The Heart of Boaz, the Tenacity of Ruth (Part 2)

If I were sitting down somewhere by the roadside and watched the following scene happen as a spectator, I'm not sure what I would have been left thinking. One thing for sure, it would have been the most bizarre thing. So here goes:

Three women are walking down the road on a journey, carrying their earthly possessions. One of them is an old woman, and the other two are young beautiful ladies. They are walking on a dusty road when suddenly, the old lady stops. She starts talking to them, and they all start crying. The two young ladies respond, and they look like they're begging, pleading with the old lady. But the old lady is calm, and says a few more words. One of the young ladies hugs them (or maybe she only hugs the old lady) and turns back, she goes the other way. It is now just the old lady and one of the young ladies. The two talk some more, and they seem to be having a very intense discussion, crying and all. Then finally, they seem to reach some sort of consensus. The pleading stops, and they continue on their journey.

If I had been sitting down spectating all of this without necessarily hearing what was being said, I would have thought, "what on earth has just happened here???".

There is something truly amazing about this scene. I have played it out in my mind so many times and the more I do, the more I become thrilled by it. I know I have briefly mentioned this scene in Part 1, but I feel we should give it a revisit. We didn't do justice to it, so let's try again.

So Naomi's husband dies.  And just when she is getting used the pain of having lost her husband, her two sons also die. I have personally experienced death in my immediate family a few times, so I can somehow relate with how Naomi might have been feeling. It is the most debilitating thing. It saps you of every little ounce of energy you have.

So it is during her time of grief, that she hears that things had become better in Judah, her birthplace - the famine is gone. The irony of it is that she and her family had left Judah to escape possible death from the famine, only to find death waiting for them (bar Naomi) in exile, in Moab. After a while, the famine in Judah ends, there is some semblance of restoration, and food is now available. Suddenty, the prospect of going back there to her home, becomes appealing. I also imagine staying in Moab had become too much for her. She could no longer stay there. It had become just a bit too much for her – I think it had become a constant reminder of her loss. She needed change, even if it meant going back to her hometown.

So she says to her daughters-in-law, “Let’s leave this place. Let's go back to Bethlehem, to Judah my home”. I'm not too sure how they took this proposal from their mother-in-law. After all, Moab was their home.

But they go with her, and this is where my favourite scene happens:
they're on the road from Moab to Bethlehem. It is hot and dusty; their feet are all caked with the dust and the mood is absolutely sombre. The three widows are walking in silence - a woman with her two young recently widowed daughters-in-law. They're all deep in thought. The two young women are grieving the loss of their young husbands, but they're also thinking of a new life that awaits them in Bethlehem. What are they going to do? Who's going to fend for them? Will they adjust to the culture, the religion? What about their families? Will they ever see their folks again? Oh, and will they find love again? Will they again find comfort in the arms of other husbands?

So there must have been an air of uncertainty, compounded with grief and pain. Everyone is silent as they walk - all three are captured in deep thoughts.

But the mother-in-law has thoughts of her own. She must have been thinking “I have lost my loving husband. My sons are also dead. What have I done to deserve this? What terrible thing have I done, LORD? What will people say when I get back to Bethlehem? How am I going to face the world? I am weak; I don't know how I'm going to make it. Really, I don't. And LORD, what about these two girls? They're looking up to me, and I have nothing to offer them”.  She sees the pain in their eyes, and the uncertainly written all over their faces.

And she can’t keep quiet any longer, and I imagine her finally breaking the silence: “Girls, I can’t do this to you. I can’t take you away from the land you've known all your lives. I love you like my own daughters. And you have been so good to my sons; excellent wives you have both been. You have also been so kind to me. But I can’t take you away from everything that you know.”

“Look at you”, I imagine her continuing, “you are both young and beautiful. You have lives to live and your dreams are still fresh. Much as I love you, and much as you bring me warmth and comfort in my grief, I have to let you go”.

This shocks the two young ladies. How can Naomi even think about letting them go? They have known her for so long, and she has been so good to them. She’s treated them like her own daughters. Yes, their husbands are both gone, but she is still their family. “So no, Naomi, we are going with you” they cry. “We’re in this together. How will you return to Bethlehem with no family – no husband and no sons, or daughters-in-law. No, we will go with you.”

