Faith, Honesty, and "in my own strength"

In the days when the judges ruled, there was a famine in the land, and a man from Bethlehem in Judah, together with his wife and two sons, went to live for a while in the country of Moab. The man's name was Elimelech, his wife's name Naomi, and the names of his two sons were Mahlon and Kilion. They were Ephrathites from Bethlehem, Judah. And they went to Moab and lived there.
Now Elimelech, Naomi's husband, died, and she was left with her two sons. They married Moabite women, one named Orpah and the other Ruth. After they had lived there about ten years, both Mahlon and Kilion also died, and Naomi was left without her two sons and her husband.
When she heard in Moab that the LORD had come to the aid of his people by providing food for them, Naomi and her daughters-in-law prepared to return home from there. With her two daughters-in-law she left the place where she had been living and set out on the road that would take them back to the land of Judah.
Then Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, "Go back, each of you, to your mother's home. May the LORD show kindness to you, as you have shown to your dead and to me. May the LORD grant that each of you will find rest in the home of another husband." Then she kissed them and they wept aloud and said to her, "We will go back with you to your people."
But Naomi said, "Return home, my daughters. Why would you come with me? Am I going to have any more sons, who could become your husbands? Return home, my daughters; I am too old to have another husband. Even if I thought there was still hope for me—even if I had a husband tonight and then gave birth to sons-would you wait until they grew up? Would you remain unmarried for them? No, my daughters. It is more bitter for me than for you, because the LORD's hand has gone out against me!"
At this they wept again. Then Orpah kissed her mother-in-law good-by, but Ruth clung to her. "Look," said Naomi, "your sister-in-law is going back to her people and her gods. Go back with her."But Ruth replied, "Don't urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the LORD deal with me, be it ever so severely, if anything but death separates you and me." When Naomi realized that Ruth was determined to go with her, she stopped urging her.So the two women went on until they came to Bethlehem. When they arrived in Bethlehem, the whole town was stirred because of them, and the women exclaimed, "Can this be Naomi?""Don't call me Naomi," she told them. "Call me Mara, because the Almighty has made my life very bitter. I went away full, but the LORD has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi? The LORD has afflicted me; the Almighty has brought misfortune upon me." So Naomi returned from Moab accompanied by Ruth the Moabitess, her daughter-in-law, arriving in Bethlehem as the barley harvest was beginning.
RUTH 1

Pastor Mark Driscoll of Mars Hill Church in Seattle started off the new year with a series centering on the Book of Ruth. He took a chapter a week, and using an expository style he tauught his congregation and others, like myself, who can listen via podcast. I've only yet listened to the first message on Ruth 1, here are some key things I took from it:

Driscoll highlighted the characters in the chapter and in turn asked "us" to identify with one, who are we must like - although different circumstances and within different moments of life we are each of the characters.

Elimelech - which means "My God is King." He was the head of the household and he made choices that put him and his family in place the jeopordized their walk with God. He took them out of God's land and lead them to Moab, wherein him and his family were removed from fellowship with other "believers," taken from a church home. Essentially Elimelech is someone who, while professing that God is King, is acting contrary to that belief and acting on their strength and power.

Naomi - which means "Sweetheart", who changes her name to "Mara" which means "Bitterness." Naomi represents a level of honesty not often seen in the church today. Life was hard for her, and on her return she basically says as much with the name change. She is at times a bitter old lady, yet she is honest. She doesn't hide from that anger, that bitterness. On her return, when among others of her faith she confesses her bitterness and is essentially crying out for help to them.

Ruth - a woman who acts on faith, who lives on her based on the character of who God is. She abandons the only way of life she has known to follow Naomi back to Bethlehem and in doing so makes the commitment to make Naomi's people her people, Naomi's God her God. Ruth does what Abraham did years before, the only difference is that Abraham heard from God, Ruth did NOT.

Which one do you most identify with???