R2-11: Have You Ever Taken A Scary Leap Of Faith That Turned Out AWESOME?!

Have you ever gone balls to the wall and taken a huge risk in your life even though you had no idea how things would turn out?

Maybe you suddenly quit your job without another one lined up because you hated it and couldn’t take it anymore…

Or maybe you left the security of a marriage because your partner was abusive…

Or maybe you decided to pick up and leave your home country for a foreign land whose culture and language was completely different from your own…

I myself have taken some big bold leaps in my life because I felt deep down in my gut that God was prompting me to do so.

And you know what, even though it was utterly terrifying in the beginning, God rewarded my faith far beyond my expectations.

I remember when I flew off to South Korea to teach English for a year and I was terrified there would be extreme prejudice against me because I’m half Japanese.

During War World II, the Japanese military had colonized Korea and treated them horribly during that time…

And I was afraid I’d be looked at as a descendant of one of their most hated enemies.

In addition, I had heard this rumor that in Asia they only wanna hire white teachers and Asian Americans were looked down on and paid less blah, blah, blah…

I was filled with all kinds of worries…

But you know what?

It was all in vain…

Not only was I paid top won (the South Korean currency) for being an American born native English speaking teacher, but I was one of the most popular teachers there!

In fact, there was this group of junior high school girls who used to send me handwritten love notes with red lip stick kisses on them.

I’m serious man!

It turned out to be a great year and at the end of my contract I came to Tokyo with $13,000 savings in my pocket.

Anyways, my whole point is even though I was worried about all kinds of bad things happening to me when I took my leap of faith, not one bad thing ever happened.

Not one!

Quite the opposite actually.

Now when we look at Ruth’s story we can see a similar series of events.

Ruth left her home country, her family and everything she was familiar with to venture out to a world she knew little about.

It was a huge leap of faith for her and she had no idea how things were gonna turn out.

Yet look at all the good fortune that happened to her.

First, Ruth was “coincidentally” led to glean in one of Boaz’s fields…

According to the Law of Moses, she could have gleaned in any field but she ended up exactly where God wanted her to be…

Soon after, the elderly and wealthy Boaz took a liking to Ruth because of her youthful beauty and character and immediately began to treat her special.

The kindness he showed Ruth was a demonstration of the Hebrew concept of CHESED…

A word which is used to describe Godly acts of loving-kindness…

And incidentally, the CHESED Boaz showed Ruth was like the CHESED that Ruth showed Naomi.

Onwards…

So Ruth’s good “luck” continued to grow.

Boaz gave Ruth permission to glean in his fields and thus receive the protection of his hired workers…

And he even told Ruth she could gather up stalks of barley and wheat that Boaz’s men intentionally had pulled out of their own bundled sheaves of grain.

No only would this make her gleaning efforts easier and much more productive, it was an unheard-of privilege for someone of her status.

So we can see that Ruth took a big leap of faith in her life and the Lord rewarded her tremendously for it.

Now how about you?

Have you ever taken a huge leap of faith that was terrifying at the beginning but then later on ended up being the best thing that ever happened to you?

I’d love to hear your story.