Sunday 4th November (31B)

RUTH
It’s a story
often told
of human loyalty,
fidelity,
conversion
and faithful commitment
to Israel’s God.
It’s a story –
layered, onion-like –
about the inclusive and mysterious
ways of God.
It’s a story
again revealing
the path of God’s grace in humanity,
neither straight nor narrow,
littered with laws broken,
social and sexual boundaries disregarded.
It’s a story
in which God’s lovingkindness
is worked out,
sometimes in ambiguious ways,
by people
whose actions and intentions
sometimes surprise, even shock.
It’s a story
pointing to our story
as a community of faith
not knowing who it is
that seeks to walk with us,
nor the ways
in which the God of grace will be revealed
among a community
called
to fill the empty,
befriend the lonely
and walk with the weary.
(Adapted from a sermon from some years ago, which may have drawn on material from other, long-forgotten, sources.)
        © Jeff Shrowder, 2012.
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