Have you  renewed your passport recently?     The paperwork is a practical reminder that there is work involved in a citizenship commitment.  There is also a price to be paid.      Opening the passport, the picture reminds us how ordinary we are.   
            As we open the pages of the book of Ruth, we discover a very ordinary person.   We come to understand the work involved in her commitment to new citizenship.    She also paid a price in following God, but unto a glorious future.     The book called after her name does not describe miracles or revelations or signs and wonders.    Rather, the book of Ruth shows how God is active and faithful through simple people in ordinary life.  
           
Foreigner to Follower
            The book of Ruth is set in the period of the Judges (1:1),  a time revealing  the horrors of life without a godly king in leadership.   The end of the book of Judges brings the author’s concluding  assessment of that season in history, “In those days Israel had no king;  everyone did as he saw fit.”  (Judges 21:25).   The state of the nation was chaos, and there was famine in the land (1:1).    There is significant  contrast between the characters in the book of Ruth  and those in the book of Judges.   Ruth stands as a refreshing story in the midst of turbulent times, a light in the darkness.  
            One theme unfolded in the opening pages of Ruth is that of being a foreigner.   Elimelech died after moving his family to a foreign land, leaving Naomi with two sons who married Moabite women,  Ruth and Orpah (1:1-5).   After both of the sons died,    Naomi decided to return to her homeland.   She had taken up residence in a foreign place,  but had not forgotten her true citizenship.    
            Orpah decided to stay in Moab (1:14), but Ruth  left her earthly homeland to reside in a new world, in Bethlehem of Judah,  with her mother-in-law.    Ruth, as a native of Moab, was accepted into Israel’s mainstream, demonstrating that natural birth alone is not the prerequisite for inclusion into the family of God.   
          
Foreignness to Faithfulness
            Ruth’s story is really a story of foreignness transformed into faithfulness.  The period of the Judges was one of depravity and immorality.   Ruth stands as a refreshing model of  a foreigner brought to faithfulness in an unfaithful world, an inspiring  example in an age of great apostasy.  
            The way the characters in Ruth act in faithfulness toward each other should inform the way we do relationships.  Naomi was faithful to Ruth and her sister-in-law, concerned about their future.  Her parting wish was that God would show kindness to them, that he would keep his faithfulness unto them (1:8).     
            Ruth, in contrast to her sister-in-law, makes a decision of faithful loyalty to Naomi, which takes her on a journey of living the call together.  Ruth demonstrates her faithfulness to Naomi, following her and clinging to her (1:14), verbalizing  faithfulness to a new people and to God in a new land (1:16).   In this, she also expresses a willingness to die for this new life (1:17),  forsaking her family, friends, homeland, and prospects for remarriage.      Even in the face of  expressed  bitterness by her mother-in-law (1:20-21),  Ruth lives out her loyalty by  working in the fields to provide for Naomi (2:2-3).      
            God, in his sovereignty, works His purposes through the faithfulness of his people.   Through the faithful actions of Ruth, God reveals that He is faithful.  What is true in the book of Ruth is true in our own lives.   God works behind the scenes through ordinary people in the normal hours of everyday life.   As modeled by Ruth, we are speaking of common people with uncommon faith, ordinary people serving an extraordinary God.            
 
Faithful to Fruitful
            What makes Ruth captivating is that it is a great story.   All good stories have conflict with resolution, including turning points.    For Ruth, the tension builds with the main characters facing a long life as widows and the ensuing struggle to support themselves.   She and Naomi arrive in the new land “as the harvest was beginning” (1:22).    The story then finds Ruth in the fields, gathering grain behind the harvesters.   As divine providence would have it, she ends up in the field of Boaz.   He was from the clan of Elimelech (2:3), meaning that he was in the  link between family and the larger tribe.    His question, “Whose young woman is that?” suggests an attraction to Ruth (adding some romance to this great story).   Boaz extends favor to her, and she goes home full of harvest fruit to share with Naomi (8-16).         
            At the midpoint of the story, the plot turns, as Naomi realizes that Boaz is one of her kinsman-redeemers (2:20).    We see a wonderful change in Naomi, as she extends a blessing to Boaz and joy with Ruth in God’s provision.    Chapter 2 ends with Ruth continuing to glean the harvest in a faithful life with Naomi.   “Then Ruth the Moabitess said, ‘He even said to me, Stay with my workers until they finish harvesting all my grain.'   Naomi said to Ruth her daughter-in-law, ‘It will be good for you, my daughter, to go with his girls, because in someone else's field you might be harmed’"  (Ruth 2:21-22).   There is no safer place to be than in the middle of God’s harvest fields, no matter what the circumstances in which you are found there.
            Traditionally, the story of Ruth is read by Jews each year at the harvest festival, also called Pentecost, or the Feast of Weeks  (Ex 34:22; Deut 16:10,16; 2 Chron 8:13).   It  was celebrated seven weeks after the Passover (Lev 23:15-16).   It has also been known as the  feast of the Harvest (Ex 23:16) and  the day of the first fruits (Num 28:26), because the first loaves made from the new grain were then offered on the altar (Lev 23:17).    There is, then, a connection of Pentecost and the harvest, a link to the Passover that expressed the calling of a  chosen and separated people as the fruit of God’s faithfulness.
            Ruth is the heroine of the book named after her.   She displays devotion to God and love for family in a way that grabs the heart.    She serves as a mirror of the character of God, a reminder that godly people are a powerful witness of God’s love, faithfulness, fruitfulness, integrity, loyalty, and patience.  
            Ruth also serves as an example to us that God can use the most unsuspecting people, through their obedience and humility, to do great things in His will, no matter what their background.   Anyone can become a  faithful follower and experience the blessings of God as a citizen of a His kingdom.  God redeems us out of  sinful foreignness, issues a spiritual passport,  and rewards  faithfulness.     That’s Ruth, that’s redemption, and  that is you and I, ordinary people serving an extra ordinary God.