TODAY’S TURNING POINT WITH DR. DAVID JEREMIAH DAILY DEVOTIONAL 10TH DECEMBER 2024 MESSAGE
Read David Jeremiah Daily Devotional 10th December 2024, Tuesday Turning Point Devotional Message
TOPIC: A Fruitful Messiah
And all the people who were at the gate, and the elders, said, “We are witnesses. The Lord make the woman who is coming to your house like Rachel and Leah, the two who built the house of Israel; and may you prosper in Ephrathah and be famous in Bethlehem.”
Ruth 4:11
Recommended Reading: Romans 8:29
The prophet Micah referred to the town of Bethlehem as “Bethlehem Ephrathah” (Micah 5:2). Ephrathah was identified as “the father of Bethlehem” (1 Chronicles 4:4), and the Ephrathites were the dominant clan. Jesse, the father of King David, was an Ephrathite (1 Samuel 17:12). So the town of Bethlehem became known as “Bethlehem [of] Ephrathah.”
The name Ephrathah came from a word meaning “to bear fruit, to bring forth, to grow, to increase.” When the elders of Bethlehem confirmed that Boaz would take Ruth as his wife, they used the fruitfulness of Rachel and Leah, Jacob’s wives, as the image of fruitfulness they desired for Boaz and Ruth: “May you prosper in Ephrathah and be famous in Bethlehem.” They didn’t know that the fruit of Boaz and Ruth’s union would be the Messiah to be born centuries later in Bethlehem (Matthew 1:5).
And the fruitfulness of Ephrathah continues today as Christ is “the firstborn among many brethren” (Romans 8:29).
A machine can do work; only a life can bear fruit.
Andrew Murray
Read-Thru-the-Bible: Philippians 1 – 4
Turning Point God was founded in 1982 as the broadcast ministry of Dr. David Jeremiah to deliver the unchanging Word of God to an ever-changing world.