Jonah/Ruth: Love Crosses Boundaries

This is the first of the "Six Weeks with the Bible" series by Kevin Perrotta that I have read, but I will definitely read more and highly recommend them to anyone interested in an easy-to-follow but in-depth study of any book of the Bible. Each of the six sections begins with a few questions. These bring to mind your own real-life situations that will be more fully explored later. Next, there is the selected Biblical passage, followed by more questions to help you ponder what you have read. Then, there is what I consider the most helpful section, a guide to the reading. This is a verse by verse analysis of the scripture put into very understandable terms while taking into account the time period when the original text was written. This is followed by several questions for application and some suggested approaches to prayer based on the readings. The final entry is "A Living Tradition" which recounts a variety of things, generally similar situations with well-known people of our own time. Jonah and Ruth are the two Old Testament books explored in this guide. In the first two sections devoted to Jonah, we are reminded that there is no automatic connection between belonging to God's people and being in tune with God. Jonah is well informed about God's plans; he just doesn't like them. Because God saw the objections to His love that lay hidden in Jonah's heart, God sent him on a mission to bring that conflict into the open. On the other hand, the book of Ruth says little about God's action. The characters acknowledge God as the source of blessings, but the story shows us God's action rather than speaking about it. We see God working through the generous faithfulness of Ruth to Naomi and later of Boaz to Ruth. We see how God works in a hidden way to arrange the circumstances of our lives. This is an excellent resource for studying the Books of Jonah and Ruth. I will definitely be ordering more from this series.