Click Here to Watch the Dramatic Monologue on Ruth 1 Performed by Erin Paige.
Scripture Reference: Ruth 1:1-22
Chesed? [Gesundheit!]
Chesed is one of those strange sounding Hebrew words that require a bit of phlegm to pronounce correctly. Its pronunciation is halfway between HES-ed and CHES-ed. Give it a try!
Chesed is one of those words that doesn’t have an exact equivalent in English. But if you put together the meanings of the following words you come up with a blend that looks a lot like chesed:
Kindness + Compassion + Loyalty = chesed
The concept of covenant is also present in the meaning of chesed. It is a one-sided loving-kindness. Just as God loves us before we have done anything to deserve his love, so we can be like him by loving others before they have done anything to deserve our notice.
Think about it. Chesed is showing compassionate loving kindness toward someone when we don’t get anything out of it.
The book of Ruth that we began studying last Sunday is the account of real people showing real chesed in real-life situations. The recipients of chesed come empty-handed; the givers of chesed have no ulterior agenda. Wow! Think of a world full of chesed and you have described heaven.
Which is precisely the point of the book of Ruth and why it is included in the Old Testament canon. It is a literary picture of God’s attitude of chesed toward his creatures. God’s attitude toward his covenant people (first Old Testament Israel
Chesed is neither an emotion nor sentimentality. It is attitude-in-action. In the case of our Lord it looks like this: “God loved the world so much (chesed) that he gave his only begotten Son (when we didn’t deserve him), that whoever believes in him will not perish . . .” you know the rest.
So even if you can’t pronounce chesed, you can certainly revel in receiving it—and you can commit your life to practicing it.
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