A diamond needs years of pressure and refining to shine; rush the process, you get fragile glass.

PEOPLE JUST LIKE US

Whatever was written beforehand is meant to instruct us in how to live. The Scriptures impart to us encouragement and inspiration so that we can live in hope and endure all things. Romans 15:4 (TPT)

Healthy Me, Healthy We — Don’t Settle For Costume Jewellery

In the days when the judges ruled,  there was a famine in the land. So a man from Bethlehem in Judah, together with his wife and two sons, went to live for a while in the country of Moab. 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. 

Now Elimelek, Naomi’s husband, died, and she was left with her two sons. They married Moabite women, one named Orpah and the other Ruth. After they had lived there about ten years, both Mahlon and Kilion also died, and Naomi was left without her two sons and her husband. Ruth 1:1–5 (NIV)

Wholeness Begins with Surrender

Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me. Ruth 1:16–18 (NIV)

Ruth did not deny her past, pain, or loss; instead, she brought God into her story.

The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit. Psalm 34:18 (NIV)

Biblical wholeness isn’t the absence of brokenness; it’s the surrender of our brokenness to God. 

Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness.” 2 Corinthians 12:8–9 (NIV) 

Identity In God Comes First

When you reap the harvest of your land, do not reap to the very edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest… Leave them for the poor and the foreigner. I am the Lord your God. Leviticus 19:9–10 (NIV)

Ruth the Moabite said to Naomi, “Let me go to the fields and pick up the leftover grain behind anyone in whose eyes I find favour—grace.” Ruth 2:2 (NIV)

If you are faithful in little things, you will be faithful in large ones. Luke 16:10 (NLT)

For you died to this life, and your real life is hidden with Christ in God. Colossians 3:3 (NLT)

Blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him. They will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit. Jeremiah 17:7–8 (NIV)

A God-given identity is the only identity that can’t be lost when life changes. — Unknown

Faithful Steps Open Divine Doors

At this, she bowed down with her face to the ground. She asked him, “Why have I found such favour in your eyes that you notice me—a foreigner?” Boaz replied, “I’ve been told all about what you have done for your mother-in-law since the death of your husband—how you left your father and mother and your homeland and came to live with a people you did not know before.” Ruth 2:10–11 (NIV)

Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Galatians 6:9 (NIV)

A healthy ‘us’ starts with a healthy ‘me’ in Christ. — Gary Thomas

So Boaz took Ruth and she became his wife. When he made love to her, the Lord enabled her to conceive, and she gave birth to a son… And they named him Obed. He was the father of Jesse, the father of David. Ruth 4:13, 17 (NIV)

May the Lord repay you for what you have done. May you be richly rewarded by the Lord, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have come to take refuge.” Ruth 2:12 (NIV)

He will cover you with His feathers. He will shelter you with His wings. His faithful promises are your armour and protection. Ps 91:4 (NLT)

For you who fear My name, the Sun of Righteousness will rise with healing in His wings. Malachi 4:2 (NLT)