LIGHTING THE ADVENT WREATH: The Second Candle

SCRIPTURE: Ruth 1:15-22

So she said, “See, your sister-in-law has gone back to her people and to her gods; return after your sister-in-law.” But Ruth said, “Do not press me to leave you or to turn back from following you! Where you go, I will go; Where you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you die, I will die— there will I be buried. May the Lord do thus and so to me, and more as well, if even death parts me from you!” When Naomi saw that she was determined to go with her, she said no more to her. So the two of them went on until they came to Bethlehem. When they came to Bethlehem, the whole town was stirred because of them; and the women said, “Is this Naomi?” She said to them, “Call me no longer Naomi, call me Mara, for the Almighty has dealt bitterly with me. I went away full, but the Lord has brought me back empty; why call me Naomi when the Lord has dealt harshly with me, and the Almighty has brought calamity upon me?” So Naomi returned together with Ruth the Moabite, her daughter-in-law, who came back with her from the country of Moab. They came to Bethlehem at the beginning of the barley harvest.

LESSON

Ruth and Naomi had lost all the people they loved. Naomi’s two sons – one of them was Ruth’s husband – had died, and Naomi’s husband had died, too. Naomi had been living in Ruth’s country, far from her family, and so Naomi decided to return to Bethlehem. Ruth could have stayed in her own country with her own family, but she chose to go to Bethlehem with Naomi. Naomi was so sad that she thought that God had forgotten her. In the days of the Bible, most women couldn’t get jobs, so women would go to the fields and take the grain that the farmers left behind. Ruth went to the field to gather grain, and there she met Boaz, a relative of Naomi’s, who took care of them. Boaz and Ruth married and had a son, and Naomi was happy. She knew that God had not forgotten them, even when she had been sad. Boaz and Ruth named their son Obed. He would become the father of Jesse, the father of King David.

THINK OR TALK ABOUT

When did you feel really sad? What can make you happy?

PRAYER

Holy God, thank you for being with us always.