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Would
you buy a house if you were only allowed to see one of its rooms? Would you buy a car if you could only see the tires and taillights? One failure doesn’t make a person a failure One achievement doesn’t make a person a success. Be patient in affliction. In
Ruth chapters 2 and 3 we see how Ruth kept stoking the fire despite the fact
that Naomi might have hurt her feelings. Has a friend ever hurt you and caused you to withdraw? We can learn from the model of Ruth. We are drawn to people who are like us. Therefore if we have a strong relationship with God, we are likely to
attract others who do so as well. As
a Christian our best friend should also be a Christian. The scripture asks what fellowship hath light with darkness? And also in Amos 3:3 "Can
two walk together, except they be agreed?" The answer obviously is no. We
need to take great care in choosing our friends.
There
are three common reasons that friendships die: distance, stress, and betrayal.
When the friendship is very close and you feel like your soulmate has betrayed
you, you may lose your desire to keep working on the friendship, and like an
untended fire, it dies. We should know that everyone, no matter how dear,
is going to let us down sooner or later because everyone has a sin nature.
The book of Ruth shows us the reality of forgiveness in action. We would
do well to study the book of Ruth and pattern ourselves after her.
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