Welcome to the Pauline Family's "Year of the Bible"! I'm reading the Bible clear through this year, and I invite you to read along with me. But first, let us pray:
My God, I adore and thank your loving and wise Providence, manifested on every page of Sacred Scripture. You have always been close to sinful and erring humanity, and have indicated the way and given hope. Amid the shadows of error and corruption, you kindled the light of your truth; amid universal corruption, you are the Just One; amid so much idolatry, humanity in every corner of the earth has cultivated a sincere worship of you.
Let my reading today increase my trust in your goodness, your mercy, and your unfailing faithfulness.
Today's chapters are Judges 21 and Ruth 1-2 and (because it is Sunday) Psalms 23 and 24.
We finish the sorry tale of Judges today. The final chapter opens with a strange motif for Valentine's Day: the dilemma of matchmaking within the restrictions of a vow not to ally one's family with the now-hated Benjaminites, while still not allowing a tribe of Israel to die out. (As they used to say on Facebook, "It's complicated.")
Then we move into one of the Bible's real love stories, the Book of Ruth. We'll read half of it today (the entire Book of Ruth is only four chapters long). Set in Bethlehem, it's a beautiful story of family bonds.
Do you remember the provisions in Deuteronomy and Leviticus about not harvesting a field completely, but leaving produce that the needy (the "stranger, the orphan and the widow") could glean? Here we see the poor but faithful widow Ruth, a stranger in Israel (she is a Moabite), gleaning in the fields of Rahab's son Boaz. (Rahab was another non-Israelite woman joined by faith to the Chosen people.)
Start reading Judges here and Ruth here and the Psalms here.
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