Every day we make choices whether we are aware of it or not and the choices we make have the power to make or unmake us depending on if they are right or wrong choices. My question to you is, what choices are you making? Today, you are a sum of the choices you made yesterday and tomorrow you will be a sum of the choices you make today.
Ruth was a woman who benefitted greatly from the choice she made. She was a young woman from the land of Moab and the daughter-in-law of Naomi, a woman of Bethlehem-Judah. Both women met in the land of Moab where Naomi sojourned with her husband and two sons; one of her sons married Ruth and the other married Orpah who was also a Moabite. But neither had children before their demise. Before the death of her sons, Naomi had lost her husband, and so she was widowed and childless and decided at that point to return to her land and people. Ruth had two options; she could return to her people, remarry and get on with her life as she had no obligation towards her former mother-in-law or she could go with the woman and take care of her as a daughter seeing she was widowed and childless. She made a choice to go with her mother-in-law, and that choice eventually made her one of the women in the genealogy of Jesus Christ. Upon arrival in Naomi’s homeland, Bethlehem, Ruth met a wealthy man, a relative of Naomi who became her husband and they had a child who became the grandfather of King David. Since Jesus is from the lineage of David, it follows that the choice Ruth made placed her amongst the ancestors of Jesus Christ. So, when the genealogy of Jesus is read, Ruth is also mentioned. No one knows what became of her sister-in-law Orpah, who made a choice to remain in the land of Moab, she moved into obscurity as the Bible never mentioned her again.
Lot also made a choice; there was strife between his herdsmen and the herdsmen of Abraham, his uncle, and Abraham noted that they could no longer live together and asked Lot to choose a different dwelling place for himself. Lot chose to go to Sodom and Gomorrah, and from the moment he arrived, he began to experience misfortune, the first being that he was taken hostage when a small group of kings fought against the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah. On this occasion, Abraham went to war to rescue him. The next misfortune was the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah in which he lost his married daughters, his wife, and all his substance. The man who went into Sodom with great substance came out empty. As if that was not bad enough, his two daughters who survived the disaster entered an incestuous relationship with him. You may wonder how all this calamity befell one man. The answer is simple; the choice he made ultimately unmade him.
Ruth made a choice; Orpah made a choice, Lot made a choice. Their choices yielded for them different results. Ruth was made by the choice she made; Orpah and Lot were unmade by the choices they made.
Our choices are powerful, and they can make or unmake us. Therefore, as people created and destined for greatness, we must exercise caution as we make choices.
You will make choices today; what will they make you?
