¹⁵ And she said, “See, your sister-in-law has gone back to her people and to her gods; return after your sister-in-law.” ¹⁶ But Ruth said, “Do not urge me to leave you or to return from following you. For where you go I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God. ¹⁷ Where you die I will die, and there will I be buried. May the Lord do so to me and more also if anything but death parts me from you.” ¹⁸ And when Naomi saw that she was determined to go with her, she said no more. – Ruth 1:15-18

What Ruth did was hard. But it was love.

I want to be like Ruth.

I want to be one who would do the right thing regardless of how hard it is.

I want to naively follow after God wholeheartedly even when I have no idea what that means.

I want to love the people God has given to me with the great love that God has shown me.

Based on Ruth 1:4 it seems like Ruth was with her husband and mother-in-law for about 10 years or a bit less. In that time their love grew for one another. What a tragedy for these women, especially Naomi in losing all the men in her life. At this point, she lost all of her closest blood relatives. But even amid her grief, she showed love for her daughters-in-law.

She sends them back for their own good and blesses them to find rest in their future husband’s house. But the following is the line that struck me:

¹³ would you therefore wait till they were grown? Would you therefore refrain from marrying? No, my daughters, for it is exceedingly bitter to me for your sake that the hand of the Lord has gone out against me.” ¹⁴ Then they lifted up their voices and wept again. And Orpah kissed her mother-in-law, but Ruth clung to her. – Ruth 1:13-14.

She said she was so bitter for their sake because God’s hand was against her. So, she is saying that God has given her great grief, but it grieved her because these young women were suffering from losing their husbands. In those days a husband was your lifeline. He was your provider and protection. So, losing their husbands was significant and it was an important blessing she gave them. Naomi’s expression, that she was so grieved, gives you the idea of how she cared for her daughters-in-law. And they must have cared for her too. Ruth’s actions showed how much she was reciprocating that love towards Naomi by basically giving up any hope for a life of her own to simply be with Naomi and care for her. This is such a powerful story of sacrificial love shown by someone who didn’t know who God was. But I do think that Ruth saw some bit of God from living with Naomi for such a long time.

Nevertheless, I think the point to note here is the demonstration of such a great love by someone who still doesn’t know who God was. It makes you think: What are we, who know God, capable of? We should be able to love even greater than this when we know that God himself demonstrated great sacrificial love for each of us.

I hope this account convicts us to reflect on how we love the people God has placed in our lives and how we can do better each day.  Let us be more like Ruth.