RUTH’S CHOICE
Today’s Reading: Ruth 1-2
Click scripture link to read online or HERE to listen online (then click the symbol of the audio speaker above the scripture portion).
Ruth’s home country of Moab was located east of the Jordan River and the Dead Sea, and south of the Arnon (Numbers 21:10-15). Today, Moab is within the Kingdom of Jordan. It was in the Plains of Moab, opposite Jericho (Numbers 22:1, 26:63, Joshua 13:32) that the Israelites made their last encampment before they entered the Promised Land.
GOOGLE MAPS – To see where the photo was taken, click HERE.
Key Verse: Ruth 1:16
But Ruth said:
“Entreat me not to leave you,
Or to turn back from following after you;
For wherever you go, I will go;
And wherever you lodge, I will lodge;
Your people shall be my people,
And your God, my God.”
In the midst of the time of the Judges comes this beautiful love story. The book of Ruth is an account of one of the most moving acts of loyalty, and of the way that God honoured that love and loyalty. Even while evil and corruption seemed so prominent in Israel, there were many honourable people who loved and served God. That number included a Moabite woman who had married an Israelite and was now a widow. In a time when Israel was often in apostasy, she left her idolatrous religion to embrace the faith of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, Joshua, and her mother-in-law Naomi. Ruth is a bright shining light pointing to the way of faith in the One true God. Over 1,000 years later, Jesus, the Son of God, would be born in Ruth’s adopted hometown of Bethlehem. From the lineage of Ruth comes the Messiah, the Christ, our Saviour and Lord.
PRAYER FOR TODAY:
Lord Jesus, Ruth and Boaz were your great-great, etc. grandparents. You are 100% Human and also 100% God. As a Human, You show me how to live as a man. You are my Mentor, my Example, and my Hero. Please give me grace to follow You more closely today than yesterday. In Your loving Name I pray. Amen!
100 PERSONAL WORDS:
I was thrilled to participate in the wedding of our second daughter, Ellen, to Nizar Shaheen, an Israeli Arab who is ordained in the Nazareth Baptist Church. As a part of the ceremony, Ellen quoted, in the Arabic language, the words of our key verse. What a powerful moment. Israeli television co-operated with TV networks in Canada and the USA to carry the wedding live across North America. In advance, we had distributed thousands of copies of a document called, “A Marriage Covenant.” I encouraged married couples everywhere to renew their vows as Ellen and Nizar said theirs at the Church in Nizar’s home village of Cana of Galilee. Jesus, His mother, and several of the disciples were guests there at another wedding 2,000 years before, and Jesus did His first miracle of turning the water into wine (read John 2:1-11). The people of Cana still call the wedding of Nizar and Ellen “the other wedding” (click here for Ellen saying the words of Ruth to her beloved Nizar).
Today, Nizar and Ellen are all over the Arabic-speaking world on TV and on the internet, winning thousands of precious people to Jesus through Light For All Nations.
Yours for love and loyalty,
David
Madaba, Jordan, just near mount Nebo where Moses looked out over the Promised Land, has a church named The Church of the Map. The church is also known as Church of Saint George. The mosaic floor map (pictured below) has the oldest known map of Jerusalem and its surrounding Biblical regions.
GOOGLE MAPS – To see where the photo was taken, click HERE.
Wow–read the whole book of Ruth–incredible love story! God is good–amen? Great message and prayer and link to Ellen and Nizar. God’s blessings on you, this morning and for the week ahead, saints. Our God will provide for He is amazing and His love for us enduring. Pick up the sword of the truth of His Word and armour of righteousness and you will be protected. Amen!
Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God.
Matthew 5:9 KJB
“YOUR Spirit” Tasha Cobbs ft. Kierra Sheard with lyrics
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=prK88Rf0T8Y
Amen,Beverlee.Here is a link to the movie “Ruth” on Youtube.God bless
Thanks, Bill. I am watching it now.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kW5WyJ1QNpM
Thanks William I also watched the movie “Ruth”
DEVOTIONALS/CHARLES SPURGEON’S MORNING AND EVENING – MONDAY, MARCH 11, 2019
Evening: “Thou shalt be called, Sought out.” Isaiah 62:12
“The surpassing grace of God is seen very clearly in that we were not only sought, but sought out. Men seek for a thing which is lost upon the floor of the house, but in such a case there is only seeking, not seeking out. The loss is more perplexing and the search more persevering when a thing is sought out. We were mingled with the mire: we were as when some precious piece of gold falls into the sewer, and men gather out and carefully inspect a mass of abominable filth, and continue to stir and rake, and search among the heap until the treasure is found. Or, to use another figure, we were lost in a labyrinth; we wandered hither and thither, and when mercy came after us with the gospel, it did not find us at the first coming, it had to search for us and seek us out; for we as lost sheep were so desperately lost, and had wandered into such a strange country, that it did not seem possible that even the Good Shepherd should track our devious roamings. Glory be to unconquerable grace, we were sought out! No gloom could hide us, no filthiness could conceal us, we were found and brought home. Glory be to infinite love, God the Holy Spirit restored us!
“The lives of some of God’s people, if they could be written would fill us with holy astonishment. Strange and marvellous are the ways which God used in their case to find his own. Blessed be his name, he never relinquishes the search until the chosen are sought out effectually. They are not a people sought today and cast away to-morrow. Almightiness and wisdom combined will make no failures, they shall be called, “Sought out!” That any should be sought out is matchless grace, but that we should be sought out is grace beyond degree! We can find no reason for it but God’s own sovereign love, and can only lift up our heart in wonder, and praise the Lord that this night we wear the name of “Sought out.””
Charles Spurgeon’s Daily Devotional
https://www.biblegateway.com/devotionals/morning-and-evening/today
Thank you Beverlee; also for this Great Love Story; for am one of the lost sheep that was found, Glory be to God’ I am, saved; I am set free!!
that should say “for I am one of the lost sheep:”
Beautiful love stories! Thanks Beverlee and William for your posts!
????
Hello all saints….May God richly bless each and every one of you this day;
PRAISE THE LORD! prayer of thankfulness, healing the stomach of Pastor’s wife, Carol, had a bug for YEARS, probably gotten from well water years & years ago, FINALLY bug is gone,she is feeling very well, her brother has same bug; prayers for his healing;
can you imagine! a bug from the days when we drank from the wells….this bug has about 37 letters in it; very special meds were used. again, PRAISE THE LORD AND THANKS BE TO GOD FOR all those who were involved with Carol’s healing;
prayers of healing for all the cancer to be gone from Susan; also all cancer be gone in Jesus Name from Jim a neighbour,
prayers for all those who are grieving the loss of friends and family,
PRAYERS OF PRAISE AND THANKSGIVING FOR OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST WHO ROSE FROM THE GRAVE WHO SITS AT THE RIGHT HAND OF GOD, WHO IS OUR SAVIOUR FOR EVER, amen amen amen
Yes, Sah Praise the Lord! Amen
What a beautiful love story!
Davids exposition; prayer and personal words’ I was able to watch the wedding of Nazar and Ellen directly on TV, that day!! Thank you also for the link of Ellen saying the vow in Hebrew.
Great pictures of the churches, thank you Reynold!
its a lovely spring day here; hope all you saints are enjoying the same wherever you are!!