Ruth 1:16-17 And Ruth said, Entreat me not to leave you, or to return from following after you: for where you go, I will go; and where you lodge… This family feeling reigns among all the true sons of God under every dispensation. It operates with all the steadiness of an instinct. Apart altogether from Divine commands, believers exercise mutual attraction like planets that move round the same central orb. They are conscious of "the unity of the Spirit." Under the Old Testament, "they that feared the Lord spake often one to another"; under the New Testament, "they that believed were together." There is not an instance recorded in the whole inspired history of Christians preferring to live in isolation from their brethren. If there were only two believers in the same city, they would be irresistibly drawn to each other just in the degree in which they were believers. And those who are thus mutually attracted shed many mutual blessings, like flowers growing contiguous to each other in a garden that drop the dew around each other's roots. And now her God-inspired resolution strengthening and glowing as she proceeds, culminates in a solemn vow of undying constancy, in which she imprecates Heaven's righteous retribution upon herself should she fail to keep it: "The Lord do so to me, and more also, if ought but death part thee and me." (A. Thomson, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: And Ruth said, Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God: |
    |