Ruth 1:1-18 

The migration story is key to biblical ancestry. In the book of Ruth, one family is the focal point. It begins with Elimelech, his wife Naomi, and their two sons, who take Moabite wives, having to leave Judah and move to Moab because of a famine. Eventually all the men die, and the women are left alone. Naomi is a stranger in a strange land, who learns that there is no longer famine in Judah, so she exercises her right to return. However, she does not go alone. Ruth, her Moabite daughter-in-law, says, in Ruth 1:16, “Do not press me to leave you or to turn back from following you! Where you go, I will go; where you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God!” The rest of the story is the story of Boaz adhering closely to God’s requirement to offer hospitality to the stranger. He permits her to glean, protects her, and eventually marries her, bringing the sojourner into the fold and making her part of the family.

Fortunately for him, there were no I-130 family petitions to sign or other immigration regulations to make life difficult. Also, she did not have to leave the country for three to ten years before being allowed to return to begin life as his wife.

(From The Bible as the Ultimate Immigration Handbook: Written By, For, and About Migrants, Immigrants, Refugees, and Asylum Seekers by Rev. Joan M. Maruskin, Church World Service Immigration and Refugee Program, www.churchworldservice.org/Immigration/
bible-as-handbook.html )