Refresh
A Recap from Sunday’s Sermon

Preaching Text:  Ruth 1:6-22

How do we make decisions with wisdom and courage?  In Ruth 1:6-22, Orpah, Naomi, and Ruth all make life-changing decisions using different methods that we can glean lessons from.  

1. Orpah looks around. She has to decide whether she will leave her homeland of Moab to go back with Naomi to Bethlehem.  She uses common sense, looking at the pros and cons.  She weighs:

God plus nothing in Bethlehem
or
Everything minus God in Moab

She decides to head back to Moab and unknowingly walks out of history forever.   Although we should use common sense in decision-making, it shouldn’t end there.

2. Naomi looks back.  When Naomi arrives in Bethlehem, she tells everyone to call her Mara (which means bitter) because God has made her life bitter and she fears God’s hand has gone out against her.  She lets her future be defined by the pain of her recent past.  The problem is that she doesn’t look back far enough.  In the story of her people in Exodus 15:22-27, God provided for his grumbling people at Marah.  She needed to remember the bigger story of which she was a part.  When suffering, we get perspective and perseverance by looking back at God’s faithfulness in the Scriptures and in our own life. 
   
   
3. Ruth looks up.  She looks at the same choice above (that Orpah faced) and she clings to Naomi declaring, “Your people shall be my people, and your God my God.”  By faith, she makes God the deciding factor.  With every decision we face, we must look up to God and ask, “How can my story align with your story?”  

Jesus clung to our sins on the cross and God’s hand of judgment went out against him so we could know God’s hand is always for us.  So in our decisions, faith is to make God the deciding factor.  And we can take courage because we know God is holding onto us.

Taking It Home:
Take an important decision you are facing and journal for 15 minutes by:
Looking Around –What are the pros and cons (5 mins)?
Looking Back – How has God been faithful to you in your past?  How has He been faithful in the Scriptures (5 mins)?
Looking Up – Ask God, “Is there is anything you want me to do (5 mins)?