New Life in Old Age
The women said to Naomi: “Praise be to the LORD, who this day has not left you without a guardian-redeemer. May he become famous throughout Israel! He will renew your life and sustain you in your old age. For your daughter-in-law, who loves you and who is better to you than seven sons, has given him birth.” Ruth 4:14-15
Naomi felt alone and without hope. Her husband had brought their family to the land of Moab because of a famine in Israel. Then he had died. Her two sons had married—lovely women, but they were Moabites not Israelites. When Naomi’s sons died too, the three widows were left with no social standing—homeless and poor (Ruth 1:1-5).
Naomi heard the famine in Israel was over and prepared to return. At first her daughters-in-law were going to go with
her, but then Naomi urged them to return to their homeland. She prayed that the Lord would show them kindness as they had shown her kindness and grant them rest in the home of another husband (Ruth 1:8-9). They shouldn’t come with her. She felt that God had turned against her. She was old; she couldn’t re-marry and have more sons.
The one daughter-in-law, Orpah, went back, but the other, Ruth, clung to Naomi saying, “Your people will be my people and your God my God” (v. 16). Lost in her grief, Naomi silently allowed Ruth to come with her (v. 18).
Their arrival excited the whole town of Bethlehem. The people recognized Naomi, but wondered where her husband and her sons were. And who was the young woman with her? Naomi told them she’d left full, but returned empty because God had made her life bitter (v. 20).
What Naomi didn’t see was God’s answer to her prayer for Ruth was about to be answered. It was the beginning of the barley harvest, and God guided Ruth into the field of Boaz to glean. Naomi saw God’s providence unfolding in this man’s generous and kind response to Ruth. In fact Boaz married her.*
God hadn’t turned against Naomi at all. He placed her in a family and gave her a new assignment: to become a grandmother.
Can you give examples of God’s provision for older people you know, including new assignments that renew and sustain their lives even in old age?
Nancy J. Baker
DIG DEEPER:
Do you struggle with bitterness as Naomi did? So did the psalmists. Read Psalm 13 and 73. What helped them turn their bitterness to joy?
Compare our laws for helping the poor with the God’s laws in Leviticus 19:9-10, 23:22; and Deuteronomy 14:28-29.
For some other interesting assignments God gave to seniors see: Abraham’s and Sarah’s in Genesis 18:10-14; Moses and Aaron’s in Exodus 7:7; Paul in Philemon 1-10: and John in Revelation 1:1-11.
*For more details of the story of The Kinsman-redeemer and of Obed, the son of Boaz and Ruth see Boaz and Ruth and Ruth