How God Redeems Us

This is our next to last week in the book of Ruth, and in the first half of chapter 4 we see Boaz make good on his promise at the end of chapter 3. Last week Naomi laid out her plan, so Ruth could have a private moment with Boaz and ask him to “spread [his] wings over [her] as her [redeemer].” And, after a sweaty night working on the harvest at the threshing floor, some uncovered feet, and waking up to a woman proposing to him in the dark, Boaz has agreed to marry Ruth—if the nearer relative to her deceased husband refuses first.

If you don’t remember what a kinsman redeemer is, or if you’re new joining us here this week, the Mosaic law in the Old Testament provided rules to help care for widows without children when their husbands passed away. It was called levirate marriage. The brother or the nearest relative to the husband had a responsibility in those circumstances to marry the widow and provide children who would be the legal descendants of the husband who had passed and not the relative, so that his family line could continue and the widow would be cared for.

In our passage this week, Boaz has a conversation with the nearer relative and learns that he’s unwilling to redeem Ruth, so Boaz steps up and vows in front of witnesses to be her redeemer. Of course, we don’t have many examples like levirate marriage in our culture today here in the West, but the theme of redemption is certainly something we’re familiar with.

We love stories where the main character experiences a loss or failure, finds new purpose, and rebuilds their lives into something new and even better than before as they redeem their past. We like to apply that kind of hopeful narrative in our own times of struggle or bad circumstances. We want to believe there’s a better future ahead of us, and we don’t have to live under the shadow of our struggles or our mistakes.

But the story of Ruth challenges our cultural assumptions. Because Ruth isn’t the one to redeem herself. She’s worked hard, stayed faithful, and done everything she can, but her and Naomi end chapter 3 in a position of dependance. Verse 18 says, “Wait, my daughter, until you learn how the matter turns out, for the man will not rest but will settle the matter today.”

That’s not how our culture likes to frame redemption stories. Our focus tends to be inward, not outward: “You can do it.” “If you just keep fighting and try hard enough, you can bounce back from this. You can do anything!” Or, the spiritual version: “If you have enough faith, then God will come through” (which might sound better on the surface, but it’s still just cause and effect with us as the cause. It’s saying we’re the hero of our own story).

But not so with Ruth. She’s lost and without hope of providing for herself in any meaningful way. She can’t redeem her story. She needs a redeemer. And even though our culture raises us to think we’re sufficient to write our own story, the truth is that we’re much more like Ruth than we realize. God gave us this little book describing one woman’s physical redemption in order to point us forward to our need for his spiritual redemption.

Because even though your dedication and hard work might help you rebound from losing your job or recover from that failed relationship, we all have experienced a much greater, more all-encompassing loss that we can’t do anything to fix. We’ve sinned against our all-righteous, all-holy creator God. In ways big and small, we’ve rejected his rule in our lives to be our own ruler of our lives. And that’s separated us from him, the author of life, which leaves us spiritually dead.

Dead things can’t make themselves come alive. No amount of hard work will do the job here. We need a redeemer. And these first 12 verses in Ruth chapter 4 give us a taste of the way that God has ultimately provided that redemption for us through Christ.

ILLUSTRATION: Authors love baking in allusions to other stories in the stories they write. Disney’s The Lion King follows the same general structure as Hamlet, West Side Story resembles Romeo and Juliet, and The Chronicles of Narnia were meant by C.S. Lewis to illustrate biblical realities and the story of Jesus.

Where do you think we get that urge from to have our stories point to other stories? It comes from our creator, and in the events of the Old Testament, we see example after example of stories that serve as a type and a shadow pointing us forward to their fulfillment in the person and work of Jesus.

So today, that’s what I want I want to do with our passage as we consider the biblical theme of redemption. I want us to see the story in these 12 verses through two different lenses: both what happened between Boaz, the other redeemer, and Ruth in history, as well as how God used their story to describe our ultimate redeemer: Jesus Christ. Because whether it’s in the life of Ruth back then or for you and me today, God’s redemption is intentional, personal, legal, and beneficial. Let’s start off looking at how God’s redemption is intentional. Look with me at verses 1-4.

