All's Well that Ends Well (Ruth 4.1-22)

Introduction

We don’t want life to be complicated. What we’re looking for is life that is straightforward, simple and trouble-free. We want life to be like driving with nice scenery, on new tarmac, straight to your destination, with empty overtaking lanes and no Sunday drivers in the way.

But in reality, for most of us, life is more like driving on an obscure, winding lane in the middle of nowhere. The satnav, if it' snot broken, is sending you down blind alleys, there are potholes, tractors in the way, there’s fog, sometimes snow, there are uncut hedges scratching the paintwork on your car and herds of sheep stepping out in front of you every other my mile.

Yes, I have driven in Wales before...

A lot of the time, you’re getting nowhere. But for Christians, all along this narrow, winding road, there are signposts that say things like, "My grace is sufficient for you" and “I am with you always” and “those who persevere to the end will be saved.”

The book of Ruth is like a tour guide for this journey. If you are confused or weary, the message of Ruth is that, however hard the road seems, it is absolutely not a dead end. In every turn of your life, God is at work, and the final outcome is fullness of joy.

Many of you have been away for much of this series, so let’s review the three preceding chapters.

The Story So Far…

The story so far is a series of tragedies, disappointments and setbacks. In Chapter 1, Naomi, her husband and their two boys leave their home town of Bethlehem because of a famine and relocate to an unholy place called Moab. The head of the family, Elimelek, dies. The two sons meet Moabite women and marry outside of God’s people. For ten years, neither couple is able to have children. Then the two sons die, leaving Naomi with her two daughters-in-law, all three now destitute widows.

And even though Ruth loves and stands by her mother-in-law, Chapter 1 ends with Naomi saying she has become bitter and cynical. "I’m coming home empty handed” she says. “Thank you God for nothing.”

God’s Sovereignty

We’ve called this series “Ruth: The Invisible Hand of God.” All the way through the book, you can see God at work through everyday events, weaving them into the narrative of his greater purposes.

We believe that God is all-powerful. He is almighty. He can do whatever he wants. God is sovereign. Nothing takes him by surprise. We also believe that God is absolutely good. He abounds in love, is kind, compassionate and patient.

But this raises a big problem. People ask “If God can do anything, and if God is always good, why doesn’t he do something about everything that’s wrong in the world? Why does he allow evil to flourish?

People ask, “Why did God kill whole families in that earthquake in Italy this week?” But no, God is a loving Father, not an assassin. He can do anything but that doesn’t mean that everything that happens in our lives is God’s will and pleasure. The Bible shows us that he gets angry, he gets upset, he feels pain. Bad things don’t happen because he wants them to, they happen because our world is broken and messed up, ultimately because of human rebellion against God.

So how does it work that God is both sovereign and loving? It means that in the end, God works all things, even bad things that are not his will, into a greater, grander, overarching purpose which is his saving plan for the world.

Jesus has already written the last page of the book of world history. It says that everything works together in the end and he will triumph, finally defeating evil.

The Story So Far… Cont./

Anyway, in Chapter 2 Naomi begins to wonder if there is perhaps some hope after all because this kind and Godly man with a good job, who just happens to be single, called Boaz turns up and he is so kind to Ruth that Naomi begins to hope against hope that Cupid’s arrows might start to fly.

In those days, your personal significance and self-worth were secured by one thing only; ensuring your family line continued.

Naomi is now past childbearing age but Ruth isn’t, and even though she had not managed to conceive for ten years with her first husband, there’s a tiny chance that just maybe it was he that was infertile and not her. If - and it’s a big if – if Ruth could marry and have children, Naomi would have a grandchild and thus a name. That’s what she’s desperate for.

But Boaz, kind and considerate though he is, is no Casanova. There is a bit of suspense in Chapter 2. Is he, or isn’t he, going to show any interest? Has he got eyes for Ruth or not? Ruth wonders to herself, “Should I risk forcing the can-we-define-this-relationship conversation”?

But the chapter ends tantalizingly with tension and uncertainty. We don’t like that, do we? We want to know. We want answers. It’s hard to trust God when you just don’t know where you stand.

