RETURNING EMPTY: Discovering Naomi's Story

A dear friend with valued wisdom encouraged me to delve into Naomi's story;

Her prophetic name means pleasant or sweet; a declaration of purpose, intention, and destiny yet severely challenged, tested and ultimately refined.

ACT ONE: Devastation

Ruth 1:20

She said to them, "Do not call me Naomi; call me Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me.

Such gravity of cumulative losses and heartache fueled Naomi's name change request. The sour pain was intensely bitter and deeper than outward bleeding wounds and scars.

To rename yourself and to hear your pain called out repeatedly each day and night is a constant reminder. A refusal to forget what has been stolen, endured and buried. A continuous declaration of an identity seemingly lost and impacted forever.

Ruth 1:21

I went out full, but the Lord has brought me back empty. Why do you call me Naomi, since the Lord has witnessed against me and the Almighty has afflicted me?"

It is devastating to have once been full but to return back where you started, completely emptied of all you once held. To question everything; the decisions, the motives, the hopes and plans. The expectant dreams verses cruel reality results.

Returning empty

Even the Almighty scriptwriter does not escape mention in the flurry of desperation laments.

To perceive only what is seen through the blurred flow of tears. To testify and conclude that affliction is the intended story ending is trauma's defeating last blow.

Trauma distorts perspective and we become victims of our wounded interpretations. The unfolding plot beside and among the numerous ruins and gravestones is hidden and missed in tragic grief.

Naomi returned home "empty" and broken but she wasn't alone. In utter defeat she was unable to activate her eyes and heart to see with clarity. Her words and her self confessed truth were released from the fractured angles of pain and brokenness.

Yet the fullness of an incomplete version of her story were inches away; unseen and unknown.

Ruth 1:22.

So Naomi returned, and with her Ruth the Moabitess, her daughter-in-law, who returned from the land of Moab. And they came to Bethlehem at the beginning of barley harvest.

Naomi and Ruth returned at the BEGINNING of a brand new harvest season. This is actually my favourite verse! The irony and the set-up, the reality and the looming turnaround all leaping off the page to declare; IT IS NOT OVER!

The plot line is already arranged.

The characters are now all in place.

The script is ready to reveal.

The audience wonders!

The curtain is about to lift!

ACT TWO: Ready

They return just as the harvest is ripe! Empty handed and empty hearted at a perfectly aligned new time of opportunity.

In just ONE season Naomi is about to witness immeasurable and unpredictable turnaround. Weeks, not years for a U-turn revolution. It was all ready, and without knowing she was ready too!

Her eyes could not see it. Her mouth could not declare it. Her self-changed renamed identity could not restrict or even contain what was coming.... just beyond her horizon view.

Sometimes the emptying creates the greatest space most needed for new fulness to follow.

The losing removes all pretences and self reliance. It exposes the vulnerability and the fragile. The tide pulls back and reveals all that we once held on to as useless and fleeting. Limited resources dry up and are gone.

The grieving, the emptiness, the trying and the failing.... giving it all up!

No husband.

No children.

No grandchildren

No inheritance

The line ends bitterly with Mara.

ACT THREE: Surrender!

Ruth 4:9.

Then Boaz said to the elders and all the people, "You are witnesses today that I have bought from the hand of Naomi all that belonged to Elimelech and all that belonged to Chilion and Mahlon.

Naomi surrendered the last things she still had left; her husband's land, her son's names and her widowed daughter-in-law; handing over everything because she loved and she hoped and despite all that had been stolen in the previous relentless assasinating seasons she still had faith to believe!

Here she really has nothing except God!

Completely empty!

1 Corinthians 13:13

These three remain; faith, hope, and love- but the greatest of these is love.

Perhaps the emptying increases our capacity to love? To show us its universal power and unrelenting purpose.

Pain and grief are the marks and measures of love; of having invested the heart in something greater than ourselves.

AGAPE love cannot be extinguished, not even in burial.

To rediscover love is to live fully again.

ACT FOUR: Restoration

Only empty containers can be filled.

The vacant space is where new things emerge. You cannot find them or receive them in fullness.

There is no space or need in plural plenty.

Wide vacancy holes preceed the refilling.

Giving it all up for a chance of change.

A grandson!

Not by bloodline but by heart!

Love wins!

Always has...and always will!

Ruth 4:16 and 15

Then Naomi took the child and laid him in her lap...

May he also be to you a restorer of life and a sustainer of your old age; for your daughter-in-law, who loves you and is better to you than seven sons, has given birth to him." The Line of David Began Here.

Naomi returned home empty, but her lap was later FULL and restored with more than she could have dared to ask or imagine and it continued for generations beyond her lifespan.

Her original name rang true!

Sweetness removes the bitter.

Emptiness repositions for refilling.

It dismantles and disarms.

It exposes and cleanses.

We might want to hold on to the old but we have to clear out space for the new.

It is the beginning of all transformation!

It is a return to loving the playwright!