Ruth 4:1–4 ESV

¹ Now Boaz had gone up to the gate and sat down there. And behold, the redeemer, of whom Boaz had spoken, came by. So Boaz said, “Turn aside, friend; sit down here.” And he turned aside and sat down. ² And he took ten men of the elders of the city and said, “Sit down here.” So they sat down. ³ Then he said to the redeemer, “Naomi, who has come back from the country of Moab, is selling the parcel of land that belonged to our relative Elimelech. ⁴ So I thought I would tell you of it and say, ‘Buy it in the presence of those sitting here and in the presence of the elders of my people.’ If you will redeem it, redeem it. But if you will not, tell me, that I may know, for there is no one besides you to redeem it, and I come after you.” And he said, “I will redeem it.”

Ancient Jewish cities were often built closely together with few large, open spaces within the city, so it was common for gatherings and meetings to happen in the opening around the city gate. Of course, it’s even more likely you’re going to meet someone when you sit down at a place they walk by frequently and just wait for them. And that seems to be what Boaz did.

This wasn’t a chance encounter when the other potential redeemer walked by. It was intentional. It was both planned and specific. Look what happens when Boaz sees the man: in the span of the first two verses, he invites him to sit down, he grabs 10 other men to serve as witnesses, and he starts a conversation that’s going to end with Boaz asking the man whether or not he’ll serve as the redeemer.

He’s not wasting any time here. Why do you think that is? It’s not because Boaz was stressed and ready to get on with his day and with his life. When people feel rushed, they don’t stop and wait for someone; they get up and look everywhere they can to try  to find them as fast as they can. Boaz isn’t intentional because he needs to be; he’s intentional because Ruth needs him to be.

She’s the one in distress, not him. He’s happy. He just spent the night surrounded by his first barley harvest after 10 years of famine and waking up to a woman proposing to him. Like, he’s doing alright, and his life’s going to be fine no matter how today turns out.

But not Ruth. Ruth’s a widow from a foreign country without much of a way to provide for herself, and her future hangs in the balance. Can you imagine, being so vulnerable with someone and putting yourself out there with a proposal and then having to go home and wait so the guy can check to see if another guy is willing to take you first?

ILLUSTRATION: Now, that’s an over-simplification, but you get my point. If you’ve ever texted someone you were interested in something flirty or asked to hang out and you didn’t get an immediate response back, then you know what I’m saying. Even worse if they have their read receipts on. Like, that’s just cruel.

Because Boaz cares for Ruth and knows how difficult of a situation she’s in, he’s inconveniencing himself, not just to check-in with the potential redeemer, but to make sure that someone will be her redeemer. He made a plan for the meeting to happen, and then once it does, he’s specific with every detail, including how he starts.

He doesn’t start with Ruth; he starts with Naomi’s land (And this is the first time that we’re hearing about it; apparently Naomi had land but couldn’t use it and selling it would be instrumental in helping provide the resources Naomi needed to survive). It’s like Boaz knew that bringing up Ruth might be a problem for the man since redeeming a widow meant your own children would have less of an inheritance because of the children that came from this marriage. So instead, he starts with something he knows the man can get on board with. Naomi has land. Will you redeem it?

The sweet thing was meant to lead him to the hard thing. And, honestly, God’s redemption through Jesus Christ operates the same way. Romans 2:4 tells us that “God’s kindness is meant to lead us to repentance.” He demonstrates his goodness to you, so that you know you can trust submitting your life to him.

Ruth chapter 4 is the exact kind of type and shadow we find so often in the Old Testament that’s pointing us forward to it’s fulfilment in Jesus. God’s redemption through Christ is thoroughly intentional. Just like Boaz, it’s both planned and specific. In Ephesians 1:4-6, the Apostle Paul’s describing Christians when he says that,

Ephesians 1:4–6 ESV

⁴ …[God] chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love ⁵ he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, ⁶ to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.

