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Ever bit into something that had the
pucker power of ten based on a pucker scale of one to ten, ten being pucker
power outrageous? Once the taste floods your mouth your lips involuntarily form
a whistle position and the hinges of your jaws rock from the vibration and
vents through the ears, figuratively speaking! Does this summon up any memories? We have all bitten into
something bitter. Some even enjoy the taste and feeling of bitter; imagine
that! In our passage today Naomi is
bitter from the taste of life, with all joking aside. An oppressive famine was
in the land of Bethlehem during the period of the Judges, a bleak and dark
spiritual time in the history of Israel (Jdg 21:25).
Her hubby, Elimelech, had taken her and
their two sons down to the land of Moab who were the descendants of Lot,
Abraham’s nephew. The Moabites were an idolatrous people. In the ten years of
her residency in Moab, Naomi was handed lemons, but she wasn’t making any
lemonade. She was virtually engulfed in a world of sour down in Moab country.
Elimelech died, followed by her two sons, Mahlon and Chilion, leaving
Naomi and her two daughters-in-law, Orpah and Ruth, widows. With the news of bread
in Bethlehem (Ruth 1:6), Ruth returned with Naomi while Orpah decided to stay
with her people. Orpah probably never knew the LORD (Ruth 1:14-15).
Ten years took its toll on Naomi. So
much so that the women of Bethlehem who were excited to see Naomi again pondered her
countenance by saying, “Is this Naomi” (Ruth 1:19)? Naomi, in her bitterness
answered the women who were in a state of shock over her appearance,
“Do not call me Naomi (pleasant); call me Mara (bitter), for the Almighty has
dealt very bitterly with me” (Ruth 1:20).
How so?
“I went out full, and the LORD has
brought me home again empty” (Ruth 1:21a, emphasis mine); the land of Moab, a picture of the world, will strip a believer to the bone like a vicious piranha. Widowed, old, with no family to take care
of her, Naomi's future prospects were anything but pleasant. You get the impression
that perhaps Naomi had come home to die, leaving the only three men in her life
buried in a land full of idolatrous soil. It’s a heartbreaker and would be a very
depressing story if it ended there in this demoralizing period of the Judges.
But let’s change gears for a moment then get back to our story set in fast
forward mode.
Allow me to venture into the fields of observation and opinion. Whether you subscribe to the four temperaments (sanguine, choleric, melancholic, or phlegmatic) or add a fifth, supine, or hold to a more contemporary psychology involving five temperaments (openness, conscientious, extraversion, agreeableness, or neuroticism [ocean]) or more than that or less or not, life's experiences seem to make everyone of us either sweet or sour (I realize this sounds overly simplistic!) regardless of our personality type, temperament, disposition, or whatever label we want to attach to people.
Allow me to venture into the fields of observation and opinion. Whether you subscribe to the four temperaments (sanguine, choleric, melancholic, or phlegmatic) or add a fifth, supine, or hold to a more contemporary psychology involving five temperaments (openness, conscientious, extraversion, agreeableness, or neuroticism [ocean]) or more than that or less or not, life's experiences seem to make everyone of us either sweet or sour (I realize this sounds overly simplistic!) regardless of our personality type, temperament, disposition, or whatever label we want to attach to people.
Growing up in Florida I have been around the “older” generation, retirees, senior citizens, elderly, or "old
folk" to use a southern slang. I have always enjoyed being around older people more than my peers. I didn't feel that I was in any competition with them on any level. I learned valuable lessons from them by simply listening, and they loved the attention. Now that I am pushing toward that “threshold” of being an "old folk" myself, I
have come to the conclusion that seniors are either sweet or sour in their
disposition. They are easy to get along with or a
handful to deal with. I am not referring to an occasional sweet or sour moment but a
character trait developed throughout their lives by their thought processes.
So let me express it in another way. All
of humanity, should they live to be seniors, are heading toward a more overt sweet
or sour disposition, generally speaking. Inhibitions seem to drop as we get
older, and we are more likely to express our opinions or feelings to others openly. It is
as if there is no in-between with the “old folk.” Obviously, medical
situations can play a role in this, but for the most part we will either wind up sweet
or sour. How is that for a sweeping generalization that makes anthropologists
cry out, “Quack!” Yeah? Prove me wrong! Ok, maybe out there somewhere is a
bittersweet person, a hybrid of sorts….
How does this happen? In my opinion it is predicated on a lifelong mindstyle or a mental lifestyle that interprets and
reacts to life’s experiences a certain way. Believers see a sovereign God who is
control of all of life’s experiences to mold and shape us for a purpose – Christ-likeness. For the non-believers life experiences are consider random or chance,
hit or miss happenings, lucky or unlucky, without rhyme or reason, without purpose or goal that
molds or shapes behavior and destiny. Negative circumstances are only overcome by human effort; God is not part of the equation. Often there is a unrealistic optimism like, “things will work out; they always do”; “it will get better wait and see”; or
“I’m waiting for my ship to come in.” Human resolve over Divine intervention is always the answer to life's difficulties from a worldly point of view.
Such sentiments are anti in nature to
the teaching of Romans 8:28 which is for a believer full of purpose for life; all things work together for good, not that all things are good. Naomi's loss of her loved ones was definitely not good. For the non-believer all hope is nothing more than wishful thinking that inevitably leads down the path of the familiar
isms: negativism, cynicism, pessimism, and fatalism. It is a life without
purpose; we live; we die; that’s it. By the time their old, isms are crawling all over them like a bad case of the fleas. Have you ever avoided an extremely negative person for fear of becoming negative yourself?
