When Naomi heard in Moab that the Lord had come to the aid of his people by providing food for them, she and her daughters-in-law prepared to return home from there. With her two daughters-in-law she left the place where she had been living and set out on the road that would take them back to the land of Judah.
Then Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, “Go back, each of you, to your mother’s home. May the Lord show you kindness, as you have shown kindness to your dead husbands and to me. May the Lord grant that each of you will find rest in the home of another husband.”
Then she kissed them goodbye and they wept aloud and said to her, “We will go back with you to your people.”
But Naomi said, “Return home, my daughters. Why would you come with me? Am I going to have any more sons, who could become your husbands? Return home, my daughters; I am too old to have another husband. Even if I thought there was still hope for me—even if I had a husband tonight and then gave birth to sons—would you wait until they grew up? Would you remain unmarried for them? No, my daughters. It is more bitter for me than for you, because the Lord’s hand has turned against me!”
At this they wept aloud again. Then Orpah kissed her mother-in-law goodbye, but Ruth clung to her.
“Look,” said Naomi, “your sister-in-law is going back to her people and her gods. Go back with her.”
But Ruth replied, “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me.” When Naomi realized that Ruth was determined to go with her, she stopped urging her.
Ruth 1:6-18
During 2026, Peachtree Church is inviting everyone into Cultivate, a churchwide discipleship plan centered on the fruit of the Spirit and the kind of life God longs to grow in us. Throughout the year, we’ll explore how love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control take shape in everyday life through the Spirit’s work. Cultivate brings together worship, Scripture, group guides, and meaningful practices designed to meet you where you are and support growth in ways that fit your season. These twice-weekly devotionals are one way to stay connected, offering reflection and grounding for daily life with God. Whether you engage in many ways or just one, you’re invited to be part of this shared journey of becoming more rooted in who God has created and called you to be.
Devotional
In our Scripture for today, we see three women on a dusty road. Naomi is the older woman, and Orpah and Ruth are her widowed daughters-in-law. These women have been through deep grief and tragedy together. Naomi and her husband and sons have been refugees in Moab, driven across the Jordan because of famine in Bethlehem in Israel. While they were in Moab, the sons married Moabite women, which was an iffy thing to have done: the Moabites worshiped many gods and practiced their religion in what a good Hebrew would consider an abhorrent way. But now all the menfolk have died, and these three women are at a crossroads. With the famine over in Judah, Naomi plans to go home to Bethlehem. She tries to lovingly send these two Moabite woman home to their mothers. All the ties that bound them are now broken. Naomi thinks they should go back to being Moabites.
Naomi goes into some detail about how she cannot provide the young women with husbands from her own family. What she describes is levirate marriage. It was the practice of the day to care for young widows by finding a match for them from the family of the dead husband. This was a compassionate practice because the lot of a woman alone in the ancient world was grim. (If you wonder just how grim, looking over the previous book, Judges, should enlighten you). With no breadwinner and no male protector to stand up for her and provide for her, a woman would be prey to predators. Things are not so different for many women around the world today.
When my daughter Carolina worked in Kenya for Give Directly, she would survey villages of about 150 people or so. Many times, she noted that widows were vulnerable to a man coming onto her property and taking it away from her. She saw many widows stripped of their homes and possessions, and worse. What Naomi feared for her two daughters-in-law is not so uncommon.
Naomi blesses them and prays that the two young women will find security in the home of another husband. They both weep at the thought of being parted from Naomi, and they beg her to let them go home with her to Bethlehem. Naomi insists, and Orpah turns and begins the walk home to her family. We should not be all that surprised at this because her name means ‘back of the neck’! And that is what Naomi and Ruth see as they watch her leave.
Ruth’s name means compassionate friend, and true to her name, Ruth clings to Naomi. We don’t know exactly why she is so strongly committed to her mother-in-law, but we do see some clues in what she says to Naomi.
Ruth says, “I’m going with you today and always. I want to keep living with you and live the way you live. I want to worship your God and be part of your faith family, and when you die, and I die, we’ll be buried together.” Ruth does not want to go back to Moab, her birth family, or her former religion at all. She wants to throw her lot in with Naomi and her kind. She likes what she has seen of the way they live, worship, and treat each other. She wants to be one of them for good.
And then she says something she must have heard Naomi and her family say when they made a covenant, a binding promise. She says, “May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me.” Ruth plans to be the kind of person who makes binding covenants, like Naomi and her family.
Naomi must have been moved and impressed by the quality of Ruth’s covenant love, because she does not argue anymore. And the two walk on together. Neither of them knows it yet, but the Lord has a future in mind for them.
For Reflection
- Are you surprised that these words we often hear at weddings were first shared by a daughter-in-law to her mother-in-law?
- What does Ruth leave behind her as she binds her life to Naomi? What does her covenant vow mean to Naomi, do you think?
Prayer
Dear Lord, I want to be like Ruth when I love someone, all in, totally committed. But I feel myself holding back, afraid of that deep intimacy, afraid of being hurt if I love too much. Lord, teach me to love deeply, as you have loved me. Make my promises deep and true. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
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