Redemption Secured | Ruth 4:1-22 | Redeeming Love
Have you ever looked at a 3-dimensional "Magic Eye" image? At first glance, it looks like a meaningless pattern of ink, but once your eyes adjust, a complete picture comes off the page.
This Sunday, we saw the book of Ruth do the exact same thing. In chapter 4, the "messy" story of funerals, famines, and foreigners suddenly clicks into focus as a royal legacy. We followed Boaz to the city gate, where he legally secured the redemption of Ruth and Naomi. While a closer relative walked away to protect his own temporary inheritance, Boaz stepped forward with integrity, becoming the grandfather of King David and an ancestor of the Messiah.
Ultimately, this story is a beautiful picture of our True Kinsman-Redeemer, Jesus Christ. He is the one who did not "stand aloof" but paid the ultimate cost to bring us into His family and nourish us with the Bread of Life forever.
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Thank you for joining us for this week's sermon from First Reformed Church in Edgerton, Minnesota. Each week we dig into God's Word, trusting that the Holy Spirit will continue the good work of sanctification in us.
I think it started when I was in my early teen years that the Sunday Argus Leader comics pages started having a computer-generated image somewhere in the comics. Now, I realize I probably have to explain Sunday comics to people under 30. So the Sunday comics, at least for me, were kind of a big deal, not just because they were longer than the comic strips on the weekdays and on Saturday, but they were also— wait for it, children— they were in color. Just describing this makes me feel really old. But anyway, the Sunday comics were a separate section of the newspaper, and I remember vividly the Peanuts comic was at the top with good old Charlie Brown, then Garfield and Family Circus at the bottom, and then somewhere, I don't remember where, there started to be this computer-generated image that didn't look like much of anything. It was just like strange patterns of colored ink. But these strange images were accompanied by instructions that let you know that you could see more than just what you saw by glancing at it casually. If you held the image sort of close to your eyes and then pulled it away and let your eyes relax, sort of— for lack of a better word, go out of focus, you would see a 3-dimensional image that looked like it was coming out of the page at you.
It looked like it was above the newspaper, and it was 3-dimensional. It looked full and complete. And as I said, just glancing at this image, the assumption would be that it was just a pattern of ink without any type of real purpose. But in actuality, as you pulled it away, you could see that it was so much more. Now, as we've been making our way through the book of Ruth, we have seen that the story of Ruth and Naomi was a mess. And it seemed hopeless. It seemed without purpose. First, Naomi and her husband left the land of promise to go to Moab. And while this move took them away from a famine, we learn that it also showed that they had a lack of trust in the promises of God. A move to Moab was also a move toward idolatry and away from the presence of the living God. And the picture got messier when Naomi's husband, Elimelech, dies. And then later, her two sons die as well. This whole picture we see painted of Naomi and Ruth's lives doesn't seem to have any purpose. Well, she and the wives of her sons are left destitute.
And when Naomi hears that God has visited Israel and that there is again food in Bethlehem, that the people had returned to Yahweh in faithfulness, God brought an end to the famine and there was food. So, the best option is to return to Bethlehem, while one daughter-in-law decides to stay with her family in Moab, to remain there in that land of idolatry. But the other woman, Ruth, she pledges her devotion to Naomi and to Naomi's God. And this is when the picture of the book of Ruth starts to become more full. The women return to the land, and this is where the providential hand of God in their story starts to take focus and become clear. Well, when they come back to Bethlehem, Ruth goes to the fields. We saw this last week, that there's this provision in the law that allows gleaning for the poor to survive. And it's there that we meet a man by the name of Boaz, who is the owner of the field. And in the providence of God, she has gone here, and we discover that Boaz is a relative of Naomi's husband Elimelech. And he has heard of the loyalty that Ruth has shown to Naomi, and so he tells Naomi to remain in the fields to be under his protection.
And he also makes it possible for Ruth to glean substantial quantities of grain. And so when Ruth returns with this large amount of grain and Naomi hears the news, that it was Elimelech's relative that has done this, Naomi formulates a plan. This was the main theme in what we saw last week. Ruth is to go to the threshing floor where Boaz is sleeping. And in a scene that doesn't make any sense at all to us as 21st century folk, she uncovers the feet of Boaz. Well, Ruth does all this, and in doing so, she tells Boaz that she is available and willing to be his wife. And so, Boaz is a redeemer for Ruth because her late husband's father was related to him. Now, this was an ancient custom that provided for the material needs of widows, but it had a deeper purpose than that as well. It was also to provide a legacy for the deceased by having a family member provide offspring for them. And so, through all this story, we are shown that Boaz is a gracious and godly man, and that is apparent in how he responds to Ruth's request that Boaz would be her redeemer.
