She was longing for home. Sometimes the thoughts had whispered through her mind like the wind whispering across the sands of the land, and other times they thoughts had whipped through her mind; a frenzied whirlwind like the wind whipping the sand up, up, up, the stinging particles infiltrating everything, and now she knew she must do what was required.
Naomi called her daughters in law to herself. Beautiful women, she would miss them so. Remnants in living form of the life her and her husband and sons had made here in Moab. She would tell them to stay, find new husbands, for even if she had conceived a son that night, would they wait till he was grown? No.
She was longing for home, but these daughters, they were home, and Orpah agreed through tears and stayed; she would find a new husband, a new home, even while she was home.
But something had settled in Ruth’s soul, like the fine particles of dust they constantly wiped away. This was not her home, there was an eternal home, somewhere, far away. She’d heard the stories for a decade of her mother in law’s God. If they were true….she must not miss the opportunity to find out, and so she made her now famous declaration. “Where you go I will go, your people will be my people and your God my God.”
So they walked home; Naomi to a known place…and on the way stories of her God. Nights under big starry skies…and Ruth heard the story of Abraham and Sarah, Rebekah and Isaac, a match made by God after another long journey. A God that knew people…
They neared Bethlehem and the women recognised them… Broken, disappointed, it all flooded out as the women welcomed Naomi home…. ‘Do not call me [g]Naomi; call me [h]Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. 21 I went out full, and the Lord has brought me home again empty. Why do you call me Naomi, since the Lord has testified against me, and [i]the Almighty has afflicted me?”
Ruth wondered, what was her role in all of this? Gathering grain, the rough stalks grazing her hands, again and again. She was grateful for the laws made by this God. Grain for the widows, the orphans, the poor.
She just wanted to taste of this God, this kindness, just a little, but then favour. The owner of the field inviting her in, drink from his water vessels, dip her bread in his vinegar.
Naomi sees the grain and enquires, who?
A spark of hope flicks in her chest, could God really be showing them this kindness? A tiny thought came to light, the traditions, the customs, not only could Ruth gather grain; there was provision here for more. Could it be possible? Naomi would watch and wait… and pray…this kindness, a drop of water to her parched soul. Drip, drip, drip… the weeks passed and more kindness, tiny sprouts of hope growing again, yes she was confident, she would ask for more. More from this kind man and more, more from God. Maybe she was not destined to be bitter, maybe there was pleasantness left for her.
Now it came to pass, in the days when the judges ruled, that there was a famine in the land. And a certain man of Bethlehem, Judah, went to dwell in the country of Moab, he and his wife and his two sons. Ruth 1:1
The story of Naomi highlighted to me, what it means to dwell in a place, particularly in our thinking and how that has the potential of changing our entire trajectory. Naomi was tired, discouraged, told her daughters in law to stay when she decided to travel back home to Israel, and yet the thought that wouldn’t let go in my brain was, in light of eternity, if her God was really the one true God, shouldn’t she have been taking them back home with her so they would fully know him?
And yet Ruth had already caught something of this and she refused to dwell in the land where she was because in her thinking, she had made a dwelling place for Him.
How often can we be like Naomi, we know Him, His hand, His works but we are standing in a place of exhaustion, whereby another who has heard our stories, is dwelling in their minds with Him in expectation of Him?
Dwell…the word had landed in my spirit, I remember it distinctly, standing in the café where we sometimes have homechurch, a quirky place of craft and warmth with remnants of the 70s. A lady shared how the word dwell kept being highlighted to her when she read the Bible and from then on it was on my radar too… for a full year.
It’s staying and remaining in a place…He who dwells in the shelter of the most High, shall abide in the shadow of the almighty. Dwell and abide, I thought maybe they meant the same thing, but there they were both in the same Scripture, with slightly different meanings and it’s not the only Scripture where it happens.
One of the Hebrew words for “dwell” is yashab, meaning to settle, remain or to sit down.
Dwell in the land and feed on His faithfulness. Psalm 37:3 Stay in that place. It’s not a thank you God for all these times that You were faithful but now I’m back to trying to sort out a mess again….remembering and gratitude is being revealed to me as a real force, just as hope has been.
I heard the story of a man who had fallen multiple stories after a balcony gave way beneath his hands, and though he died on impact, he was brought back by the medical team but had multiple injuries. As he lay in his hospital bed recovering he made the choice to moment by moment rejoice in the Lord in prayer. One day when he was finally home, he thought I wonder how much of an impact all this rejoicing has made? I’m not going to rejoice for a week. Within a few days he was back in bed in terrible pain but as he started rejoicing again his body healed.
To dwell is partially a mental place, a place of belief, God said this, I’m staying with these Words. When you believe that He is your protection, so much debris flies past instead of sticking. When you believe He is your healer, those germs, that genetic thing you were born with, lose their grip.
Psalm 91 is a wonderful place to begin to understand what God has for us as we dwell in Him. There are two excellent books about Psalm 91 that I have read and I was able to interview Peggy Joyce Ruth.
Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly. We dwell in it, it dwells in us. If you remain in My Word, and my Words remain in you, you will ask whatever…. and it will be done.
Not whatever as in things that don’t align with the Word, but we will be emboldened to ask for that which does, and there’s so much that does.
Abide from John 15: 4 in the Strongs is the Greek word meno g3306 to remain. A place with him. Tarry. Not depart from. To continue to be present.
A mentor said to me: The truest words you can write are not forced into being, they ripen on the vine.
That has been true of these thoughts about dwell… and also a book I’ve been trying to write. The world will say do it now, you could make money now. God says, it’s not time to birth.
Chad Gonzales has some wonderful resources about what our union with Christ, our abiding can produce in us as we remain in Him.
If the word Dwell has captured your heart in the way it did mine, I invite you to have a look at the Scripture Printable I created with a jacaranda theme. There are around 20 Old Testament Scriptures from the Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes and even Daniel, along with 4 from the New Testament.
