Sermons

“Being Naomi”

Psalm 146; Ruth 1:1-21 – Rev. Rebecca Littlejohn

Vista La Mesa Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), La Mesa, California – November 1, 2015

All Saints Memorial Sunday

Holy God, bless the speaking and the hearing of these words, that we might know that you are always with us and trust in your mercy to bring us to peace. We pray in the name of Jesus, Amen.

If we’re going to look for a biblical lesson on grieving, the Book of Ruth seems a good place to land. Because we are celebrating All Saints Day today, I had assumed I would have to search beyond the lectionary for our readings today, but when I discovered the lectionary was guiding us to read about Naomi, it seemed like a good fit. Naomi has had it hard. Forced to emigrate because of famine, she lost her husband in a foreign land. Then her young adult sons, shortly after marrying women there in Moab, also both died. Can you imagine the depth of her grief? Of course, grief is never something it’s fruitful to compare, but this woman has had it hard.

There are two lessons from early on in Naomi’s story that I think we can benefit from. She’s really very much like us, it turns out. She is going to head back to the land of Judah, and what does she try to do? She tells her daughters-in-law to go back to their parents’ houses. When we’re sad, when we’re grieving, when we’re depressed, this instinct to isolate ourselves is strong. Why should anyone want to be around me? I’m a mess. I have nothing to offer. I’m a burden. Just let me be miserable in peace, alone. Except that’s not what happens, is it? Oh, that we might all be as fortunate as Naomi, with someone in our lives as persistent as Ruth, who refuses to leave us alone. Nope. Not happening, she says. Ruth’s speech here is such a model of devotion and faithfulness that it’s become a staple at weddings. “Do not press me to leave you or to turn back from following you! Where you go, I will go; where you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you die, I will die—there will I be buried. May the Lord do thus and so to me, and more as well, if even death parts me from you!”

Ruth’s words may be the most beautiful absolute refusal to do as someone asks that I’ve ever seen. The promise to accompany Naomi through whatever may come, for the rest of their lives, creates a powerful covenant. But these words are also a reminder that not only does Naomi have Ruth, she also has a people – a people Ruth is committing to join – and a God – a God Ruth is pledging to serve. Poor, grieving Naomi, who has done her best to wander off alone to grieve herself to death in solitude, has been gifted with a companion, a community, and a God. We are called to be Ruth for one another. To insist on being present. To remind those who are grieving that they have us as companions, that they have a community, that they have a God. So this first lesson is about helping each other resist our tendency to isolate ourselves.

Then there is the lesson in verses 20 & 21. Naomi and Ruth arrive back in Bethlehem. The neighbor women remember Naomi, of course, but they are surprised to see her. “Is this Naomi?” they ask. And her answer is No. “Call me no longer Naomi, call me Mara, for the Almighty has dealt bitterly with me.” And here is where we need a little help from our Hebrew scholars, in the notes. Naomi, it seems, sounds like the Hebrew word for “pleasant” or “sweet.” Mara, on the other hand, sounds like the feminine form of the Hebrew word for “bitter.” So Naomi is demanding a name change. Her life isn’t pleasant or sweet. Her life is bitter, and her name ought to reflect that reality. Her very identity has changed, she announces, because of the calamity she believes God has brought upon her.

Except what happens? Nothing. In the very next verse, the narrator is still calling her Naomi. Everyone else is still calling her Naomi. There is no more mention of the name Mara in the entire story. Nobody listens to her. They refuse to accept her new identity. They refuse to believe that what has happened to her has irreparably changed who she is. It’s as if the community is saying to her, “You are Naomi. God created you to be Naomi, and Naomi you shall remain.”

We may feel as though we don’t know who we are anymore, when we’re reeling from loss. We may feel like everything has been stripped from us, our identity and self, along with whatever was actually taken away. But the community of faith is here to remind us that we’re still here. We are still the beloved child of God we were before. Our lives may have a different shape than before, but our essence is still love. We refuse to call you Mara. You are Naomi. All is not bitterness. Life can be sweet again. We will not let your grief swallow you whole. We will not let bitterness consume you. It may feel impossible to remember who you are, or even that you are, but we will hold that truth for you, until you are ready to carry it again yourself. You are Naomi.

There is a final lesson I’d like to pull from Naomi’s story, though it comes from beyond the passage we read. For those who are not familiar with the Book of Ruth, what you need to know is that after Naomi and Ruth get back to Bethlehem, Naomi becomes a key figure in the pairing up of Ruth and Boaz, who are eventually the great-grandparents of King David. Ruth is mentioned by name in the first chapter of Matthew, where the gospel writer lines out the genealogy of Jesus. This vital pairing of Boaz with a woman of Moab – signifying God’s love for the whole world – could not have happened without Naomi’s involvement. Without her sojourn to Moab and her return to Bethlehem, with Ruth as her companion, the ancestral line would not have been what it was.

When her husband and her sons had died, Naomi thought her life was over. She was convinced that she had nothing left to offer anyone. She was a dried up leaf, a pile of ashes to be swept out the door. She had no idea that her most important days were still in front of her. Grief can seem to take away any meaning from life. Loss can hollow us out, leaving us empty and gasping for breath. But what we often forget is that sometimes empty vessels are the most useful to God. Sometimes it is when we’re absolutely convinced that there’s nothing more we can do, that we are finally able to let God do things through us. We may not always recognize what we’re doing, or that we’re doing anything at all. But that doesn’t mean God is done with us.

These lessons from Naomi – that we must help each other resist the tendency to isolation; that we as a community must help people hold onto their identity and not be consumed by grief or bitterness; that even when it doesn’t feel like it, life can have purpose and meaning after loss – lessons may seem particularly salient in the face of personal loss. But there are many kinds of grief in our lives. The loss of loved ones, the loss of a job, the breaking off of a relationship – these losses too can bring grief that threatens to cut us off from community and meaning. We were in a bit of a season of grief a couple months ago within this congregation. The waves of loss just kept coming. And the state of the world wasn’t helping. With heart-breaking stories of refugees risking their lives while seeking better lives, with ever growing rosters of those lost to gun violence, with the polarization of our society, and the increasingly devastating consequences of environmental degradation, we may all have times of disorienting sorrow, when we are tempted to isolate ourselves, to give in to bitterness, to give up on the idea that we can make a difference.

That is when we must all strive to be Naomi. We must all strive to be Ruth. We must re-commit ourselves to the community of faith that helps us remember that we have one another, and God has us. To be part of a community of faith that proclaims every week that love is stronger than death is to have something to hold onto in the face of grief that tries to take everything from us. To be part of a community of faith that reminds us who and whose we are is to be called back, by name, from the brink of sorrow and bitterness. To be part of a community of faith is to be reminded on a regular basis: You have a people. You have a God. I am here with you. We are not alone. Let us join in remembering. Alleluia and Amen.