Then Elimelech, Naomi’s husband, died; and she was left, and her two sons. Now they took wives of the women of Moab: the name of the one was Orpah, and the name of the other Ruth. And they dwelt there about ten years. Then both Mahlon and Chilion also died; so the woman survived her two sons and her husband.
(Ruth 1:3-5, NKJV)
If you’re like me, you’ve read at least part of the book of Ruth several times. Yet, it never ceases to touch my heart when I read of all Naomi suffered.
She’d left her home and extended family to go to a foreign land, and sometime thereafter, her husband died. How hard would that have been? Losing your spouse so far from your homeland. Knowing, if you were fortunate enough to return home, you’d do so without your husband?
Then things picked up again. Her sons married Moabite women, and based on what we’ll read in the next few days, Naomi seemed to have good relationships with them. For ten years, her life was likely relatively carefree.
Although an interesting fact just struck me: Her sons were married for ten years, yet apparently there were no grandchildren. We can only assume God had “closed the wombs” of her daughters-in-law, just as He had Sarai, Hannah, and Rachel in previous generations.
Naomi would have grieved over this just as she’d grieved over the loss of her husband.
And then the unthinkable … both of her sons die. In those days, women were dependent upon the men in their lives. First their fathers. Then their husbands. And if their husbands died, they’d live with and be supported by their sons.
Suddenly, Naomi had no one. And she lived far from any extended family that might have taken her in.
Imagine. Imagine how devastated she must have been, how alone, how frightened.
Have you ever been in a place where you seemed to lose everything? Are you in that place now? Stick with me, my friends. As we continued through the book of Ruth, we’ll see how God can and will work in what appear to be the direst, darkest moments.
Always.
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