Lesson 13: A mother’s choice

Read Ruth 2

One day Naomi told Ruth and Orpah that she was returning to her own homeland. She was leaving the house where the three of them had gotten to know each other, and she told Ruth and Orpah to return to their parents’ homes too so they could start new lives.

Most often, when we take our trouble to Jesus, many options will be placed in our paths as solutions. We must be careful to ask Jesus about each possibility to see if this is from Him, or if this is not yet His answer. To both Ruth and Orpah this may have sounded like a great answer. They could return to what they had known all their lives. Perhaps there might already be someone interested in marrying Ruth.

But just because a possibility opens immediately for something we might like or be comfortable with, this does not mean this is Jesus’ answer to our prayer.

The Apostle Paul faced a situation like this one day. He had planned to go to Jerusalem. On the way a man came to him and told him he would be arrested and imprisoned if he went there. The members of the church told him this was not what he should do. We would easily understand that prison would not be where anyone wanted to be, and it would be natural for us to choose what would be better for us in such a situation (Acts 21:7-14).


But Paul knew what Jesus was asking of him, so he told the people of the church not to break his heart by encouraging him to do what he knew was not what God had asked. He continued on his journey to Jerusalem, and just as the man had said, he was arrested. Paul spent the next few years in one prison after another. But God planned that during this time Paul would write many letters to the churches he had started – and those letters are with us today as books of the New Testament. Paul could not have known how Jesus would use his time in prison, but it was to benefit not only the believers of his own time, but also believers for all the years to come.

When we come to a situation we do not know how to live with, we need to wait on God until we are certain we know His plan and will for us in the situation. The temptation to get through this hard time quickly will be strong, because none of us like to be uncomfortable or in pain. For Ruth, to move on to a new life would have been a great temptation. It would have been a way to forget about the pain of losing her husband. We will read about her choice in the next lesson.

*How do you ask God about the choices you need to make?