Memory Verse: Joshua 24:15 “…choose you this day whom you will serve… but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”
Welcome boys and girls! I’m so glad you are here for our “God’s Ultimate Makeover” series. In this series, we are going to be learning about people in the Bible who received God’s Ultimate Makeover. Does that mean that God built them a new home, Or gave them a new wardrobe & hairstyle, like you see on TV? Of course not! What it really means is that when you receive Christ as your Savior from sin, He changes you from the inside out! He makes you a new person!
Oh, now I don’t mean your looks will change, and you still have the same name and all, but now you are clean and new inside. Your sins are taken away, and God comes to live inside of you forever! And, He keeps on working inside of you to make you more and more like Jesus every day! Then, one day, you will get to go to live with Him in Heaven for all eternity!
Jesus’s Ultimate Makeover never ends… it just keeps on getting better and better! If you haven’t already received God’s Ultimate Makeover, I hope you will do that soon, maybe even today.
Lets get on with our story!
One of the people in the Bible who received God’s Ultimate Makeover was a woman named Ruth. Ruth was from a place called Moab. In the country of Moab, the people worshiped many false gods. Ruth, as she was growing up, probably worshiped these false gods too. It was all she knew! It was all she had been taught to do. But, it was the wrong thing to do. It was sin!
Worshiping these false gods was not making Ruth change on the inside! She needed God’s Ultimate Makeover to make that happen. She needed to worship and follow the True God, and trust Him to take away her sins to have eternal life in Heaven.
One day, Ruth got married! But she didn’t marry a Moabite man. She married a Jewish man. His family had moved to the land of Moab because there was a famine in Israel, the home of the Jews.
What is a famine? That’s right, it’s when the crops don’t live and so there is no food to eat. But, there was food in Moab, so the man’s family had moved there. Sadly, the man’s father, Elimelech, had died. That left the man, and his brother, and their mother Naomi. And now Ruth was married into this Jewish family.
Jewish people did not worship many false gods. They worshiped the One True God. Naomi’s family worshiped the One True God. Now, they taught Ruth about Him too!
Sadly, after about 10 years they got married, Ruth’s husband died. His brother died too. Naomi was all alone except for Ruth. Naomi decided to go back home to Bethlehem, the town where they were from in Israel. Things were better there, she had heard. The famine had passed. She had family there, and friends. Naomi knew that all of Ruth’s family were in Moab. Naomi loved her daughter-in-law, but she thought Ruth might be happier staying in Moab near her own family and friends. Naomi told Ruth to stay in Moab. But, Ruth didn’t want to stay in Moab. Ruth loved Naomi, and wanted to stay with her. Even more important, Ruth had come to love the One True God that Naomi had taught her about. Ruth wanted to go where she could worship and follow Him freely, not back to where the people all worshiped false gods. The Bible tells us what Ruth said to Naomi:
“Don’t ask me to leave you and turn back. I will go wherever you go and live wherever you live. Your people will be my people and your God will be My God.” (Ruth 1:16)
Ruth had surely received God’s Ultimate Make-over in her life. Ruth chose to follow God the rest of her life!
The two women returned to Bethlehem. Naomi’s friends and family were excited to see her! They were saddened to hear about the death of her husband and her two sons.
They were also probably very curious about this young Moabite woman, Naomi’s daughter-in-law, who had come back to Bethlehem with her. As they got to know Ruth, they saw how kind she was to Naomi. They saw how hard working she was. And they saw how much Ruth loved the One True God she had chosen to follow. When Ruth received God’s Ultimate Makeover, God changed her on the inside, and it showed on the outside to all the people around her.
One person who noticed Ruth was a man named Boaz. He was a “near-kinsman,” or, a relative of Naomi’s.
Boaz was a farmer who had a field of barley that Ruth had come to work in. Ruth worked very hard picking up barley grain that had been dropped by the harvesters. Poor people were allowed to do that in Israel so they would have something to eat. Ruth and Naomi were very poor. Boaz noticed how hard Ruth was working to provide food for herself and Naomi. He had heard how kind Ruth was to her mother-in-law. He had also heard how Ruth had chosen to follow the One True God that the Israelites worshiped, rather than the false gods of the Moabites.
Boaz decided to ask Ruth to be his wife, and she said yes!
Boaz was happy and Ruth was happy, and Naomi was happy too! God had worked everything out in a very special way. Ruth and Boaz soon had a baby boy of their very own. They named him Obed, and he was like a grandson to Naomi.
Boys and girls, if Ruth had not chosen to follow God, and receive His Ultimate Makeover, all these special things would not have happened to her. But, there is an even more special thing that happened to Ruth because she decided to follow God.
Ruth’s baby boy, Obed, grew up and became the father of Jesse. Jesse became the father of David, the same David who killed the giant Goliath, and became the King of Israel. And from David’s descendants, Jesus was born as a baby in that same town that Ruth and Naomi and Boaz lived in; Bethlehem.
So the Savior, the sinless Son of God, who would die on the cross to take away Ruth’s and yours and my sins, and then rise from the dead three days later…. He was Ruth’s great great great great great… Grandson!
Boys and girls, have you decided to follow God like Ruth did? Have you asked Jesus to forgive you for your sins and come into your life? Do you want to receive God’s Ultimate Makeover in your life, and be changed from the inside out like Ruth was?
You can do that today!
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