Thursday in Advent

6Verse 6. When Naomi heard in Moab that the LORD had attended to His people by providing them with food, she and her daughters-in-law prepared to leave the land of Moab. 7Verse 7. Accompanied by her two daughters-in-law, she left the place where she had been living and set out on the road leading back to the land of Judah. 8Verse 8. Then Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, “Go back, each of you to your mother’s home. May the LORD show you loving devotion, as you have shown to your dead and to me. 9Verse 9. May the LORD enable each of you to find rest in the home of your new husband.” And she kissed them as they wept aloud 10Verse 10. and said, “Surely we will return with you to your people.” 11Verse 11. But Naomi replied, “Return home, my daughters. Why would you go with me? Are there still sons in my womb to become your husbands? 12Verse 12. Return home, my daughters. Go on, for I am too old to have another husband. Even if I thought there was hope for me to have a husband tonight and to bear sons, 13Verse 13. would you wait for them to grow up? Would you refrain from having husbands? No, my daughters, it is much more bitter for me than for you, because the hand of the LORD has gone out against me.” 14Verse 14. Again they wept aloud, and Orpah kissed her mother-in-law goodbye, but Ruth clung to her. 15Verse 15. “Look,” said Naomi, “your sister-in-law has gone back to her people and her gods; follow her back home.” 16Verse 16. But Ruth replied: “Do not urge me to leave you or to turn from following you. For wherever you go, I will go, and wherever you live, I will live; your people will be my people, and your God will be my God. 17Verse 17. Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried. May the LORD punish me, and ever so severely, if anything but death separates you and me.” 18Verse 18. When Naomi saw that Ruth was determined to go with her, she stopped trying to persuade her.

1Verse 1. Beloved, this is now my second letter to you. Both of them are reminders to stir you to wholesome thinking 2Verse 2. by recalling what was foretold by the holy prophets and commanded by our Lord and Savior through your apostles. 3Verse 3. Most importantly, you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires. 4Verse 4. “Where is the promise of His coming?” they will ask. “Ever since our fathers fell asleep, everything continues as it has from the beginning of creation.” 5Verse 5. But they deliberately overlook the fact that long ago by God’s word the heavens existed and the earth was formed out of water and by water, 6Verse 6. through which the world of that time perished in the flood. 7Verse 7. And by that same word, the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men. 8Verse 8. Beloved, do not let this one thing escape your notice: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. 9Verse 9. The Lord is not slow in keeping His promise as some understand slowness, but is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish but everyone to come to repentance. 10Verse 10. But the Day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar, the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and its works will be laid bare.