This becomes harder than Naomi thought it would be. These girls do not understand what it took for her to finally admit that she cannot remove them from their lives. “I really can’t do this to you girls. You really need to go back. This is much harder for me than it is for you. You’re the only family I have left, but I need to release you. I’m old now, and I do not have much to look forward to. But you, you both have so much to look forward to, so much to give. It's not that I don't want you to come with me. I just want you to be happy. In fact, I'd so like to see you happy, so much that I even want to see you remarried. Knowing that you have both found refuge in the arms of other husbands will be some much needed comfort for me.

At this, they all weep some more!!! They’re all hugging each other, weeping, BUT the three are crying for different things. Naomi is crying because she must let her daughters-in-law go - the only link she had with her departed sons. Orpah, is crying for something else: she is bidding goodbye to her mother-in-law, the woman who has been so good to her. The mother of her dearly departed husband - her only living link to him. BUT, there is Ruth, the unrelenting Ruth, who is crying for something else. I love Ruth!!

                                                                                Okay, let me get a hold of myself.

So finally, Naomi’s argument convinces Orpah. It makes sense to her. What’s there for her in Bethlehem? Is she going to live the rest of her live tending to her mother-in-law? She realizes that this is actually much more difficult than she thought. She had not applied her mind to this. So she decides the best thing to do for herself - she turns and walks back home.

Naomi then turns to Ruth. "Look at Orpah", she says. She’s going back home, to her people and to her old life. “Why aren’t you going with her?” she says, with tears in her eyes. They both look at Orpah. She’s chosen to go back to her gods, to her people, to her old way of doing things. She's not ready to march into new territory, new avenues. She’s not ready to embrace a new world. She chooses to go back to familiarity.

And then we finally get to see what Ruth was crying for. We get to see the beauty of her heart. It is here that her amazing character emerges - we get to witness the tenacity of this young woman, Ruth. She emerges not only as a caring and kind woman determined to be there for the mother of her deceased husband, but she also emerges as a woman of great resolve and determination. She emerges being a woman who knows what she wants. She is staunch, yet humble. She is persistent, but also gentle.

She is facing the uncertainty of what Bethlehem, her new home, brings her.  She was given an opportunity to turn back to a life she’s probably comfortable with, a life which might be more predictable and reliable than her new one and she watched her sister-in-law going back to this more familiar life. But Ruth makes an unprecedented move – she chooses the road less travelled. In one paragraph, she makes a statement that will ring through the ages. She says to her mother-in-law:

“Don’t urge me to leave you or 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”

I’m sorry, I can’t get over this declaration by Ruth. Something about it makes you sit down and pause for a second. What is amazing about this statement by Ruth, is not only that she is refusing to give up on her mother-in-law; it’s not that she is showing her astounding compassion for a woman she has come to love so dearly. No, what is most breath-taking for me is that she is refusing to turn away from her destiny. She displays amazing courage by going against the grain, and declares that she will march on to a world she does not know.

It would have been perfectly understandable and acceptable for Ruth to join her sister-in-law, Orpah, going back home. It would have made sense. But the only thing about turning back like Orpah did is that she would have walked into the sunset and we would have never heard anything else about her again. She would most probably have left no mark in history, other than she would have remarried and lived a nice comfortable life with her new husband.

But no, not Ruth. Ruth makes an astounding decision. She is not letting Naomi go alone. She, unlike Orpah, decides to march on to this new territory, no matter how scary it might have been.

In the final analysis, what makes Ruth's decision overwhelmingly humbling is this bold declaration here: "your people will be my people and your God my God". What she is saying here is, not only does she want to be with Naomi, but she is also prepared to change whatever needs to be changed in order to embrace the new. She is letting go of her gods and embracing a new One. She is leaving her old life and taking a bold step of building a new one.

How many would have made such a decision? How many would have been so bold as to say, I’m ready to leave everything behind and embrace the new. Okay, let me ask this differently; how many would have been ready and bold enough to say I am ready to let go of my old self and to become a new me?

Ruth chose to take the road less travelled, with all the uncertainties that it presented. What I love about her is that she did not do it for the possibilities of making a better life in a foreign land. She just chose a new way, untested and untried, because the time and the season called for it.

At the risk of being preachy, I can't resist but ask: if your "season" demanded that you change everything, your surroundings, your life, and your way of doing things, would you? If your season demanded you let go of everything you knew, and march on to unchartered territory, would you? I mean, we change the way we dress, what we do and how we do things when seasons change; when winter becomes spring. Why not apply the same principle when it comes our spiritual lives, careers etc? Would you be ready to let go of the old and embrace the new when the season called for it?

