The driver clutched the wheel and gritted his teeth as the villain in the passenger seat scratched at his hands and grabbed for the wheel. As the camera panned out, the car zig-zagged across the road, narrowly dodging other cars. The struggle ended only when the car swerved off the road and crashed into a tree.
You’ve probably watched a scene like this in a movie as I have. Perhaps, also like me, you have felt that your life is like this—a chaotic car ride with opposing drivers vying for the wheel. To resolve the inner turmoil that comes from opposing drivers, we must first note the possible drivers vying for control, and then consider which driver should have control.
We can see a couple of these a couple of these drivers in the Old Testament book of Ruth. The characters in this story are quite relatable because they were real people just like us. And they made life choices driven by unseen forces, just like we do.
First, we see Elimelech—a Jewish man, husband and father faced with the hardship of famine. In a tight spot, Elimelech transplanted his family to the land of Moab—a forbidden land inhabited by a pagan people. What drove Elimelech’s life-altering decision? All Elimelech could see was famine in the land of promise. How could this be the promised land if it was now a barren land? Elimelech had no idea when the famine would end. So, he allowed a sense of urgency—a desperately felt need to escape an uncomfortable situation—to overtake the wheel of his family’s life. Often, our lives are driven around by the same sense of urgency. When we find ourselves in an uncomfortable situation for an indefinite period of time, we tend to look for the fastest way out rather than waiting on God’s clear direction. As the apostle Paul admonished in Philippians 4, uncomfortable situations can teach us to be content in any season and trust that “my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.” If we bail at the first sign of hardship, how will we ever experience the supernatural provision of our Heavenly Father? We must be on guard when urgency starts reaching from the passage seat and grabbing at the steering wheel of our lives.
A second character we can learn from in this story is Naomi, the wife of Elimelech and mother to two sons. Over a period of at least ten years in Moab, death robbed Naomi of her husband and both of her sons. In despair, Naomi decided to return to her homeland of Judah. When her surprised neighbors welcomed her back home, Naomi insisted on being called Mara, which means bitterness. She not only felt bitter over her losses, but she also identified as bitterness. How had she come to a point in her life where she had chosen a name for herself based on her bitter feelings? Naomi had allowed wrong assumptions about God and herself to take the wheel.
When her daughters-in-law pleaded to go with her to Judah, Naomi replied, “it grieveth me much for your sakes that the hand of the LORD is gone out against me” (Ruth 1:13). In these words are encapsulated at least three faulty assumptions. First, she assumed that God was against her. She also assumed that God’s opposition to her had made her a menace to everyone around her. She felt like bad luck to her daughters-in-law. Surely, it would be better for them to return to their pagan gods than to remain with her and the God she assumed was against her. Naomi also made wrong assumptions about her future. As she told her tearful daughters-in-law, “Turn again, my daughters, go your way; for I am too old to have an husband” (Ruth 1:12). Naomi had lost all hope of experiencing love and provision again in her life, and she assumed that if her daughters-in-law accompanied her back to Judah, they would lose all of hope of love and provision as well. All Naomi had to go on (all we have to go on, humanly speaking) was her past experience. Her past experience included sorrow and loss. She then took that past experience and extrapolated it into the indefinite future, as if all that she could ever experience would be sorrow and loss. Naomi assumed that her story was over. You and I know, of course, that this was only chapter 1 of her story! Hang on for another chapter, we might urge Naomi, and you’ll see that redemption is coming!