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November 11, 2012
Old Testament Reading: Ruth 3:1-5,
4:13-17
1Naomi,
Ruth’s mother-in-law said to her, "My daughter, I need to seek some
security for you, so that it may be well with you. 2Now here is our
kinsman Boaz, with whose young women you have been working. See, he is
winnowing barley tonight at the threshing floor. 3Now wash and
anoint yourself, and put on your best clothes and go down to the threshing
floor; but do not make yourself known to the man until he has finished eating
and drinking. 4When he lies down, observe the place where he lies;
then, go and uncover his feet and lie down; and he will tell you what to
do." 5She said to her, "All that you tell me I will
do."
4:13 So Boaz
took Ruth and she became his wife. When they came together, the LORD made her
conceive, and she bore a son. 14Then the women said to Naomi,
"Blessed be the LORD, who has not left you this day without next-of-kin;
and may his name be renowned in Israel! 15He shall be to you a
restorer of life and a nourisher of your old age; for your daughter-in-law who
loves you, who is more to you than seven sons, has borne him." 16Then
Naomi took the child and laid him in her bosom, and became his nurse. 17The
women of the neighborhood gave him a name, saying, "A son has been born to
Naomi." They named him Obed; he became the father of Jesse, the father of
David.
Sermon: “An Unlikely Redemption”
When we left Ruth and Naomi last
week, they were clinging to one another and heading toward Bethlehem from Moab,
searching for food. But, y’all there
just weren’t any McDonald’s serving up camel burgers in that desert. There was no International House of
Mannacakes, not even a Pik-N-Fig. They
were starving.
But as they arrived in Bethlehem
(which had the hopeful meaning of “House of Bread”), their eyes were filled
with the golden rows of a promising barley harvest. Remember that it was the law for Israelites
to not glean all the way to edge of their fields, but instead to leave some for
the foreigner and widow. They fit the
bill.
Somehow, that long road with Ruth
by her side seemed to have lifted Naomi beyond the notion that her name should
be Bitterness. Now, her focus was on
putting one foot in front of the other and surviving, for both of them.
She directed Ruth to the fields of
Boaz, a distant relative, hoping he would show extra compassion on her. He certainly did: this kinsman-redeemer as he’s
called, fed her from his own table, and then selected the best sheaves of grain
for her to take to her mother-in-law.
It is a testament to one too many
Disney movies that we assume he did all this because he found her pretty. Ruth was cunning and brave, risking herself
greatly to provide for Naomi once again.
We see this in the next scene of
the story: Naomi asks Ruth to go down to where Boaz slept, on the “threshing
floor.”
I once saw a billboard in Atlanta
that advertised a Christian Women’s Conference called “The Threshing
Floor.” It is slightly disturbing,
though, to realize that a threshing floor in those days, where workers
separated grain but also relaxed after a hard days’ work, had more to do with
certain establishments like one sees driving through Fayetteville on Bragg
Boulevard, than with a place of worship and morality. If picking in a field alone as a woman was
risky behavior, entering the threshing floor alone was nearly reckless, proved
by the fact that Ruth had to sneak out so no one would see her there.
But desperate times called for
desperate measures. Ruth went to Boaz,
uncovered his feet, and layed down. Boaz
awoke shocked to find her there. He said, ‘Who are you?’ And she answered, ‘I am Ruth,
your servant; spread your cloak over your servant, for you are next-of-kin.’
Like the law requiring society to
provide for orphans, widows and foreigners, another law required the
next-of-kin (a male) to provide for his female relatives if no closer kin was
living. You see, Yahweh designed this
community to care for each other. Boaz
hesitated a little, saying he’d check it over and be sure he really was the
next-of-kin and then did so: the next
day he went to the elders and claimed his right to redeem.
With all the romance of a board
meeting, ten elders decided that, as next-of-kin, Boaz could redeem his claim
on any land belonging to Naomi, oh, and Ruth became his property, too. He actually used the language of “acquired”
to describe taking Ruth to be his wife.
Fellas, I don’t recommend using that language on an Anniversary
Card! “20 years ago, I acquired you,
honey! Aren’t you pleased??”
But what was a business transaction
became a powerful ending to our story: redemption was everywhere. Ruth and Naomi were redeemed out of poverty
and grief. Boaz was redeemed out of
living only for himself. And, through
the child of Ruth and Boaz, who was of the line of David and thus of the line
of our Savior, Jesus Christ, we were all redeemed.
The popular reading of this text has
us focusing on Boaz as the kinsman-redeemer.
He was this. But our story began
with a woman who clung on when life was hopeless, and our story ends with her
receiving new life.
The neighborhood ladies said it
best when they spoke to Naomi, “Blessed be the Lord, who has not left you this
day without a next-of-kin!; and may his name be
renowned in Israel! 15He shall be to you a restorer of life and a nourisher of
your old age; for your daughter-in-law who loves you, who is more to you than
seven sons, has borne him.” Those eager
neighborhood ladies also gave that little baby boy a name: Obed. It means worshipper.
There are many who
had a hand in the unlikely redemption found in Ruth’s story. But whether we celebrate Naomi’s grit and
will to survive, or Ruth’s steadfast, brave devotion, or Boaz’s generosity, or
the neighborhood’s contagious joy, they all have one source. The One we worship. The One the baby Obed in his very name points
us to: Christ, our Redeemer.
Let us never think we
are capable of redeeming ourselves. But
let us also never think we do not have a hand in the redemption of another:
especially those left most vulnerable in this world.
The smiles of people
served through the Mission to Cameron this week shine of redeemed humanity. As I sat with one of the women we served in
her trailer in Carolina Lakes, she told me about all the children she had taken
in during her lifetime. While working at
Pinelake Nursing Home in Carthage, she noticed two small children, a boy and a
girl who were always hovering nearby. It
turns out they lived in a drain pipe. So
she took them in, working extra shifts to earn the money to support them. She acted as their next-of-kin, bringing
redemption. And when we replaced her
door and windows, and put underpinning around to keep out the cold, we acted as
hers.
All she could tell
me, over and over, was how blessed she was.
When redemption runs that deep, it overflows into the lives of everyone
you meet.
For we are all next
of kin to each other. Each of us,
through the Holy Spirit, has a hand in the redemption of this world, and each
of us will forever belong to the loving family we call the Body of Christ. Like the neighborhood women, we proclaim with
joyful praise and compassionate service: “Blessed be the Lord, who has not left
us this day without a next-of-kin!”
Amen.