Preaching And Reading The Old Testament Lessons
Our text for the morning sets us immediately into the middle of a family drama. Naomi and her husband Elimelech were Hebrews who had moved during a famine from their home in Beth--lehem to the plains of Moab in search of better pasture for their flocks. They had two sons. But tragedy struck the family. First, Naomi's husband died. Then the two sons, who had married Moabite women, died also, leaving Naomi a widow in a foreign land, with no way to support herself and with two widowed daughters--in--law on her hands.