“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. 

When Naomi heard in Moab that the Lord had come to the aid of his people by providing food for them, she and her daughters-in-law prepared to return home from there. With her two daughters-in-law she left the place where she had been living and set out on the road that would take them back to the land of Judah. 

 Then Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, ‘Go back, each of you, to your mother’s home. May the Lord show you kindness, as you have shown kindness to your dead husbands and to me. May the Lord grant that each of you will find rest in the home of another husband.’ 

 Then she kissed them goodbye and they wept aloud and said to her, ‘We will go back with you to your people.’“

Ruth 1:10 

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December 9, 2025 

Advent begins in the dark. During this season of long, cold nights we begin lighting candles, believing that life and light are coming to save us. Advent is a season not of celebration, but of waiting. We wait for what we cannot see. We wait in a time of distress, holding out a candle of hope that what has begun with just a tiny flicker will grow into fullness and life.  

The story of Ruth begins this way, also. Her hope, too, begins in the dark. The writer of Ruth begins the tale with irony that would not be lost on the first listeners: there is a no food to be found in the “house of bread” (or in Hebrew, Bethlehem). Naomi’s family did what people have always done and still do today: when it becomes impossible to survive in your native land, you migrate to a region with more opportunity to provide for your family.  

But the darkness followed them. First Naomi’s husband died, then her two sons. As a married woman with two sons myself, I cannot imagine the grief and suffering she experienced in the face of these three deaths. But more, she was in a foreign land without extended family. And as a woman in a patriarchal cultural, she (and her daughters in law) had no legal identity with which to support themselves.  

Naomi’s only shot was to return home. Her daughters’ best shot was to marry again and (hopefully) have children who could care for them in the future. 

We know how this story ends. We know that in the pages that follow we will see love, faithfulness, service, sacrifice, and redemption—between individuals, and within the society from which God required justice and compassion. We know that the final page of this story is the hope of the united kingdom in David, and the eternal kingdom in Jesus.  

But for now, this great eternal hope is no more than a flickering candle in the darkness.  

Questions for reflection and discussion:  

  • What darkness and suffering do you see in this story? What flickers of hope do you see? 
  • What darkness are you facing in your own life? 
  • What tiny flickers of hope can you see in your own life and community?  

 Church Reading Plan: 2 Chronicles 9; Jude