of faith. But her thoughts go farther than simple association with Israel; she identifies herself with the people, whatever their state might be, in order to belong to the God of Israel, the true God who does not change: “Thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.” Having turned her back on Moab and its idols, she now belongs to a new cause with which she identifies, excluding every possibility of separation. Only death can break such bonds. Here we see how God and faith meet, understand one another, and unite together. How clearly this account leads us to understand that faith is the only means of bringing sinful man into relationship with God! Just as Ruth clung to Naomi, so faith clings to the Mediator, the object of God's counsels, who alone can give an assured relationship with the true God and an unshakable position before Him.

Ruth, on the other hand, represents that remnant of the nation, which will hold fast to the promises of God, in a dim and cloudy way at first, without claiming aught as a right, but distinctly in faith laying hold upon God. This is seen in her answer to Naomi. It is not mere nature, but faith in the living God that speaks in her reply: "Entreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge; thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God: where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried; the Lord do so to me, and more also, if aught but death part me and thee." This was in answer to Naomi's desire, that she should return to her people and her gods. It was thus real faith which made use of the covenant name Jehovah, which expressed itself in Ruth's reply — a faith which had stood the test of having no attraction for nature offered to it.

Let us, before passing on, glance again at verse 14, where we read that in contrast with the departure of Orpah, Ruth "clave to her (Naomi)." The word, "clave," denotes Ruth's complete self-surrender in love and loyalty to her new calling. She was yielding herself wholeheartedly and unreservedly to share not merely the temporal fortunes of her mother-in-law, but the worship of Jehovah in the land of His chosen people.