Going Home

             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. (Ruth 1:6-7)

             “When he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired servants have food to spare, and here I am starving to death!  I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired servants.’  So he got up and went to his father. (Luke 15:17-18)

            The book of Ruth is set in the time of the Judges when Israel would turn away from God, be subjected to foreigners, and return to God. Ruth’s story parallels that process. Her family moved away from God and were subject to foreigners, and in today’s passage, she returns to God. Another parallel is the parable of the prodigal son. I’m not suggesting that Ruth didn’t happen, just that individuals and groups can and do follow similar patterns. The nice thing about that is that we can learn from their experiences and apply what we learn when we find ourselves in the same pattern.

            Today’s passage says that Ruth heard that there was food in Israel. There are several possibilities here. It could be that the famine had lasted ten years and was just ending, that no one happened to report to Ruth that there was food in Israel earlier, or that until she lost her husband and sons, she was content to stay in Moab even if there was food in Israel. As with the prodigal son, it wasn’t until things got bad where she was that her thoughts turned to the possibility of things being better at home.

            The key here isn’t home in the physical sense. We can be just as stuck at home when God calls us to leave it. I remained at a church until God orchestrated events so that I had to leave. I have stayed in jobs where I was miserable because I was convinced nowhere else would be any better or that any better place would see that I’d worked in that previous place and want nothing to do with me. The “home” involved in Israel, Ruth, The Prodigal Son, and in our lives is, first and foremost, God, and the first step in the process is to recognize that things could be better and that we may not be as stuck as we think we are. In fact, our being stuck may be God’s way of telling us it’s time to move, and when we move, the direction we need to go is toward home, which is toward God.