Ruth made an unpopular decision of willingly and consciously changing her circumstances, a decision that  would later make her a channel through which history was made. In Ruth, I am learning the power of remaining true to my belief and conviction. I love Ruth.

I’m sorry, I was supposed to talk about Boaz on this post, BUT this woman, Ruth...!!!

Okay, enter Boaz…… (let’s explore him in the next post).

 Picture taken from commons.wikimedia.com

The Heart of Boaz, the Tenacity of Ruth (Part 1)

The story of Ruth and Boaz is most captivating.

I am sold. Boaz is my main man! And Ruth, well, what more can be said of her? A power couple, I think. If you hang with me for a minute, you’ll get to see why………….

Few men are known or remembered for the women they marry. Not many are known for their marital choice. It is normally the other way round - a woman will be known for the man she marries. But in this story, we get to meet a powerful man, who if it were not for his choice of a woman, we would probably know very little about. But before I rave about Boaz, let’s go back a little bit and give his story some context.

So there’s a man named Elimelek. He has a wife, Naomi (beautiful name), and two sons, and they all live in Bethlehem. In the passing of time, drought hits their land, and this pushes the small family of four to move to the land of Moab. The couple’s sons are still bachelors when the family migrates to Moab. And it is here, in Moab, that the two sons find themselves two lovely local (Moabite) women.

During the 10 years of living in Moab, tragedy strikes the family. All three men die. We do not know the causes of the deaths, or whether they all died around the same time. All we know is that first died the father, and the two sons followed. The sons leave no children behind. And that’s the tragedy of life - a woman is left without a husband. Her deceased sons leave her with two young wives.

The matriarch makes a difficult decision – she is going to go back home, and face the world she had left behind. She and her husband with their two sons left their home with the hope of finding a better life in exile – in Moab. But here she is, coming back with no husband or son. In a sense, she is coming back poorer than when she left. I think one of the reasons why I admire Naomi is her tenacity to face life head-on. Whatever the town will say when she gets back, she will face it. Be it, scorn, pity, shame or even sympathy, she’ll face it.

On the way back with her two daughters-in-law, she says to them: “Listen girls, I’ve got nothing to give you. You married my sons, but they’re both dead now. And look at you, you’re still young and have lives ahead of you. There are no prospects for me that I’ll get married again, but that doesn’t apply to you. Now go back home to Moab, to your families, you might get lucky and find men who would marry you”. She is, in today’s context, giving them her blessing to move on with their lives. She’s a very realistic and kind woman, this Naomi. I love her.

One of them, Orpah, accepts this blessing. She turns back and goes home and we hear nothing about her again. The other, Ruth, makes a bold move – “not a chance, I’m not going back. Let’s not argue about this, I’m going with you. Husband or not, I’m going with you. Foreign as your country might be, I’m sticking by my decision”, and it is here that she utters those famous words – “where you go, I will go. Where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God”. {I pause and take this in - wow}. Now I love Ruth.

Naomi can’t counter such staunchness and determination from her daughter-in-law. Ruth knows what she wants.

Anyway, they arrive back in Bethlehem with very little in terms of possessions, and it is here that we get to meet our man.

Boaz, it is said, was a man of means – he was rich. He owned land and had workers tilling his land. Our first experience of Boaz is when he arrives at the field. He is a powerful man – rich, with authority. He arrives to oversee how the workers are doing, and he impresses me with how he interacts with his workers. He greets the harvesters, “The LORD be with you!” he says to them. “The LORD bless you”, they respond.  (Such beautiful exchanges!!!).This was probably a normal way of greeting in those times, but it somehow gives me an impression of a man who is powerful, yet full of humility and grace.

It so happens that on this particular day, Ruth had gone to harvest some left-over grains from Boaz’s field so that she could feed herself and her widowed mother-in-law. For one or another reason, Boaz notices her. I’ve read some review that believes that this might have been love at first sight. I don’t know and I’m not sure what about her he saw, but she stood out. Maybe it was because she was all alone, picking up grains left behind by the harvesters. Whatever the reason, he noticed her.

And note that he noticed her before he knew anything about her.

