Simple Trust
“‘I will do whatever you say,’ Ruth answered. So she went down to the threshing floor and did everything her mother-in-law told her to do.”
Today’s Text: Ruth 3 (Living Life Daily Devotional)
Ruth has a kind of simple and uncalculating spirit that is sorely missing in this world. It showed up in her insistence on staying with Naomi when she returned to Judah. We get the sense that in Ruth’s mind, she was now Naomi’s daughter. It would have been more complicated and unnatural to restart a new life.
Ruth’s spirit was also evident when she took the initiative to glean in the fields, even knowing that it would be dangerous. For Ruth, their need to survive was not complicated or hindered by her insecurities as a foreigner, as a stranger in a strange land, as a poor woman with no leverage or power. I cannot count how often, especially as a young, awkward, Korean-American, I have been stopped dead in my tracks from taking simple steps to do what is best for me and for others in my life.
And Ruth’s spirit is clearly evident here in her simple obedience to Naomi. There is no doubt that Ruth’s simple obedience was grounded in her trust of Naomi. But it is important for readers to see Ruth’s simple obedience had less to do with anything Naomi did but everything to do with Ruth’s character itself.
Ruth’s simple and uncalculating spirit became in her life a covenant of trust toward Naomi, and that trust manifested in her a genuinely obedient heart.
I like to remind myself that a step of obedience is always a step of faith. Faith and trust go hand in hand. Faith is an inward disposition that leads to obedience. Trust is an outward expression of faith revealed through our obedience.
In the final analysis—as we stand before Christ when He returns—we will realize that a disobedient spirit (toward anyone!) always betrays a lack of trust in God.
I think that it is a very helpful exercise to imagine the entirety of our lives existing on a post-it note. In truth, that is very much how God sees our lives. No matter how complicated we make our lives to be, no matter how much we have to calculate our every move to navigate all the twists and turns of this broken world, we will always find ourselves on that post-it note in God’s hands.
Of course, a life of faith is not merely about living a simple and uncalculating life. A life of faith is about living a simple and uncalculating life because we are yoked together with Christ.
“Come to me all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
— Matthew 11:28-30
Father, my trust and my hope are in You. The reality of this broken world is that I cannot even put my complete trust in my closest companions. But I confess that others could say the same of me. And yet, I pray that You would create in me a simple, uncalculating, obedient spirit, because I put my hope and trust in You alone. In Jesus’s name. Amen.
