Song of Solomon 8:6-7

“… for love is as strong as death, jealousy as cruel as the grave; its flames are flames of fire, a most vehement flame. Many waters cannot quench love, nor can the floods drown it. if a man would give for love all the wealth of his house, it would be utterly despised.”

Everyone wants a perfect love story, and many say Ruth and Boaz had just that. But let’s not forget all that happened before they even met. Ruth was married and in love once before meeting Boaz, and then her husband died along with just losing her brother and father-in-law. The tragedy that this woman went through is devastating, but her commitment to her God and to what He had in front of her is where the love bleeds through in the fields of Boaz. Ruth had a life changing decision very soon after just losing her husband; whether or not to stay with Naomi or go back to her home and marry someone else. Unlike her sister-in-law Orpah she stayed committed to her journey with the Lord, who He had put not only above her to follow after but to help and be a friend too. Ruth went daily into the field of Boaz until barley harvest was ended. To see right in the beginning, the servants heart she had, that she with having nothing, would go out to find food even after the reapers had gone through only picking up what was left behind. We know by reading the story of Ruth that by the end of barley harvest, Boaz and Ruth were in love.  The true beauty of this story to me was found in the profound wonder of, the love of a great man for a noble woman. The honest love of a great man and a good woman is born in the heart of God; and this kind of love is noble and ennobling, and to me is described perfectly here in the Song of Solomon. We all want to have love and to be loved, but it can quickly become “flames of fire” if it is “stirred up or awaken to soon.” (Song of Solomon 8:4). I can only testify and account for myself the countless hours of grieving and becoming double minded over a love that soon became something of this world and not of the Lord. The struggle is real for us all, but the battle has already been won, and the Lord has already formed a perfect plan for us all even before we had the chance to think about love. Let us also not forget that we can only love, because “He first loved us.”