And he shows his integrity not only in the fact that he doesn't take advantage of this young woman who's at his feet, but he also tells her that there's a closer relative than him, and he is going to make sure that if this closer relative doesn't want to marry Ruth, he will redeem her. And this is where we left off last week at the end of chapter 3. And like the other chapters of Ruth, we're kind of left hanging. Well, how is the story going to resolve? But the final words of chapter 3 had Naomi telling Ruth that she was certain that Boaz would settle the matter in short order. And so with that somewhat short summary of the story thus far, we can now turn to find in these opening verses of chapter 4 that Naomi was right that Boaz would bring this matter to a resolution quickly. So we see that Boaz goes to the gate of the city. Now, in the ancient world, the gate of the city was where formal matters were decided, sort of a combination between a city hall and a courthouse type of idea.
And we discover as we read that in the providence of God, this closer relative, this other one who is higher up the ranking to redeem Ruth, passes through the gate. And as we consider this story, it's important that we remember the fact that neither of these two men who will be talking here are close enough relatives that they are legally obligated to marry Ruth. If they were, this whole matter would have been settled a long time ago. None of this would have to take place. And so, we discover in verse 2 here that all of this is such an important matter that there needs to be witnesses. And so, Boaz has 10 elders of the city come to act as these witnesses. And what they are about to discuss is more than just a friendly discussion about who is going to marry that pretty young Moabite who came to town. These are legal matters. This is important. And so I'm sure that this man that met Boaz at the gate is probably wondering what business Boaz has with him that requires his time and 10 witnesses. Well, the discussion begins with Boaz letting this relative, whose name we are never given, know about a potential land transaction.
He says that Naomi is selling a piece of land that belonged to Elimelech, and Boaz is facilitating this. And this gentleman is very interested. I'm guessing he saw this as a great opportunity. He gets the land of Elimelech. He would have to provide for Naomi, but she is an older widow. And so, what he has to do there is going to happen under a limited time. He does not have the obligation of care like he would have if she was a younger widow. So, what a deal! What an opportunity to have more land! What an opportunity to leave a greater legacy for my children! It all seems like a great deal. So he agrees to redeem the land and Naomi here. But then Boaz finishes by giving him the details of the whole transaction. As soon as he redeems the land, he also will become a redeemer for Ruth. And with her being young, with her not having any children, he is responsible legally to provide children in the name of the dead. As you can imagine, this is a game changer in the whole discussion. This changes it a lot.
And so the nameless relative says that he cannot redeem her because it would jeopardize his own inheritance. He is not willing to do it. It's just too much. When the whole picture comes into focus, this man, whose name we're not given— and I don't think that's an accident— this man is only concerned about himself and his legacy. He doesn't want to ruin it. But he is doing exactly that, because he will not be remembered. He is only remembered as the one who would not redeem Ruth. And so, he exercises his right not to be the redeemer. And Boaz steps up and he redeems Ruth. He does everything that is required. And Boaz, in contrast to this other man, he shows grace and mercy and love. And it's not required of him, but he does it anyway, because that is the kind of man that he is.
And we see a real contrast here in this story. The nameless man was concerned about himself and his legacy, and he didn't have compassion and mercy. But Boaz, as we've been seeing throughout Ruth, is a godly man. He's filled with love, and he does everything that is required for him to redeem Ruth. So here we come to verse 7, and we learn of an interesting custom from this time. They confirmed a transaction by taking off their sandal and giving it to the other person. So the next time you're finalizing a deal with someone, you know, at the bank or whatever, instead of a handshake or a signature, hand them your shoe and see how that goes over. Tell him that's a guarantee of your promise and it's good enough. If it's good enough for Boaz, it's good enough for you. No, but seriously, we don't really know much about this custom or the significance of it, but the importance here of Ruth telling us this is that we're seeing that Boaz is once again doing things with integrity. It was the custom, and he did it. He did it the right way. He's a man of integrity.
And he gives his sandal to the closer relative as a sign that he wants to be the redeemer for Ruth. And then he also publicly declares that he has done what needs to be done to redeem her in the sight of the witnesses. It's all done legally. Ruth is taken care of, and now by extension, so is Naomi. And in the providence and provision of God, these women have come from the curse of idolatry in Moab to the blessings of God in Israel. What an amazing story! Just 4 chapters, and we have the curse of idolatry, and now we're reading of the blessings of God here. And notice the statement of the witnesses here. And how this Gentile Moabite outsider is now brought into the covenant people of God through this. They hope for her to be blessed and that she would be like Rachel and Leah, that she would be a long-loved and respected mother of the people of Israel, though she is an outsider. They pray God's blessings of offspring on her. And we see them call upon another Gentile woman that brought offspring into the covenant line. Tamar. She is welcomed in by faith, by her commitment to God.