Notice when God’s plan of redemption started in those verses: it was before the foundation of the world. And notice who was a part of that plan: those God chose and Jesus. That means that before sin entered the world, Jesus was the hope of the world. His death and resurrection for us wasn’t plan B in order to salvage us. No, it has always been the plan to redeem us.

God wasn’t surprised when sin entered the world, and his plans weren’t thwarted when we rebelled against him. Because as Romans 9 points out, whether it’s in the display of God’s love and mercy toward the world or it’s in the display of his justice against the things that are bad in the world—including what’s bad in us—both in his mercy and in his justice, God is demonstrating his good character to the world he created and showing us exactly why he’s worthy of our trust, our submission, and our worship.

Because God punishes sin, we can trust that one day he will right every wrong against us. And because God is generous in his mercy, we can trust that we don’t have to be condemned even though we fall short of his righteousness, because God so loved the world that he sent his only Son that whoever believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. Our God’s redemption is intentional. But secondly, his redemption is also personal. Let’s keep reading in verses 5-6.

Ruth 4:5–6 ESV

⁵ Then Boaz said, “The day you buy the field from the hand of Naomi, you also acquire Ruth the Moabite, the widow of the dead, in order to perpetuate the name of the dead in his inheritance.” ⁶ Then the redeemer said, “I cannot redeem it for myself, lest I impair my own inheritance. Take my right of redemption yourself, for I cannot redeem it.”

Boaz is following through on his promise to Ruth. He’s waited for this other man to come by the city gate, he’s gathered a group of witnesses to treat the conversation as official business, and he’s providing every detail, so the other man has the full context of what’s being offered. When it’s just Naomi’s land, the man answers in verse 4, “I will redeem it.”

But then Boaz continues in verse 5: “The day you buy the field from the hand of Naomi, you also acquire Ruth the Moabite.” Suddenly, any plans for greater wealth with the new land goes out the window when he learns he’d be expected to have children with this widow, and those children wouldn’t legally be his descendants and would reap the inheritance of this land What seemed like a self-serving opportunity at the beginning now looks like it requires selfless sacrifice.

And he’s not willing to do it. In verse 6, he tells Boaz, “I cannot redeem it for myself, lest I impair my own inheritance.” He was willing to help poor Naomi when it benefitted him and his family, but it was a different story when helping the poor came with a cost. I feel that. My self-serving heart is most open to helping people when it doesn’t inconvenience me to do it. The more “being about someone else” requires me to be less about myself, the less interested I am in stepping into the gap.

That’s why we can’t save ourselves. It’s why we don’t come to Jesus without him first pursuing us. Because we’re not wired to make our lives entirely about him in a way that costs us—as Jesus said, to deny ourselves and pick up our cross and follow him. That’s not who we are in our sinful nature—But we don’t have to do it on our own because Christ did it for us first.

Do you realize that God didn’t just cast out a net hoping to catching you? No, Scripture tells us he left the 99 other sheep in the fold, so he could go pursue you. Our God’s redemption is relational. If you’re not a follower of Jesus this morning, or maybe you might call yourself a Christian but that’s never really been an important part of your life—Well, even when we’re not intentional with God, he is intentionally working to make himself known to you.

ILLUSTRATION:  I had done online dating for 11 months before I met Macie. I was an admin for a Facebook group for a singles’ ministry at a church when Macie suddenly joined the group one day. And, I’ll be honest, I noticed. I checked out her Facebook profile, and one of our mutual friends was a lady that attended the Bible study I held in my home.

So, I very sincerely told that lady, “Hey, do you know this girl, Macie? She joined the Facebook group, and I’m thinking she wants to get connected. You should invite her to our Bible study.” And each week, I’d check in, “Did you remember to invite that lady, Macie?” “Yeah, but she’s just busy.”

