Ruth 2

Ruth is where we are right after the book of Judges, and right before 1 Samuel. We learned last week that this time period that the story of Ruth goes on is the time of the judges. And the time of the judges was not necessarily a great time. It was a time of spiritual decline for the nation of Israel, and they kept falling into idolatry and so the Lord would use various things to try to get their attention and bring them back to a place of repentance and faith. And sometimes he would use their neighbors coming to attack and oppress them, and sometimes he would use more natural disasters, such as famines and that sort of thing. In fact, when we started the Book of Ruth last week, it started by telling us that it was a time of famine, and during times of famine, people would often relocate to go find food. I mean, you're living in an agrarian society and if the ground isn't producing crops, then you don't eat. And there's one particular family that this book focuses on a husband by the name of Elimelech, his wife, Naomi, and their two boys decided to do that relocation to find food for their family. And they went to the land of Moab. And during that time, it was a very difficult time that nothing really, but heartache and loss when they got there. I don't know if you can relate, but Elimelech passed away in a foreign land. The two boys were given in marriage to Moabite women and then they died. And we don't even know how old they were, but we know they hadn't born any children yet. And so they died in their youth. And suddenly Naomi is left alone. I mean, she's got these two daughters-in-law, but they're also widows. And here she is a widow. And we talked last week about how desperate life could quickly become for a woman who was a widow and had no other family members to provide for her. Eventually, after about 10 years, Naomi began to hear word that the famine had lifted in the nation of Israel. And so she decided to make her way back. And she began at first to travel with her two daughters in-law. But along the way, she stopped and said, girls, you need to go. You need to go back to your family. Go back to what you know. And get a husband and carry on with life and one of the daughters-in-law, Orpah, eventually took her up on that offer, but Ruth was quite a different response.

She literally pleaded with Naomi not to turn her away, but she said, I'm going to go with you and I'm going to go back to Israel with you, and your nation is going to be my nation. Your land is going to be my land. Your God is going to be my God. And so they made their way and when they got back to the area of Bethlehem the women of the area recognized her after 10 years and they said, is this Naomi coming back? And Naomi said, well, it's me, but don't call me Naomi because the name Naomi means pleasant. She said, life has not been pleasant. Life has been very bitter. So I want you to call me Mara, because Mara means bitterness and my life has been full of bitterness. She said, I left with my family and I was full, and now I've come back empty. And this is where we basically take up chapter two. But there was this interesting comment at the end of chapter one that began to open, just a hint, just a glimmer of hope for Naomi and Ruth. And that is that the barley harvest was just beginning. And it says in verse one of chapter two,

Let's pray. Father, as we go through these verses and dig into Your Word here today, Lord, we just really pray for your Holy Spirit to lead us. We need you. We need you to lead us, and we need you to open our hearts and minds to what is being said here in this second chapter so that we can understand it and then apply it to our lives. We look to you, Lord, to accomplish these things, and we ask you to do it in the name of Jesus our Savior, amen. Amen. Amen. Well, as chapter two opens here in the book of Ruth, we're introduced to a new character, a man by the name of Boaz. His name means strength. Isn't that a good name? Just, yeah. It's just like naming your kid, you're strong. And verse one actually tells us that he was a relative of Naomi's on her husband's side. And it says here in the ESV, he was a worthy man. If you have a different translation, your Bible may say he was a very wealthy man. I believe it's in the New King James that says that. And he was of the same clan as that of Elimelech, meaning that not only were they related, but they were of the same clan. And he is a landowner who's been prospering even during this time. But for Ruth and Naomi, it's just it's time to just survive. And so, you'll notice in verse two, this is when Ruth speaks to Naomi asking for permission to go out into the fields and to glean. And Naomi says, go, my daughter. And I want to talk to you just a little bit about this whole idea of gleaning, because this was a very, it was very kind of a cool thing. First of all, it was God's provision for people who were poor, people who were sojourning through the land for those who were widows and orphans and that sort of thing. And gleaners would follow behind the harvesters, the reapers, if you will, and they would pick up what was left behind. And this was something God had commanded them to do. Them, meaning the landowners, to leave some to don't be careful not to harvest all of your field, but leave some of it for the poor of the land. And it was frankly, God's welfare program. And it was a good program. It was a good way of taking care of people because first of all, it encouraged basically generosity from the people who were landowners and who had something to give. But it also required hard work for those who were receiving from who are on the gleaning end of things. And the reason I say that that's a good thing because hard work preserves people's dignity. And that's a good, and that's one of the reasons this was such a great program. We've learned here in the United States of America that when the government just hands out things to people and doesn't ask anything in return, we don't get any of the benefit. We don't get any sense of the necessity of being generous because all we, they're just giving away the money that they took from us in taxes. And nobody's terribly happy about that. So we're not generous in our giving. And the people who are on the receiving end essentially have their dignity stripped away from them because they didn't have to do anything to receive it. And so, I got to tell you, I really like God's welfare program. I really do. I would love it if the government in the United States, not that they're going to listen to me. Let's see what Paul says. Yeah, that's not going to happen. But if they decided one day, listen, we're going to stop giving away money to the poor, and we're just going to encourage the people, the citizens of the United States, to be generous to the poor. That would be a better system.

