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“Loyalty”
Ruth 1:1-18
Mark 12:28-34

November 5, 2006 - Kim M. Henning

Tom Brokaw entitled his book, “The Greatest Generation”. Brokaw used the word ‘greatest’ to describe those men and women who persevered through the Great Depression and World War II.

The Greatest Generation, as Brokaw called them, encountered one challenge after another. Banks closed. Savings accounts disappeared. Jobs were scarce. Then came WW II. Food was rationed. Gasoline was rationed. Our nation was at war and there was great uncertainty. Brokaw describes the precariousness of those days and the remarkable courage that it took for ‘The Greatest Generation” to persevere.

Another story is told from another time in history.....

A man named Elimelech marries Naomi. They live in Judah. Drought covers the country of Judah. Crops cannot be grown. There is no food. Hunger is a terrible thing, so Elimelech and Naomi journey to the foreign country of Moab.

Elimelech and Naomi are parents of two sons. The boys grow up and eventually take for themselves wives who are from Moab, they are not Jewish. And for a brief while we have a family of six: Elimelech, Naomi, their sons and daughters-in-law, Orpah and Ruth.

But then, an untimely tragedy occurs—Elimelech dies and Naomi is a widow. A short while later, a son dies. And then the second dies. Not only does Naomi grieve but she realizes how vulnerable she is.....she’s an aged woman, she lives in a foreign country, she has no family. How will she survive?

Naomi decides within herself that she has one option: return to Judah. With some head-strong determinism, she starts walking..... and those two daughters-in-law join her. But then she stops.

Positioned in the middle of the road, she turns to Orpah and Ruth and tells them to go back. “Go back to your mothers” she tells them. “I have no more sons to give you. Even if I married tonight and became pregnant.....would you wait for them to grow up? This makes no sense. Go home. And that is what Orpah does. She kisses Naomi and says good-bye.

And then comes Ruth. But Ruth does not choose the way or Orpah or the way that she is told. “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....”

Listen to Ruth.... This is a Moabite woman who plants her feet with her mother-in-law. Listen to the security of these words: “Do not press me to leave you.....”

Listen to Ruth. She’s not an ordained pastor or a learned theologian. She’s an ordinary woman with extraordinary conviction, “Where you I, I will go; where you lodge I lodge.”

Listen to Ruth. We live with shallow convictions. Relationships are fragile. We live in a transient world. We exist in a time that talks about down-sizing and out-sourcing. And then along comes Ruth with some unusually soul-gripping words: “your people, my people; your God, my God.”

The words that Ruth speaks..... I invite you to say them with me,

“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....”

What you have just spoken is a vow of loyalty. And what a refreshing word that is to those of us who live with fear and anxiety and wondering if anyone cares for us at all. Shallow commitments are the death of every one of us. We want something that will stick like glue. We want something that will not have to be argued out in court someday. We want something, we need something that will get us through the hellishness of life.

Is there anyone willing to speak a total commitment – word of faith?

Is there anyone willing to anchor their promises, solidify their relationships?

Is there anyone willing to speak a promise to God, a promise to Jesus Christ that is more than ‘feelings’, that is more than a flash in the pan? “In life, in death, in life beyond death....

Is there a Ruth here this morning, willing to speak her loyalty?

Understand this. Loyalty like that expressed by Ruth.....begins as an inside job. Loyalty is character. I think of some of the Psalms in the Bible where the Psalmist says, ‘bless the Lord, O my soul’. When the Psalmist prays, he speaks to his soul and he speaks to God simultaneously. The Psalmist knows that he needs to talk to himself before he talks to God. That is loyalty. It begins as an inside job. “Bless the Lord, O my soul.”

Understand this. Loyalty like that expressed by Ruth.....is costly. She is not a free-loader. When Ruth says to Naomi, ‘where you go, I will go’ and all the rest of that she is like Abraham and Sarah who leave their family, leave their home in order to follow the voice of God. Ruth is an all or none kind of woman. She reminds me of the widow who takes her two copper coins....all that she has, and she drops them into the temple treasury. Jesus stands back and says, ‘wow, what faith!’ That’s loyalty.

Understand this. Loyalty like that expressed by Ruth.....shapes the future. Ruth determines her future when she speaks her promise. That is like Paul, the Apostle Paul who says that faith is our ‘hope beyond all hope’. Ruth stakes her entire future in relationship to her mother-in-law, Naomi. Our expression of loyalty tells us what we are going to be doing with our lives five years from now, ten years from now.

Understand this. Loyalty, like that expressed by Ruth is life-changing. Ruth says, no less, ‘your God will be my God.’ Ruth is willing to build her life, shape her life, structure her life under the authority of God. She will pray....as Naomi prays. She will honor the Sabbath as Naomi honors the Sabbath. She will obey the commandments as Naomi obeys the commandments. Loyalty is life-changing. Even Jesus said, “Take up your cross, and follow me.”

Ruth is a model of faith for us. She speaks a vow of loyalty and carries through.....In closing, let me say just two things.....

The first is very important. If you are like me, there are many times when we have been less than 100% with our promises. I have been less than my best, at times, with my vows, my promises. And I suspect you have been too. We have each hoped that others would be more generous, more faithful, more devoted than we are....... We have each hopes that others would ‘pick up the slack......’ We have each fallen short...... Not one of us has been 100%. So let’s be clear: ‘a vow of loyalty begins today. A vow of loyalty doesn’t have to reflect the past as much as it does today and tomorrow. Make a vow today.

The last thing I would like to say is likewise very important. Our vows and our promises are absolutely necessary if we want to live these short lives with any integrity at all. But our vows are bigger than us. Our vows reach into the future. Our vows shape future generations. Ruth made a vow. And do you know what happened three generations later? Three generations later, there was born through the bloodline of Ruth, a great grandson who is named David......who would become the greatest king of Israel. David, offspring of Ruth’s loyalty, would be the one who write some of those beloved psalms. David, offspring of Ruth’s loyalty, would be a great unifier of Israel, and would go down in history as a model of faith.

A remarkable woman, Ruth, spoke a vow of loyalty that would define her and the future ahead of her. Would you join me in speaking the vow that Ruth spoke?