Took about a month, and then she came. Then, a couple of weeks later, she came again—with a guy. So, I had to let that run it’s course; it wasn’t long. But once that was over, she thought she had covid and had to quarantine on the week I invited people to a game night at my place just to get to know her more.

So, I had to find an excuse to text her about something random every day… In a much less creepy way, our God is a pursuing God. For me, it was because I wanted to get to know Macie. But God already knows everything about us. He pursues us because he wants us to know him.

If you’re not a Christian here this morning, don’t settle for just trying out church as an intellectual endeavour; the Bible tells us Jesus changes us when we have a relational encounter. Seek him, pray and ask him to make himself known to you, and then open a Bible, meet with Christians and ask questions, and watch how God reveals his goodness and his kindness to you. If our God is relational, then we will understand him better in the context of relationships. We look to the person and work of Jesus to know who God is, and we look to his people to know how we can change us.

In our passage this morning, there were two potential redeemers: one whose interest was only for himself and one whose interest was the good of the person they were redeeming. Clearly, one’s the better option here, but if we’re honest, all of us have spent time looking to “other redeemers” in our lives that likewise fall short of being able to redeem every part of us.

Your career might succeed for a season, but you might spend more time away from your family than you want to reach your goals. You might invest well and create wealth for you and your family, but then tragedy strikes and you lose someone you love. Jesus is the only one who can redeem all of us because who he isn’t dependent upon us. He doesn’t change, but if you get to know him, fall in love with him, and follow after him, he’s promised that he will change you to be more like him.

In this chapter, we see Boaz willing to redeem the people no one else wanted, and it points us forward to our God who invites all people, regardless of your background or your baggage, to come and follow him. The lowliest of people in the world’s eyes can become co-heirs with Christ in God’s eyes, not because they were that great, but because our redeemer is that great, and he has sacrificed himself for us. But our confidence doesn’t just come in how loving God’s redemption is; it’s also legal. Let’s keep reading, now in verses 7-10.

Ruth 4:7–10 ESV

⁷ Now this was the custom in former times in Israel concerning redeeming and exchanging: to confirm a transaction, the one drew off his sandal and gave it to the other, and this was the manner of attesting in Israel. ⁸ So when the redeemer said to Boaz, “Buy it for yourself,” he drew off his sandal. ⁹ Then Boaz said to the elders and all the people, “You are witnesses this day that I have bought from the hand of Naomi all that belonged to Elimelech and all that belonged to Chilion and to Mahlon. ¹⁰ Also Ruth the Moabite, the widow of Mahlon, I have bought to be my wife, to perpetuate the name of the dead in his inheritance, that the name of the dead may not be cut off from among his brothers and from the gate of his native place. You are witnesses this day.”

The door has been opened for Boaz, and he’s ready to walk through it. This isn’t just a well intentioned commitment; it’s a legal contract. Apparently when someone took off their shoe and gave it to somebody in ancient Israel, you knew they meant business. The author of the book of Ruth was writing far enough after the events of the story it seems that they felt it would be helpful to explain that this was a tradition back then.

And, once again, Boaz’s integrity is on display. He follows up his sandal with a speech, telling the witnesses he will take on the responsibility as redeemer for Ruth and Naomi’s land—not for his own gain, but look at the middle of verse 10: “to perpetuate the name of the dead in his inheritance, that the name of the dead may not be cut off from among his brothers and from the gate of his native place.” There’s no backing out now, and that was exactly Boaz’s intention.

Boaz looked to satisfy every legal demand in redeeming Ruth, and Jesus is the same way in his redemption of us.

• Boaz removed his sandal to show his commitment to Ruth; Jesus removed himself from his position next to the Father to be born as a baby and show his commitment to us.

• Boaz was able to redeem Ruth because of his relationship to her family; Jesus is able to redeem us because of his relationship to his Father.

