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Drastic Times Drastic Actions

Ruth 1:1 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.
 
Did you see what happened here? A bunch of bad stuff. A man who lived during the era of the judges, a notoriously tricky time, was running from a famine. Never a good thing. This husband and dad took his loved one to an enemy country to live for a while. 

This love story guided by God's sovereignty seems to start very severely for this family. The dad immediately died, and after marriage for ten years, the two sons died too. All of this left a bitter mommy and two widowed daughters-in-law. 

It was God's fault. He did it to me. Call me Mara (bitter), not Naomi (pleasant). God did her wrong. If there were country music back then, Mara / Naomi would have been a star. 

It just so happened that news came that the Lord had sent rain and the bakeries were back in business! This following interchange could have seen the universe implode. No less than FIVE times, Naomi used the phrase "Go back." In her twisted thinking, she thought that she was doing the girls right. She had no idea that God was going to produce the future king of Israel from her line. 

Nothing would dissuade Ruth, and she walked into one of the sweetest love stories in history. It's a story that has affected all believers. It is truly an eternal story that has no comparison. Thank you, Ruth, for not being deterred by difficulty!

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