Famine: Cause, Reaction, and Result
Application
- Sometimes we must choose to remain in difficult situations in order to learn what the LORD wants to teach us, so that later we will not falter in our faith because we have a track record of the LORD’ faithfulness.
- Not even one of us can state how much mercy we have received from the LORD so that our sin, rebellion, and disobedience has not caused our deaths.
- John 15:1-2 (NASB) “I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit.”
- Conclusion: John 14:23-24 (NASB) Jesus answered and said to him, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our abode with him. He who does not love Me does not keep My words; and the word which you hear is not Mine, but the Father’s who sent Me.” John 15:10-11 (NASB) “If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love; just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love. These things I have spoken to you so that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full.”
Bible Text
(1) Now it came about in the days when the judges governed, that there was a famine in the land. And a certain man of Bethlehem in Judah went to sojourn in the land of Moab with his wife and his two sons. (2) The name of the man was Elimelech, and the name of his wife, Naomi; and the names of his two sons were Mahlon and Chilion, Ephrathites of Bethlehem in Judah. Now they entered the land of Moab and remained there. (3) Then Elimelech, Naomi’s husband, died; and she was left with her two sons. (4) They took for themselves Moabite women as wives; the name of the one was Orpah and the name of the other Ruth. And they lived there about ten years. (5) Then both Mahlon and Chilion also died, and the woman was bereft of her two children and her husband.
-Ruth 1:1-5 (NASB)