Lesson Four • We Are Family
Devotion #5: To Serve
Nathan Elliott
As my wife and I prepare for the arrival of our first child, numerous thoughts race through my mind: Am I ready to raise a child? How much do diapers cost? Why is God allowing this to happen now? Similar concerns may have gone through Ruth and Boaz’s mind when God blessed them with a child. Ultimately, all of those fears were quickly silenced by the amazing realization that God blessed us with the gift of life. There is no greater blessing that God can give us than the gift of life, but with every life, comes the curse of death. This curse has and will affect every human who has ever been born. Thankfully, through the lineage of Obed came a Redeemer for us all. He is Jesus.
We do not know a lot about Obed, but what we do know is that he was the son of Ruth and Boaz. Obed then grew and had a son named Jesse, and Jesse fathered the great King David.
Why did God choose such a normal family to carry on the seed promise of the Messiah? We do not know. However, Ruth had something very precious, even when she lost everything. She had a servant’s heart and this is often all that God requires when He wants to use us to do mighty things for His Kingdom. We can only assume this same character trait was carried down through generations starting with Obed, whose name literally means “to serve.” In our day-to-day, whether we are parents, married, unmarried, divorced, or widowed, may we all strive to serve.
Philippians 2:3 says, “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.” Verses 5-8 continue, “Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”