The vast difference between a believer
and a non-believer is a matter of choice. The former chooses the Life; the
other chooses a life. All are accountable to the LORD for their own decisions in the end. I
believe that sweetness or bitterness is a byproduct of our own choices in how we willingly decide to view life's experiences. There are no victims in this decision, only
volunteers to become sweet or sour as we grow older. It's
not as if one chooses to be "sour," but by choosing to live a certain way that is contrary to the will of God, they just naturally turn sour from all
the isms stemming from the circumstances of life. Sweet or
sour is not limited to seniors but seems to manifest itself more prevalently in
the latter years of life as I alluded to earlier.
Naomi had a prolonged bout with
bitterness; but it was not a character trait but a circumstantial trait or an unspiritual reaction to life’s circumstances. She couldn't do anything about the circumstances, but she could control how she responded to it. She got her eyes off the LORD down in Moab through a negative turn of events! She may have originally bought into the idea for the family to flee the severity of the famine in Bethlehem ten years ago because conditions in Moab appeared to be better, not everybody in Bethlehem fled to Moab. It is uncertain how many went to live with Lot's descendants.
Indeed, painful circumstances, whether physical or emotional, can definitely be a distraction depending upon the mindstyle. How many times did Naomi mutter to herself with the loss of her loved ones, “We should never have left Bethlehem; we should never have left Bethlehem.” She lost count over the years. Now she is returning to the land of her nativity taking her bitterness along with her. Naomi is a biblical illustration that if we don't address our spiritual problems where we are at, we will simply haul our spiritual baggage to wherever we are going. Fortunately for Naomi, she would lose that baggage in Bethlehem.
Isn't it ironical that the answer to Naomi's bitter twist and turns in life was traveling right along side of her in their dusty journey to Israel! God was in Ruth working out His plans (she would be in the lineage of Christ, Mt 1:5-6)! In the end Naomi is going to snap out of this deep despondency and bitterness by ditching Mara for Naomi forever (There was no bi-polarity or multiple personality issues going on with Naomi, only a spiritual one!) thanks to God working through Ruth and Boaz. Her hope and purpose in life, her joy in the LORD were going to be restored. I wonder how many times she muttered in Bethlehem, "It's so good to be home; it's so good to be home?" The process of healing is not overnight; but there is healing in His wings (Mal 4:2).
Indeed, painful circumstances, whether physical or emotional, can definitely be a distraction depending upon the mindstyle. How many times did Naomi mutter to herself with the loss of her loved ones, “We should never have left Bethlehem; we should never have left Bethlehem.” She lost count over the years. Now she is returning to the land of her nativity taking her bitterness along with her. Naomi is a biblical illustration that if we don't address our spiritual problems where we are at, we will simply haul our spiritual baggage to wherever we are going. Fortunately for Naomi, she would lose that baggage in Bethlehem.
Isn't it ironical that the answer to Naomi's bitter twist and turns in life was traveling right along side of her in their dusty journey to Israel! God was in Ruth working out His plans (she would be in the lineage of Christ, Mt 1:5-6)! In the end Naomi is going to snap out of this deep despondency and bitterness by ditching Mara for Naomi forever (There was no bi-polarity or multiple personality issues going on with Naomi, only a spiritual one!) thanks to God working through Ruth and Boaz. Her hope and purpose in life, her joy in the LORD were going to be restored. I wonder how many times she muttered in Bethlehem, "It's so good to be home; it's so good to be home?" The process of healing is not overnight; but there is healing in His wings (Mal 4:2).
Mara is awaiting anyone of us who dare
to travel into Moab, a place of bitter opposition to God, away
from the will of God. There is no happiness there, only the taste of eventual
bitterness and emptiness and futility everywhere you turn, culminating in death. Ruth and Naomi had arrived in Bethlehem, the
house of bread, which was once without bread from the famine but now flourishing for "the LORD had
visited His people" (Ruth 1:6). Now the impossible is about to become reversible, from sour to sweet, bitter to pleasant, Mara to Naomi, a work only God can do; no self-help remedies can fix this! She returned to the place where she belonged all along.
No doubt Moabic or worldly living leaves a bitter taste in any believer's mouth. It is tough on anyone who lives there. God's will is not to be found in that place. The story of Ruth and Naomi is like a beacon of hope in a nation shrouded in darkness; God will never abandon the nation of Israel (Ruth 4:14-15, 17). The sweet are not immune to sour, but sweetness comes only through knowing and obeying the LORD while sourness results from disobedience. The eternal destiny of the saints is unimaginably sweet with
a pleasant power of infinite based on the pleasant scale of one to infinite causing the mouth to grin from ear to ear.
Yahweh is in absolute control, never allowing any experience to enter our lives without His approval! He desires for us to be controlled by His Holy Spirit (Eph 5:18) to enable us to do His will and to trust in Him unreservedly as Romans 8:28 plays out in our lives.
Stay in the will of God and stay sweet! Just “How sweet it is” only eternity will reveal. Wouldn't you rather bite into the Bread of Life (Jn 6:35) than something bitter from Moab? The only remedy for bitterness is returning to the Bread of Life. Like happiness, bitterness is a choice. We can learn it the hard way or the easy way. "Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good; blessed is the man [or woman] who trust in Him" (Psa 34:8). <><
Yahweh is in absolute control, never allowing any experience to enter our lives without His approval! He desires for us to be controlled by His Holy Spirit (Eph 5:18) to enable us to do His will and to trust in Him unreservedly as Romans 8:28 plays out in our lives.
Stay in the will of God and stay sweet! Just “How sweet it is” only eternity will reveal. Wouldn't you rather bite into the Bread of Life (Jn 6:35) than something bitter from Moab? The only remedy for bitterness is returning to the Bread of Life. Like happiness, bitterness is a choice. We can learn it the hard way or the easy way. "Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good; blessed is the man [or woman] who trust in Him" (Psa 34:8). <><