He asks about her, who she is and so forth. They tell him of her little history – she is a young widow who refused to let her widowed mother-in-law come back from exile alone. She is a woman who left her home, her place of birth, and followed her mother-in-law to a foreign land, thereby embracing a new life and people, and to serve a foreign God.

I think this is where he really sits up and takes a closer look.  For most men, this would probably have been where it all stopped.  A turn-off, if you will. “Nah, she’s got a history”. Perhaps she might have even appeared to be a little intimidating to other men. “What woman leaves her people, where she has prospects of remarriage, but goes to a foreign land with her widowed mother-in-law? Nah, she’s too attached to her mother-in-law”

No, not Boaz. Boaz is, in fact, impressed with Ruth and develops compassion for this lady. So enthralled by her history, and humanity that he goes to her and they have their first recorded encounter. And thus begins a love-story that will change the course of Christian history…..

My next post will show why I admire Boaz……

"I'm Free", I think

I asked, Billy, one of our drivers, to drive me to a meeting at our client’s offices. When driving back, I asked him if he thought it would rain in the late afternoon – I want to go for a jog. (It’s been raining every single day for the last couple of weeks). I’m putting on some weight, I complain to him. I must go for a run.

At first he couldn't make out what the word rain is, or maybe he just misheard me. I repeat, but this time I translate “rain” into the local language, Lingala, as the word happens to be the same as in my language, Tshivenda, as well as other South African languages. “Mvula, do you think it’s going to rain”, I rephrase the question, pointing to the sky. He’s suddenly impressed that I know Lingala, until I tell him that the same word occurs in my language as well, also in reference to the rain. This does not kill his excitement and fascination nonetheless, that our languages have similarities.

He then responds to my question, and speculates that it might just rain. He starts stroking his belly and complains that his weight gain is even more serious and of a concern than mine. I tease him by saying he’s been eating a bit too much these days, “the company is paying you well” I tease. He disagrees, obviously, and offers a more compelling explanation for his weight gain: “no, is because I’m free. No problems”  

African cultures are very similar, more so the little behavioural nuances and our philosophies on different things. Ever since I arrived in the DRC earlier this year, I have noticed many mannerisms and way of human interactions that I can easily attribute or match with how we do things back home. Like when a lady colleague of mine comes into the office and greets me, she clasps her hands in that traditional way of greeting I know only from back home in Venda. When I come back from leave in South Africa, my Congolese colleagues will ask me how everyone is back at home, if the family is doing well (a family they know nothing about, or even know exists). That’s how we do it in Africa, and South Africa (tongue in cheek, Mr President). When we greet and ask you how you are doing, we ask in the plural – “Le kae?”, how are you and yours doing?" because you represent a collective. You’re not your own – you belong to a community, so we're therefore also concerned about those you represent, which is why we ask how all of you are doing. Not just you the individual.

Anyway, back to the fascinating topic of weight. Sometime last year, an elderly colleague of mine, back in South Africa, suddenly realized that I had put on a lot of weight (this is before my weight loss which I will talk about some other time), she started to quiz me why I’d decided to let myself go. She asked if I’d gotten married which apparently is the reason we men, oh and women alike, put on weight. After having answered “no” to a series of questions as to why I’d gained weight, she concluded: “okay, pelo e tshweu neh”, Sesotho which when directly translated means “your heart has whitened or your heart is white”.  This denotes that your heart is at peace, you’re happy.

Equally, when you shed off some weight, be prepared to answer a litany of questions about what is ailing you, physically or psychologically. You can’t just lose weight for the sake of it. No, there must something. I've had friends boldly declare that “there’s something you’re not telling us” – because of my weight loss. And no, they weren't referring to some secret diet plan that I am selfishly keeping to myself. No, this something is implied to be a sickness I have not disclosed to them, which should explain my weight loss.

So your weight is somehow a barometer of your happiness. Nice.

So when Billy, my Congolese colleague, confidently justified his weight gain by saying it’s because “I’m free, no problems” I knew what he meant. Blame the weight on happiness. But to be fair, he did finally concede that maybe a little bit of over-indulgence on the pap could have something to do with his weight gain.

There really was no point to this post to be honest with you. If anything, when those of you I know meet me and ask why there’s a sudden bulging of my waistline, I’ll happily offer Billy’s explanation: I’m free, no problems. That should settle it.