In Chapter 3, Naomi and Ruth throw caution to the wind in an audacious move that I personally wouldn’t advise any young woman to try at home.

Ruth puts on her best dress and perfume, creeps into Boaz’s room when he’s asleep at night, having had a few drinks, and she snuggles up by his feet. He wakes up. She startles him. Who’s this lovely woman lying down at the end of his bed? “I am your servant, Ruth” she says. In the circumstances, that sounds perilously like “Anything I can do for you Boaz?”

But Boaz is a godly man and he doesn’t take advantage of her at all. "Protect me as my husband” she says. “I am not asking you to marry me. That would be weird. But I am asking you to ask me to marry you." This is amazing. Even in our culture of equality, it’s usually men who initiate courtship and propose marriage. In those days, and in that culture, even more so; this was totally not done.

Then, interestingly, Boaz says to Ruth not how presumptuous she is, but how kind she is. He says, “You haven’t gone running after younger men.” So Boaz is an older man. He calls Ruth “my daughter” so he’s probably old enough to be her dad.

Why would an older man with property and a good income be unmarried? Was it just that he hadn’t yet met Miss Perfect? Did he have some physical disfigurement? Was his personal hygiene a bit iffy? Was he just not the marrying type? None of the above.

Here’s the reason; no girl wanted to marry Boaz because of who his mother was. Matthew 1.5 tells us that his mother was Rahab – that’s the same Rahab we meet in Joshua 6; a prostitute who betrayed her own people. For some reason, none of the girls in Bethlehem want a double-dealing retired sex worker as a mother-in-law!

Boaz is a nice guy, and he’s done well for himself, but he’s got baggage and no one wants to marry into his family - except Ruth, who sees his heart and accepts him, and loves him for what he is. No wonder Boaz says to Ruth in 3.10 “The Lord bless you for this kindness.”

When you look in the mirror, what do you see? Many people have a poor self-image, even Christians. But the Lord looks deeper into your heart.

Here’s how special you are: when your parents conceived you, there was 1 chance in 350 million that you were the outcome, because that’s how many sperm cells race towards each unfertilized egg every time a baby is made. (On average, that is. I haven’t actually counted…)

You are chosen by the Father. You are the focus of his affection. You are the apple of his eye. You are his son, his daughter, by faith. He has lavished grace upon you. You were once cut off from mercy, but now you are part of a chosen people, a holy, treasured possession.

Shifting the Last Obstacle

But just when Ruth and Naomi see light at the end of the tunnel, just as their long and winding roads straighten at last, an almighty landslide blocks the highway.

There is someone else who, according to Jewish custom, is first in line to redeem Ruth and marry her. It’s complicated. So again chapter 3 ends with suspense and uncertainty.

But in Ruth 4.1-13 Boaz removes this last obstacle.

Here's the problem in three sentences.

1) The law said that if someone lost his land, for whatever reason, his immediate family had the right to redeem it (that is, to buy it back and keep it the family).

2) If a man who lost his property died before having children, the nearest of kin had a duty to marry his widow and have children to perpetuate the name of the deceased. The name had to be preserved at all costs.

3) If this new couple had children, it was the children who inherited the land, not the nearest of kin who had redeemed it.

So Boaz discusses the situation at the city gate, with this nearest of kin. We don’t know his name. Boaz calls him “friend” so let’s call him Mr. Friend.

Boaz tells him that Naomi is selling some land. It’s not worth much. Otherwise Ruth wouldn’t have been gleaning like a beggar in the field. Naomi needs to sell her one small asset just to have food to eat. So Boaz says “You have first refusal; it’s yours if you want it. If not, I’m next in line.”

Now, Mr. Friend is a waste of space. He is the redeemer. He has a moral obligation to look after Naomi and Ruth after their husbands’ death. This is his job. What has he done for these widows so far? Nothing. He hasn’t called round, he hasn’t provided for them, he hasn’t protected them - he doesn’t care.

In v4, it all goes pear-shaped. Mr. Friend does want to buy the land. So Ruth, this sweet, loyal, hardworking, godly woman is going to get landed with a guy who doesn’t love her and doesn’t care and Boaz is going home empty handed.

