From Moabite to Israelite – Part 1
But Ruth said, “Do not urge me to leave you or turn back from following you; for where you go, I will go, and where you lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God. Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried. Thus may the Lord do to me, and worse, if anything but death parts you and me.” [Ruth 1:16-17]
Do you recall the first person you fell for? Remember how puppy love felt? I do! I walked on the moon without touching the ground. Butterflies hovered around my head and in my stomach. I didn’t know what day it was or even if it was day. Goosebumps covered my skin and goose eggs made up my common sense quotient. Ah, amore.
As we all know, puppy love doesn’t last. The temporary blindness which accompanies it, along with the temporary insanity, dissipate sooner or later—usually sooner—and we realize our lovely “beauty” is really an unsightly “beast”…sort of like Mrs. Shrek. Yes, puppy love is more a Hollywood thing than it is reality.
And then there is the real thing, the real McCoy, true love, the kind which we can read about in 1 Corinthians 13 but rarely witness in real life. Let’s identify real love, God’s love, shall we?
For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life [John 3:16].
In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins [1 John 4:10].
See! True love, God’s love, doesn’t TAKE. It GIVES. Real love looks out for the one loved, rather than see how it can profit from the one loved. Does this not explain why the divorce rate is sky high in today’s antichrist society? Everyone looks out for his/her own interests. All of us have a penchant for putting Numero Uno first. In the Bible this is recognized as “hate”, in contrast to “love”…and the Bible is quite correct.
It is hard for us to grasp what we read in Ruth 1, as quoted at the start of this study. We have the words of true love there. In fact Ruth’s true love came from Israel’s King YHWH and metamorphosed her from a Moabite to an Israelite. The proof is right there in the two verses I quoted. Ruth’s metamorphosis takes place in those verses.
“How so?” you are no doubt wondering. It has to do with the usage of the words God and the Lord. We’ve posted studies on this issue already, and my Heavenly Citizens series delves into the matter exhaustively on many occasions. Let’s have a brief review.
The word God isn’t a name or even a title. It is hard to define because it applies only to the one true God. This makes it unique. Suffice it to say that the word human depicts a species. In the same way the word God does likewise, except the species consists of only one, making Him not a species. The word God denotes deity. On the other hand, the words the Lord—in reality only one Hebrew word, viz., YHWH or Yahweh or Jehovah—is the actual NAME of God.
Oh, but this is a right fine location to pitch our tents for the night. We will return to this issue in our next study. See you then.
To further research this issue, I direct you to my book Genesis: Volume 1 of Heavenly Citizens in Earthly Shoes. To purchase my books please go to:
http://www.amazon.com/Randy-Green/e/B...
Do you recall the first person you fell for? Remember how puppy love felt? I do! I walked on the moon without touching the ground. Butterflies hovered around my head and in my stomach. I didn’t know what day it was or even if it was day. Goosebumps covered my skin and goose eggs made up my common sense quotient. Ah, amore.
As we all know, puppy love doesn’t last. The temporary blindness which accompanies it, along with the temporary insanity, dissipate sooner or later—usually sooner—and we realize our lovely “beauty” is really an unsightly “beast”…sort of like Mrs. Shrek. Yes, puppy love is more a Hollywood thing than it is reality.
And then there is the real thing, the real McCoy, true love, the kind which we can read about in 1 Corinthians 13 but rarely witness in real life. Let’s identify real love, God’s love, shall we?
For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life [John 3:16].
In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins [1 John 4:10].
See! True love, God’s love, doesn’t TAKE. It GIVES. Real love looks out for the one loved, rather than see how it can profit from the one loved. Does this not explain why the divorce rate is sky high in today’s antichrist society? Everyone looks out for his/her own interests. All of us have a penchant for putting Numero Uno first. In the Bible this is recognized as “hate”, in contrast to “love”…and the Bible is quite correct.
It is hard for us to grasp what we read in Ruth 1, as quoted at the start of this study. We have the words of true love there. In fact Ruth’s true love came from Israel’s King YHWH and metamorphosed her from a Moabite to an Israelite. The proof is right there in the two verses I quoted. Ruth’s metamorphosis takes place in those verses.
“How so?” you are no doubt wondering. It has to do with the usage of the words God and the Lord. We’ve posted studies on this issue already, and my Heavenly Citizens series delves into the matter exhaustively on many occasions. Let’s have a brief review.
The word God isn’t a name or even a title. It is hard to define because it applies only to the one true God. This makes it unique. Suffice it to say that the word human depicts a species. In the same way the word God does likewise, except the species consists of only one, making Him not a species. The word God denotes deity. On the other hand, the words the Lord—in reality only one Hebrew word, viz., YHWH or Yahweh or Jehovah—is the actual NAME of God.
Oh, but this is a right fine location to pitch our tents for the night. We will return to this issue in our next study. See you then.
To further research this issue, I direct you to my book Genesis: Volume 1 of Heavenly Citizens in Earthly Shoes. To purchase my books please go to:
http://www.amazon.com/Randy-Green/e/B...
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