The events in Ruth take place during the time of the Judges and Bethlehem is the scene. The book is not a romance, though it is a love story: A Covenant love story.
Bethlehem means bread, and at the time of Ruth, there was a serious lack of it. A Midianite invasion had caused a famine that leads to Elimelech, his wife Naomi and his sons to abandon their inheritance (land) and head east to Moab.
Over the next 10 years in Moab, Naomi’s sons marry, her husband dies, and then both her sons die leaving her and her two daughters-in-law, Ruth and Orpah alone to fend for themselves.
Naomi decides to return to Bethlehem when she hears the famine has passed and there is once again bread in the land. Though Naomi tells Ruth not to come, Ruth is determined.
But Ruth said, “Do not urge me to leave you or to return from following you. For where you go I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God. (Ruth 1:16)
Ruth is a Moabite. A descendant of Lot. Now, she has become a covenant member through marriage.
In their poverty, Naomi has had to sell the family lands. She is a widow with no husband, no son, and no inheritance. She has been effectively “unpersonned”.
Ruth offers to glean for food. Gleaning was hard work. You carried your basket and followed along behind the reapers in the field, collecting what might fall to the ground. It’s through gleaning day after day that she meets Boaz, a landowner and a distant relative of Naomi’s.
In the midst of the chaos that is the book of Judges, Boaz is a faithful man who loves and fears the Lord (Ruth 2:4). Boaz welcomes Ruth because he has heard of her kindness to Naomi (Ruth 2:10-12).
Naomi is a woman in need of redemption. Without a husband, son or inheritance, she has no name among her people.
Have you ever wondered why our names are written in the Book of Life? Why does such a book exist and what is its significance? As sinners, our name perishes with us. We have forfeited our claim to the land. Like Naomi, we are a people in need of redemption.
In the course of time, Boaz offers to redeem Naomi through marriage to Ruth.
At the beginning of Ruth, we read that it was the time of the Judges and there was no king in the land. At the end of the book, we have a wedding and a new son that will lead to the throne of David (Ruth 4:16-18).
Though Israel serves idols, the Lord does not abandon her but shows His loving-kindness. At the beginning of the book, no one has rest and the land is all but lost. By the end, Ruth and Naomi are living in the land and enjoying rest in the faithfulness of God.
In the final scenes of this story, we see Naomi holding the lad – Obed. Ruth has had a Son and so their name will not be blotted out of Israel. In fact, Obed would be the son through whom God would redeem not only Israel, but the World.
In this way, the book points to Jesus, the greater Son of David who becomes our kinsman redeemer.
He becomes one of us through the incarnation and is born in Bethlehem. Because of His love for us, He offers Himself as our Redeemer and is able to pay the asking price – His death on the cross.
In this way, we also become sons who, like Obed, inherit what Jesus has bought back at the cost of His own blood. We inherit the earth and receive rest in God.
God shows His kindness by not causing our name to perish, but by keeping it written in the Lamb’s Book of Life. And so, We are redeemed, we inherit eternal life – eternal sonship and the right to live in the land for all eternity.
This is the good news of the Gospel. Your name will not be blotted out.
Now, some might ask, “Okay, well and good, we are redeemed. But why this elaborate love story of Ruth and Boaz, with dead sons, Moabites, widows, and poverty? Why doesn’t God just send a prophet or the Angel of the Lord? Why this story?
The reason is simple, and lovely. This world runs along the lines of its Creator. This means that the redemption He secures for us, like the rest of all creation, is going to reflect His nature and character, from root to fruit.
And that redemption is beautiful. It’s beautiful because God is beautiful and so it is only to be expected that His redemption requires a beautiful story – like the one we find in Ruth.
God has written His redemption into every atom of this world. And you and I have been invited to enter the story of His redemption and find our rest, our bread, and our inheritance in Him who owns heaven and earth.
What do You Want to Read About?