It would be more in keeping. It would encourage generosity on our part, and it would reserve the dignity of those who were on the receiving end. So anyway, this whole gleaning thing and God's program of giving and blessing and encouraging is all outlined in the Word of God in a couple of different books of the Old Testament. Let me show you these on the screen first from Leviticus. It says,

“When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap your field right up to its edge, (in other words, don't go right up to the end of it) neither shall you gather the gleanings after your harvest. And you shall not strip your vineyard bare, neither shall you gather the fallen grapes of your vineyard. You shall leave them for the poor and for the sojourner: (and he tells him, he says) I am the LORD (and this is my command).” And then in Deuteronomy we read this,

“When you reap your harvest in your field and you forget a sheath in the field, Remember a sheath was a gathering of barley or wheat, and the reapers would cut it. And then they would tie it together in a sheath and then they would lay it on the ground and the others would come behind and pick it up and take it and pile it up on a wagon or whatever. And basically, the Lord is saying here, if you forget one, then don't go back for it, he says. It shall be for the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow, that the LORD your God may bless you in all the work of your hands.”

Did you notice this? So God commanded that the landowners bless the poor, and then he turned around and said, if you do this, I'll bless you. So there's a double blessing going on, which is, it's just wonderful. Right? So verse three goes on and it tells us that Ruth set out and she gleaned in a particular field. And then just by happenstance, she began to glean in a part of the field that belonged to Boaz. And in verse four it tells us that Boaz came from Bethlehem walked out into the fields and he said to his reapers, the Lord be with you. And they answered, the Lord bless you. And this is the first hint that we get of the character of this man, Boaz. And I told you a moment ago that the time of the judges was predominantly a time of spiritual depravity and decline in terms of the health of the nation. But you know, this is a godly man. Boaz is a godly man. Even during times of darkness, there are godly people and you know what we call those people in the Bible? We call them a remnant. That's what the Bible refers to them as. In fact, the Apostle Paul talks about this in Romans chapter 11. Let me show you this on the screen. Goes like this. He says,

Do you not know, and he's going to tell him a story from the Old Testament, what the scripture says of Elijah, how he appeals to God against Israel. And he says, Lord, they've killed your prophets. They've demolished your altars. And I alone am left. I'm the last person in the land who's faithful to you. And he says, and now they want to kill me. They're seeking my life. Look what God said, but what is God's reply to him? No, no, no, I've kept for myself 7,000 men who have not bowed the knee to Baal. And then look at how the Apostle Paul comments afterwards, he says so too, at the present time, there is a remnant, chosen by grace. And I believe that present time applies to all present times, including this present time. We're living in a time of very great spiritual darkness. We're living in a time of great moral depravity, but guess what? God still has a remnant. And you say, well, pastor Paul, how do you define a remnant? And you define a remnant as people who are faithful to the Lord. Who love the Lord, who love