So Boaz ups his game and what he does is brilliant. “Oh yeah,” he says. “Did I mention the small print? The land comes with a Moabite woman (a foreign migrant, on benefits) whom you’ll have to marry. She’s been married before, she doesn’t seem to be able to have children. And she has a bitter mother-in-law who’d have to live in your house as well. The two of them are inseparable. Still interested?”

Mr. Friend’s jaw drops and he says, “I would love to, but I just can’t. You do it.” Boaz, under his breath, says, “Yes!” and they shake hands on the deal.

And so in v9, Boaz becomes the family guardian and redeemer. He doesn’t have to, remember. He is under no legal obligation at all. Just like Jesus didn’t have to redeem us. He chose us out of pure grace.

There are so many parallels.

Boaz was eligible to redeem Ruth - Jesus was eligible to redeem us.

Boaz was willing to redeem Ruth - Jesus was willing to redeem us.

Boaz paid a price to redeem Ruth - Jesus paid the highest price to redeem us; his own blood.

Boaz overcame obstacles to redeem Ruth - Jesus overcame the greatest obstacle to redeem us by rising again.

Boaz was under no obligation to redeem Ruth. Jesus didn’t have to redeem us either. It was pure grace.

In this part of the story, Ruth is in the background, and doesn’t say a word. Her redemption is a free gift to which she contributes nothing.

We don’t bring anything to our redemption either; no good works, no religious performance, no persuasive arguments, just ourselves, as we are.

So, v13, Ruth and Boaz marry, make love and have a child. In that order. They don’t shack up together for a couple of years to see if they’re compatible. A dozen studies from the 1970s into the early 2000s showed that, on average, couples who cohabit before marriage have a 33% higher chance of divorcing than couples who move in together after the wedding.

Ruth and Boaz commit to one another, for better, for worse, then they consummate their marriage, and then they have a little boy called Obed which means “servant worshipper.”

After all the darkness; the famine, the funerals, the poverty, the homelessness, the low-paid jobs, the misery, the bitterness - here is Naomi, tears running down her face, with a grandson in her arms; a little boy born in Bethlehem who makes everything right. Who does that remind you of?

And I love it in v15 where they say to Naomi, “your daughter-in-law, who loves you and who is better to you than seven sons, has given birth.” In other words, she has given you a name, she has made you a somebody from a nobody.

In our world, even in our day, especially in places like China and North Africa, people often say that boys are worth more than girls. In fact, we don’t even have to go abroad to find this.

In 2012, two doctors in Birmingham and Sheffield were filmed in an undercover investigation offering to abort babies because they were girls which thankfully is illegal.

The Crown Prosecution Service had sufficient evidence to prosecute these doctors, but decided it was not in the public interest to do so. So someone launched a private prosecution and the doctors were summonsed to answer charges in Manchester Crown Court. 

The CPS refused to release the footage, so the judge could not allow it as evidence. The case collapsed and the court ordered the brave young woman who brought the case to pay these doctors who offered gender-targeted terminations £36,000, plus £11,000 costs.

So in the UK we have state-sponsored abortion by healthy mothers of healthy babies because they are girls. I cannot tell you how disgusted and ashamed that makes me to be British.

God’s word says that godly and kind daughters, like Ruth, are more valuable than the perfect number of sons.

Ending

I’ve spoken about Boaz, and how, as a redeemer he foreshadows Jesus. But I want to end by looking at this young woman, Ruth, who had nothing, but through faith became the great-grandmother of King David.

You look at Ruth, and:

·       You see one who left the comfort of her father’s house to became poor in a strange place

·       You see one who loved the loveless

·       You see one who considered a man’s heart, not his background

·       You see one who gave her life for a bitter, hopeless woman and became her salvation

This laughing stock, this family tragedy who had no name, became, through faith, the ancestor of the one whose name is above every name.

Because when you look at Ruth, you see her greatest descendant, the Lord Jesus.

The invisible hand of God; may we have faith to trust that it is at work in the everyday ups and downs of our lives to bring outcomes we could scarcely dream of.

Let’s pray…

Sermon preached at All Saints' Preston on Tees, 28 August 2016