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‘Call me, Bitter.’

That was what Naomi said when she lost her husband and two sons. She said, ‘Don’t call me Naomi. Call me Mara, because the Almighty has made my life very bitter’ (Ruth 1:20). And in her deep grief, she tried to drive away those she loved.

God’s exiled people experienced the same in nature. They came to a spring, but ‘they could not drink its water because it was bitter’ (Exodus 15:23). They backed away from it and rejected it, because bitterness has a way of driving others away.

But God stepped into both situations. God gave Naomi a grandson through the very person she tried to reject. He cured the water for his exiled people, the very water they refused to drink. And God will do the same for us. Let’s not drive others away in our great sadness and bitterness of heart, for it is often through these people that we find God’s hope.

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The last laugh…

In this 100th blog, I wondered what the Bible had to say about ‘100’.

Nothing glamourous, as I had hoped. The first one embodied a cynical old man! “Abraham fell face down; he laughed and said to himself, ‘Will a son be born to a man a hundred years old?'” (Genesis 17:17) I wondered… am I still on the ground laughing at God’s promises? Do I still doubt him when he says he will save?

Then a surprise. The last ‘100’ at the end of the Bible was about Abraham as well! “Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead – since he was about a hundred years old.” (Romans 4:19) Yes, each of us can flounder in impossible situations. So often I do. But it is God who laughs at those impossibilities and difficulties.* He tells us, “I’ve got it. Don’t fear.”

*Psalm 2:4; Psalm 37:13

Photo by Ben White on Unsplash