His Word and are watching for his appearing. That's the remnant. And I trust that you are part of that remnant. And then as we see in verse five, Boaz takes notice of Ruth. He comes to one of his young men who's in charge of the reapers, and he goes, yeah who's young woman is this? And you can't hear his inflection, so you don't know whether he's just being inquisitive, or he is going, who is that sort of, I don't know. She might be a looker. I mean, and you got to know she's out there working in the fields. She probably doesn't look her best, but Boaz still takes notice of her and the servant, lets her know, or lets him know, rather, that this is the young Moabite woman who came back with Naomi from Moab and so forth. And he's aware. You can tell that the people all through Bethlehem, everybody knows. So the grapevine is working really well. People are talking even without the internet. You just need to know that people still talked even back then, and they all knew everybody else's business. Have you ever lived in a, well, of course, some of you live in small towns, you can't turn over in bed without people knowing about it, and it's just one of the wonderful things about living in a small community. I say “wonderful” with a fair amount of sarcasm, but you guys know what I mean. But he tells him, yeah, this is the gal who came back with Naomi and so forth. In verse seven, he tells Boaz that Ruth has been working hard all day long, just took a short rest. And then I want you to notice how Boaz then speaks to Ruth beginning in verse eight. Look with me there in your Bible, verse eight.

Don't wander off into another man's field. He says, Have I not charged the young men not to touch you? Wouldn't that have been an interesting conversation between Boaz and his workers? Guys, come here, come on, gather around. See that girl over there? Yeah. Don't touch her. Don't go near her, and so forth. And then he says, And when you are thirsty, go to the vessels and drink what the young men have drawn.” Guys, we need to pause here for a minute because first of all, this is really good stuff. It's really important that we look at this. All the things that Boaz is saying to Ruth, encouraging her not to go into any other fields, following close behind the other servant girls that are out there working in the field. He also gave her permission, you might have noticed in those verses, to follow closely behind the reapers, and that means I want you to be the first to get whatever they drop or they don't pick up. In other words, I want you to get there first before any other gleaners get there. I want you to have it. And then he actually tells her that he has spoken to the men on his workforce, and he's warned them not to go near her or touch her in any way. And then finally, he invites her to drink from the water that is being brought along for the workers. And by the way, none of this was required in the Law of Moses, even though we read those couple of passages where landowners were commanded by the Lord to leave some of their crop in the field so that the poor could glean it. The Lord said nothing about water and any of these other things. This is all just coming from Boaz's heart, right? And what I want you to notice, and I want to particularly speak to the men here, if I may, just for a moment, and particularly the young men. Those of you who are young men, I want you to see what Boaz is doing in this woman's life. He is providing and protecting, providing and protecting. And the reason I'm pointing those things out, and I want to encourage the men to listen, and honestly if I could give any advice to younger men who want to be attractive to women, it's not about your haircut or the clothes you wear, or the car you drive, or the fact that you work out at the gym. If you want to be truly attractive to a woman, then learn what it means to be a provider and a protector, because that's what women are looking for and they'll even marry a guy with a dad bod to get it. Yeah. Well, let me tell you something, I've lived long enough to know that when nature and gravity and time begins to cause all of those things that we otherwise thought were so important to fall away, and droop, and all the other things that happen. It's providing and protecting that really matters at the end of the day, providing and protecting. And Boaz is showing Ruth in no uncertain terms that he is husband material. And trust me, Ruth noticed. Look at verse 10. And 10 Then she fell on her face, bowing to the ground, and said to him, “Why have I found favor in your eyes, that you should take notice of me, since I am a foreigner?” And I want you ladies now to take note of what is going on in Ruth's response to the kindness that is being shown her by Boaz. Ruth was a woman who had lived a pretty challenging life up to this point. She was born and raised in Moab, but then she married an Israelite, who was a foreigner in her land, but who died before giving her any children or anything. And now she's a widow and she's come back to Israel with Naomi and she's facing a very uncertain future, and yet we don't see Ruth saying, why has all this been happening to me? Why is all this going on in my life? That's not the question that she's asking. Do you know what question she's asking? She's asking, why are these good things happening to me? Do you see the difference? And let me tell you something else, this is a very very attractive attribute in a godly woman. A woman who isn't, first of all, a complainer who just gets up and just deals with life. And when good things happen, she's appreciative. That's very attractive in a woman, very attractive. And she says, why have I found favor in your eyes? I'm a foreigner. There's no reason for you to treat me this way. Why is this happening? Why are these good things happening in my life? It's so funny. This is the opposite of how we