• Boaz satisfied the law by agreeing to provide Ruth with offspring who would gain the family’s inheritance; Jesus satisfied the law with his perfect life and paid for how we fail God’s law with his atoning death, so his offspring would get an eternal inheritance.

If God’s redemption wasn’t loving, then he wouldn’t offer it to us, but if it wasn’t legal, then it wouldn’t be effective. Jesus simultaneously showed the love of God in drawing near to us while also meeting the legal demands of God by living the perfect life we couldn’t and paying the price for the ways we sin against him. Martin Luther called this “The Great Exchange” where our sin was placed on Christ and his righteousness is placed on us.

We don’t earn our salvation, but it’s still legal and just because it was earned (just not by us). Jesus satisfied the demands of the law where we couldn’t, and we can be legally declared righteous in the eyes of God when we repent of the ways we try to rule our own lives and turn to place our faith in the person and work of Jesus as the ruler over our lives.

When Jesus said, “It is finished” on the cross, he meant it, and that’s a legal transaction that no one can ever undo (which is why we can have confidence both when we’re doing well living for him and when we’re struggling with our own sin—because we know that, in Christ, God sees us the way he sees his Son—and just like Boaz was described in this story as a “worthy man”, Jesus is once again the fulfillment; he is eternally worthy, and we are legally, eternally, his.

One final note as we wrap up our passage for the morning. Look with me one more time, now at verses 11-12.

Ruth 4:11–12 ESV

¹¹ Then all the people who were at the gate and the elders said, “We are witnesses. May the Lord make the woman, who is coming into your house, like Rachel and Leah, who together built up the house of Israel. May you act worthily in Ephrathah and be renowned in Bethlehem, ¹² and may your house be like the house of Perez, whom Tamar bore to Judah, because of the offspring that the Lord will give you by this young woman.”

Because Boaz has legally bound himself as the redeemer, the response of the witnesses is now full of hope. The deal is done. Even though the marriage is still to come, and Ruth doesn’t even know yet, Boaz has already redeemed her. Again, we see the grace of our God in saving us dripping through the text—planning our salvation before the foundation of the world and Jesus paying for our sin before we even knew about him or had committed a single sin against him.

Here in the story, the elders responded with the hope of three blessings: one about Ruth, one about Boaz, and one about the family. For Ruth in the first half of verse 11, they pray that God would make her fruitful like Rachel and Leah, the wives of Jacob who gave birth to  12 sons who would develop into the 12 tribes of Israel. For Boaz in the second half of verse 11, they pray that he would continue to act worthily and be known in Bethlehem for good character.

And finally, they pray in verse 12 that their family would birth a long line of descendants mentioning the house of Perez. Perez was an ancestor of Boaz, whose parents were Judah and Tamar. Tamar was a widow, but through her marriage to Judah, their son Perez became the father of many generations. Even though Ruth was seemingly barren from what we know about her in the story, the elders pray that their marriage would be blessed with descendants like Perez, and we know that they were. Their son, Obed, was the grandfather of King David, and several generations later, the family would give birth to the Messiah, Jesus Christ.

Here in these last verses as we close, we see that God’s redemption is beneficial. It’s a blessing to those who receive it, and it’s also a blessing to those who are near those who receive it. And that applies for us as Christians today as well. Following Jesus is a blessing to your life: he gives you a steady identity that doesn’t fluctuate with your performance or your feelings, he gives you an enduring peace that he’s in control in any circumstance, he gives you a sense of purpose that’s bigger than yourself.

But following Jesus shouldn’t just be a blessing to your life. When you’re following Jesus, it should bless others who are near to you in your life. Not because we’re awesome, but because the God we worship is awesome. And when we spend time with him, and we rest in him, and our lives are being shaped by him, then we will increasingly bend out the intentional and relational love of God in every sphere of our lives to the people around us as we live, learn, work, and play.

Boaz was a worthy man. Jesus is our worthy Savior and Lord, and repenting from your sin against him and resting your faith in him is the greatest blessing you can ever experience.

Let’s pray.