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Naomi’s Journey Through Hardship

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The man’s name was Elimelek, his wife’s name was Naomi, and the names of his two sons were Mahlon and Kilion. They were Ephrathites from Bethlehem, Judah. And they went to Moab and lived there.

[NIV] Ruth 1:2

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Do you know where Bethlehem is located?

As we heard before, Bethlehem is really famous for the place

where Jesus Christ was born and for David’s hometown.

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Before the Israelites made a king, the Judges ruled the country.

Samson and Gideon had been Judges of the land.

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Meanwhile as the Judges ruled, there was a severe famine

and the people of Bethlehem suffered many hardships because of that event.

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The Elimelech family who lived there was really concerned about it.

In actual, Elimelech and his wife Naomi had been recognized

people in Bethlehem because they had lived well in the land of their fathers.

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However, the famine was so severe in their land

that they had decided to leave for Moab

where people didn’t serve God like their home land.

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Moab was a place where it was full of idol worshippers

whom God disliked and it had a bad reputation for enticing Israelites

to sin when Israelites came back to Canaan.

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Even though, Elimelech’s family knew that truth, they left for Moab

while the famine was going on in their land.

At that time, Moab was a better place to live with a plentiful supply

of food than Bethlehem.

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One day, Elimelech passed away which made Naomi get the first shock

of her life. All of his family held a funeral with tears of sorrow.

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As time went by, Mahlon and Kilion got women to marry

and they introduced them to their mother.

They said, “Mother, this is my fiancé.” And “I‘ll marry to that woman.”

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Naomi knew that God disliked her sons’ marriage,

however, she allowed her sons to marry with Moabite women

because the faith of her and her sons were weak and unsincere.

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They married, one named Orpah and the other Ruth

and they were good to their mother-in-law and they were happy.

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However, tragedy didn’t stop there, both sons, Mahlon and Kilion,

died suddenly.

Naomi and her two daughters-in-law were in great sorrow.

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Naomi thought to herself after her two sons and her husband had died;

 “This is God’s punishment because we had chosen to leave Bethlehem

 to live for our own desires not God’s.”

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At that time, Naomi deeply realized her journey for Moab which was full of idols was wrong and she found her unhappiness without God’s hand. Also, she started to notice the greatness of living with God.

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When Naomi met the first trial, she had left God and she finally met harder situations. If Naomi counted on God, God would have taken care of all of her problems in His way. Thus, when we meet a difficult situation, we definitely should pray and lay aside our own desires to seek after God’s will.  We should obey God for He is the only holy and perfect one.