I’ve heard portions (at least) of this said or sung at weddings, by the bride to her groom:
Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee:
for whither thou goest, I will go;
and where thou lodgest, I will lodge:
thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God:Where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried:
the Lord do so to me, and more also,
if ought but death part thee and me.
Pretty touching stuff. And meaningful. And even appropriate.
But what if those words were said or sung at a wedding…by the bride…to her mother-in-law? 😯 After all, the above words were said by Ruth to Naomi, her mother-in-law. 🙂 (Read Ruth 1:14-18 for yourself!)
For some reason, I thought about that the other day. As I have other times, including one time when I wrote:
They fit so well in a Godly marriage ceremony. Interestingly, though, these words were originally uttered more than ten years after the wedding . . . and they were not directed toward the marriage partner at all. The words and the commitment they express were spoken by the “bride” to her mother-in-law. (Imagine the stir if this were done in a contemporary wedding!)
Source: The Commitment of Ruth
By the way, do you know the identity of Ruth’s second mother-in-law?