Brown's Daily Word 1-25-11

Good morning,
It is a brisk New York winter morning, but energizing and enervating. It was rather cold yesterday for a walk outside, so my wife took advantage of the size of the local mall as a walk spot.
Whenever I read the faith stories of Naomi and Ruth, I am blessed, inspired, and challenged. When Naomi heard that God had visited His people, she returned to her home town of Bethlehem. Yes, she felt hurt by her circumstances, and she was still bitter and angry, but nonetheless she returned. Naomi said, in essence, God has afflicted me, and I am unhappy about it, but where else would I go? He is God and, ultimately, it is He “to whom we must give account” (Hebrews 4.13).
We do not want our faith to end when circumstances seem to conspire against us. If we are under the "frowning providence" of God, we need to take a step in the right direction by turning back to the Lord and going where he blesses. We must return to the church and the covenant people, and to corporate worship, even in our hurt and bitterness. To whom else can we go?
Naomi instructed Ruth and Orpah to return to their homelands and families. “Think,” she said. “You will not have a husband or children; instead, you will have trouble and hardship. Turn back.” Orpah followed the instruction of her mother-in-law. Longing for her family and friends, she decided that was the better life and better path. Amazingly, we hear no more about her in the Bible.
The Bible does not promise a life of comfort and ease, but it does promise an eternity of reward and joy. However, that destiny is often reached by the path of suffering. Orpah realized that the way of continuing with her mother-in-law was difficult and turned aside to a more pleasant path.
Ruth’s hope was not so sentimental. She has wisdom beyond her years and beyond Naomi's efforts to dissuade her. Despite an apparently hopeless future of widowhood, childlessness, and poverty, Ruth took Naomi’s hand and walked with her to Bethlehem, saying, “Where you go I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God. 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.”
Ruth had come to trust in Naomi’s God in spite of Naomi’s bitterness. She left the Moabite god, Chemosh, and commited herself to the faith of the covenant people. True faith turns to God for a future hope and promise. Ruth demonstrated ideal womanhood as she saw beyond present bitter setbacks. Not controlled by a demand for the securities and comforts of the world, she had courage to go into the unknown, under God's leading. She was radically committed to relationships with the people God brought into her life. Women like Ruth are not prized by a confused culture and lost world, but hers is the kind God honors and entrusts with the work of his kingdom.
Ruth lived an extraordinary faith in a very ordinary life. She returns a widow to a foreign land, worked as a farmhand, and obeyed and served her mother-in-law. She worshipped Jehovah, and she proceeded to love her husband and raise godly children. Other than in the book of Ruth her name is mentioned only in Matthew 1:5 to note that her son was Obed, in the family line of Jesus our Lord and Savior.
In Christ,
Brown

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mIim2Hvz0sE



Saturday evening worship service.
Location: First United Methodist Church. Endicott
53 McKinley Avenue, Endicott.
Sponsored by the Union Center United Methodist Church, 128, Maple Drive, Endicott


Saturday January 29.2011 6 PM Gathering: Coffee.
6:30 PM Worship Service
Worship Music by Laureen Naik, Gary and Gena McMyne
Speaker:
Rev. Brown Naik,