Columbia International University alumna Deborah McQuilkin (’82), the widow of CIU’s third president Robertson McQuilkin, looks at life’s adversity through the eyes of Naomi, the mother-in-law of Ruth in the Old Testament. 

Naomi returned to Israel from Moab after the death of her husband and her two sons. But it would be through her faithful daughter-in-law Ruth, the Moabitess, that the lineage of the Messiah continued. 

McQuilkin is the author of the new book, “Naomi: A Reason to Hope,” published by CDM, a division of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA). She summarized her thoughts on the PCA women’s website, “enCourage.”  

“A study of Naomi in the book of Ruth demonstrated that life brings financial insecurity, loss, death, transitions, conflict, and drama,” writes McQuilkin. “These are a part of life we don’t want to expect. We feel surprise or even shock when devastating events come. But there is hope: God is present, and He is good. May I repeat, God is good. In His love and sovereign control, God never fails to do good to and for us. Whatever God does is right. He is working something greater in us, to make us complete. His goal is not our happiness; God’s goal for us is holiness, that we might walk in loving oneness with Him. This oneness results in accomplishing His purposes, not ours. Therefore, we need to be God-compatible, and adversity is the fast track to becoming so.”

Read more of Deborah McQuilkin’s thoughts in her article, “The Life of Naomi and how Adversity Disguises God at Work.”

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