And as the story concludes, we see that the prayers are answered here because Ruth and Boaz become husband and wife, and the Lord sees fit to open her womb. And the result of this is that we see that the women declare that Naomi is blessed because Boaz has redeemed her and her family. The blessing spread beyond Ruth, beyond what is going to come. Naomi is blessed as well. And the prayer is that this child's name will be renowned in all of Israel. But even more, they declare that he will be a restorer of life in her old age and that this daughter-in-law, this formerly pagan Moabite, they declare that she is greater to Naomi than 7 sons. There's some significance with that number there. She isn't just saying that Ruth is better than 6 sons. The number 7 is the number of perfection. So what these people are saying is that Ruth in her faithfulness, in her devotion, she is greater than the fullness of sons that Naomi might have had otherwise. Ruth is better than many sons. Why? Because she was faithful to Naomi and she put her trust and her faith in God.
When she could have gone after the idols of Moab, she remained faithful to Naomi and put her trust in Naomi's God. And here we are given the name of this child, and it lets us know why the book of Ruth is in Holy Scripture. Yes, the book of Ruth is a cool story of God's providence and provision. Yes, the book of Ruth is a story of turning from idolatry to worship of the one true God. And the book of Ruth is also a tale of godly faithfulness and commitment and the righteousness of Boaz. But none of these things are the reason it's in the Bible. They're all good things, but that's not why it's a part of Holy Scripture. When we look at these lineages that are in the book of Ruth, it helps us in the same way the instructions in the comics help me see the picture that came off the page at me. As you pull back and you look at the full picture of the story of Scripture and what Ruth is telling us, the big story comes into focus. In fact, it comes off the page at us. It shows us the fullness of the story and the fullness of the promises of God.
The reason that we're blessed with the story of Ruth and Naomi in our Bibles is because of what I mentioned previously about the Messianic legacy. The story of Ruth is about the big story of the Old Testament. That here Obed is in the line from Adam and Eve that leads to Jesus. This child's name is Obed, and he is the father of Jesse, and Jesse is the father of David, the one through whom the Messiah will come. The one through whom the king who will always be on the throne will come. So this book is not just the story of Naomi, Ruth, and Boaz. It is a story of the faithfulness of God. Yes, to Naomi and Ruth and to Boaz, but it's the story of faithfulness to you as well. Because God promised that he would bring a redeemer. And your Redeemer is far greater than Boaz. Your Redeemer is his greater son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Boaz was godly and gracious, but he was just a type and a shadow of the great kinsman-redeemer who was going to come and buy his people back from sin, death, and hell. And this book is a beautiful picture of God's covenant faithfulness to us, his people.
And so the book of Ruth has taken us from idolatry in Moab to God fulfilling his covenant promises in Bethlehem. As we dwell on this beautiful story, may you and I daily forsake the temptations of an idolatrous world and put our hope in our Redeemer who did everything to buy us back and give us the sure and certain hope of eternal life. And as we close up today, I want us to think back to our first week in Ruth. It was there that we discovered that the word Bethlehem literally means "house of bread." But in that first chapter, we learned that it was breadless because there was a famine. The people had turned away from God. But the people returned to the Lord their God. And He was gracious and merciful. He is slow to anger. He is abounding in steadfast love. And He visited them and bread returned. And as the book ended, we saw the family line that would lead to the Bread of Life who came to Bethlehem for us. He suffered and died for us as His people that we might be saved. And today, as we come to the table, we receive the bread of His body and the cup of His blood.
So come to the table today in faith, knowing that because you're united to Him by faith, we now feed on Him and He nourishes us and leads us to life everlasting. Come. Taste and see that the Lord is good. For He is our perfect and eternal Redeemer. Amen. Let us pray. Great and merciful God, we thank You for the story of redemption, that You did everything to buy us back as Your people. We thank You that You brought the Bread of Life to Bethlehem that we might know the fullness of salvation, that we might be fed by you. And so as we come to your table today, we pray that we would trust in the nourishment that you give in your body and blood, that we might be faithful witnesses to our great Redeemer to the ends of the earth. It's in the name of Jesus that we pray. Amen.
Thank you for joining us for this week's sermon. For more information about First Reformed Church, head to our Facebook page or website, edgertonfrc.org.
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