Wherever My Lord...May Be...There Will Your Servant Be

2 Samuel 15:17-25 – So the king set out, with all the people following him, and they halted at the edge of the city. All his men marched past him, along with all the Kerethites and Pelethites; and all the six hundred Gittites who had accompanied him from Gath marched before the king. The king said to Ittai the Gittite, “Why should you come along with us? Go back and stay with King Absalom. You are a foreigner, an exile from your homeland. You came only yesterday. And today shall I make you wander about with us, when I do not know where I am going? Go back, and take your people with you. May the Lord show you kindness and faithfulness.” But Ittai replied to the king, “As surely as the Lord lives, and as my lord the king lives, wherever my lord the king may be, whether it means life or death, there will your servant be.” David said to Ittai, “Go ahead, march on.” So Ittai the Gittite marched on with all his men and the families that were with him. The whole countryside wept aloud as all the people passed by. The king also crossed the Kidron Valley, and all the people moved on toward the wilderness. Zadok was there, too, and all the Levites who were with him were carrying the ark of the covenant of God. They set down the ark of God, and Abiathar offered sacrifices until all the people had finished leaving the city. Then the king said to Zadok, “Take the ark of God back into the city. If I find favor in the Lord’s eyes, he will bring me back and let me see it and his dwelling place again.

Ruth 1:16-17 – 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 even death separates you and me.”

Leviticus 15:31 – “‘You must keep the Israelites separate from things that make them unclean, so they will not die in their uncleanness for defiling my dwelling place, which is among them.’”

Psalm 46:4 – There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy place where the Most High dwells.

1 Samuel 4:21 – She named the boy Ichabod, saying, “The Glory has departed from Israel”—because of the capture of the ark of God and the deaths of her father-in-law and her husband.

Application:

• ·         Ruth’s commitment to Naomi was complete, even though it held no prospect for her except to share in Naomi’s desolation.
• ·         Ruth, a Gentile, swore her commitment to Naomi in the name of Israel’s God, thus acknowledging Him as her God.
• ·         Since God dwelt in the tabernacle, any unholiness could result in death if the people came into His presence.
• ·         Sin separates all people from a holy God and results in their death unless atonement is made.
• ·         The removal of the ark from Israel did signal estrangement in the relationship between God and His people.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV