In days like that, who could stand for truth? Who could possibly live faithfully? There are too many contrary pressures, too much compromise and complacency. No one can be immune to such a disease. The very best you can do, surely, is keep your head down, back away from corrupted society and hope the storm might eventually pass.
Maybe that's how you feel about our own days, too? Too many challenges to meet for your conscience to be kept clean and clear. Too many subtle and sorcerous stresses that deflate your heart and defeat your every attempt at honest goodness.
The book of Ruth persuades otherwise. The funereal beginning provides the context but it doesn't determine the tone and content of the lives on display. Rather, we're treated to a portrait of genuine godliness, of a faithfulness that grows more and more fruitful. A commitment to loyal love that reflects that of the covenant LORD; an approach to the Law that is not boundaried but looks to bless beyond its stipulations. A simplicity of faith, an honest humility, a dependence upon the living God and a thankfulness to him that is far more than lip service.
None of this is worked-out in ideal conditions. Naomi's faith is tattered and torn; Ruth is an outsider with a suspect heritage and Boaz risks his reputation and financial security. And yet...
And yet their lives display the beauties of the grace of God - a compelling, courageous expression of the life of God in the souls of men and women. Against all the odds, in the face of the most destructive currents that could engulf in a moment, they hoped in God, tasted and saw that he was good, and stood with a joyous integrity.
It could be said of them, as it was of Elijah, that they were people just like us. Fallible, prone to temptation; the unfinished handiwork of God. But this God, whose Son would come in the fulness of time from the line of Boaz and Ruth, is the God who will one day complete the work that he has started, on the day of Christ Jesus. He is our hope, in days like these.
Despite the times, our calling and privilege remain the same: to "become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and warped generation...shining among them like stars in the sky as [we] hold firmly to the word of life" (Phil 2:15), having all that we need for life and godliness, having the encouragement of being united to Christ, the comfort of his love and our common sharing in his Spirit.
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Speak, I pray Thee, gentle Jesus!
O how passing sweet Thy words,
Breathing o'er my troubled spirit
Peace which never earth affords.
All the world's distracting voices,
All the enticing tones of ill,
At Thy accents mild, melodious,
Are subdued, and all is still.
Tell me Thou art mine, O Saviour,
Grant me an assurance clear;
Banish all my dark misgivings,
Still my doubting, calm my fear.
O, my soul within me yearneth
Now to hear Thy voice divine;
So shall grief be gone for ever,
And despair no more be mine.
(William Williams, 1717-91;
tr. Richard Morris Lewis, 1847-1918)