Letter on the Wall

When I was a little boy, I shared a bedroom with my late elder brother. On the wall next to the bed, hung a framed-letter given to my brother by my dad. I don’t think the letter was personally written by my dad, but it was given to my brother nonetheless.

The letter was mounted on the wall directly above the bed - I suppose the idea was that the letter would be a constant and daily reminder of the message it carried. I’m not exactly sure whether it was my brother or dad that had decided on where to hang and display the letter, but whatever the case - there hung the letter on the wall, day in and day out, for many many years.

I remember how, as a young boy, I would climb on the bed and try to read out and make sense of the contents of the letter. I did not consider that as a violation of privacy because the letter was, after all, publicly displayed in a room I shared with my brother. For many years, the letter hung on the wall until it became part of the furniture, and I eventually got bored  reading it, even though my English vocabulary had since improved.

Yesterday I woke up with a bit of nostalgia for a lot of things, and that letter came to mind but for the life of me, I cannot remember what it said. And it has being bugging me that I can’t remember the contents of the letter. (And to think that the letter was not even addressed to me).

That letter is no longer on the wall. I don’t know why I’ve been thinking of that letter, but whatever it is, it prompted me to look online for something similar, and that’s where I stumbled on this book.

Letters to My Son by Kent Nerburn promises to be a very good read, if the online reviews are anything top go by. I’ll give you my feedback once I’m done, or perhaps before then….. 

Wishes of an Uncle

I am a very privileged uncle of 4 boys aged fourteen (14), thirteen (13), nine (9) and the last one is just a tender three (3) years old. The 13-year old has a quiet demeanour, and being the eldest, he always assumes the role of observing and monitoring what his younger brothers and cousin are up to, casually exercising his authority when it’s absolutely necessary, albeit diplomatically. The second one has the natural flair of being able to perceive things a kid his age normally struggles to comprehend, and he’s not shy to flaunt his intelligence. The third one is just a marvel. He will either make you laugh with his amazing wit and sense of humour, or make you cringe with embarrassment as he doesn't believe in keeping his opinion to himself. I don’t know how many times my sister would call to tell me what latest thing this lad had just asked the visitors, or said to a teacher. Whatever it is he is thinking, you will know about it. And finally, there’s the youngest one who is just too clever for his age. Love him.

But all 4 are unique and they make our family gatherings very colourful. Perhaps it is this individual character uniqueness that makes me wonder and think of the men they all will be one day. I have high hopes for all four of them. I hope that they find their purpose in life and pursue it, and be the best that they can be. But more than WHAT they will be in life, I often wonder about WHO they will be, what kind of people they will be. What kind of MEN will they be, that’s what keeps me awake at night.

These boys are still wet behind the ears, and only one of them has just entered teenage-hood, but my overactive mind has already ventured into the future and I've asked myself if I will one day be a proud uncle to negotiate lobola for any of these nephews of mine. Will I be a bold enough to ask a family to release a daughter for marriage to these boys?

I know I know, all these questions will probably be what King Solomon calls vanity of vanities. It’s not wise to ask such questions, he would probably say, because you don’t know what the future holds.

.

I had a friend back in varsity and we both had a heart for serving the community. We got into a discussion once about what role we would each play in society upon leaving university. How would we help develop and heal society? Our common understanding of what society needed was that ALL people needed healing, what President Mandela would call the “Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP) of the soul”.  Where we differed is how we would individually tackle this problem. My approach was quite simply, “I want to help restore the broken family structure of our country because it is families that produce people, and people make the societies we have”. So it was my firm belief, and still is, that what South Africa needs is a restoration of the family unit.

But with the passing of time I have come to wonder whether stable, loving and well-grounded families are all that we need to produce well-rounded individuals who are ready to positively contribute to society. Would hugging my nephews a bit more and giving them pats on the back make them responsible citizens? Is that too simplistic, or is it not? I honestly don’t have the answers to all these questions. This is probably one of the very few times I will admit to not having an answer.  

In the meantime, I will keep wondering, but praying for my nephews. I want them to grow to be men of integrity and truth. I hope and pray that they will grow up in the fear of God and one day make honest husbands and responsible parents. Regardless of what the South African man has become, I want my nephews to grow up living honest and truthful lives, knowing that it is costly to be different from the crowd, but it is also hugely rewarding.

I don’t necessarily pray and hope for them to live in a better world, but I hope that they MAKE a better world around them, for it is the individuals who make the society.