respond to hardship and difficulty. Our culture has so effectively fed us a steady diet of “you deserve.” And we've swallowed it hook, line, and sinker to the point where when things happen that we don't think should, we're like, what's this? I didn't sign up for this. Why is this happening to me? You know why we say that? It's because we think we deserve better. We've been convinced we deserve better. I remember years ago I was talking to a guy, sharing the Lord with him. He was an unbeliever. And he stopped me like midway and he goes, why should I care? What good has God done for me? I looked at him, I said, what good have you deserved? And he kind of went, no, you got a point. But see, we're told we deserve all these things, and yet we know it's a lie. Deep down, we know it's a lie, but we're trying to live like we deserve it. The bottom line is that what we see in Ruth is this appreciative attitude that is beautiful. I mean, it's beautiful. This is one of the reasons why it tells us in Proverbs 31 that a godly woman has beauty that doesn't fade because her beauty doesn't come from just what you can see in a mirror. She's a godly woman. And so I hope you guys, particularly you younger men and women, I hope you see what I've done here. I just gave you some important tips on being attractive, right? Well, men be providers and protectors. Focus on that. Focus on providing and protecting. And women don't be complainers and show appreciation for the good things that you have. You thought that you had to go out and buy all kinds of clothes and makeup and go to the gym and spend a bundle. I just saved you a lot of money. You're welcome. It's not about those things. It's about godliness. Anyway, in the following verses we learned that Boaz was well aware of what Ruth had done for Naomi and the love and sacrifice she had shown her. And he says in verse 12, and I love this, he says, the Lord repay you. And this is just another way of saying, may God bless you, Ruth, for all that you've done. He says, and a full reward be given you by the Lord, the God of Israel. And then I want you to see this last statement, because this is important. He says, under whose wings you have come to take refuge. That doesn't mean God has wings. That's a figurative statement. It just means that Ruth had placed herself under the protective banner of the love and provision of the God of Israel. And that's his way of saying, I see Ruth, that you've turned your back on the useless gods of Moab and you've come to worship and serve the one true living God. That's what he's saying. And it's a beautiful beautiful thing. And it had become common knowledge, which means Ruth had made her commitment to the Lord public. By the way, Boaz could, you can see in his words, that he knew she was a godly woman by the blessing he spoke over her and the things he said. I know what you did for Naomi. I know what you did. He knew she was a godly woman and that's a good point to bring out because that's another thing that a godly man should always make a priority. Before he begins to show attention to any woman, he should know that she's a godly woman, so that they're not going to be unequally yoked. Alright, but Boaz isn't done providing for Ruth. Look at verse 14. It says, at mealtime, this is where Boaz said to her, come and here and eat some bread and dip your morsel in the wine. Your Bible may say vinegar and I'm going, ugh. Wouldn't that be terrible? Dip your morsel in the vinegar? I would say, where's the ranch dressing? Pull it out. Get it out here, because no vinegar. Anyway, so we're told here that she sat with the reapers and he passed her the roasted grain, which is what they were eating, and she ate until she was full. And then she left some to, and we're going to find out in the later verses again, that she gave that to Naomi when she got home and that sort of thing. And it says here in verse 15 that when she rose to glean after this meal, and we don't know whether it was lunch or dinner or somewhere in between, but it says that he instructed his young men saying, “Let her glean even among the sheaves and do not reproach her. Alright, stop here. Do you guys see what he's saying now? Again, gleaners were given permission to pick up what was left over, what was dropped on the ground, what was still standing that the reapers had missed. They were given that permission. What's Boaz doing? He comes to his men and he goes, and you can tell that he's got a thing for this girl now, and he says to the guys, all right guys, here's the deal. If she even pulls some of the stalks out from the stuff that you've cut and already tied up in sheaths and laid on the ground, just don't say a word to her. And you can see what Boaz is doing. He's making it easy for her to get done what she needs to get done in terms of gleaning and so forth. But again, this is just him providing for her. And so we're told in verse 17 that she gleaned until evening and then her work wasn't done. She's worked all day. And then she's going to start the threshing process and they would take a club and they would put the stalks on a rock and they would beat them, to separate the stalk from the grain and so forth. And we're told here that it came to about epha of barley, which is about four gallons of grain, which is a good day for a gleaner. And then verse 18, she took it up, went into the city. Her mother-in-law took one look at it and went, what in the world? Where have you been? And who took notice of you and so forth? May he be blessed Naomi says in verse 20 whose kindness has not forsaken the living or the dead. And Ruth tells her that it was Boaz. And this is in verse 20, where Naomi gives us some very important insight. And I want you to look at the last part of verse 20 with me, because this is where Naomi says, she also said to Ruth, this man is a close relative of ours and one of our redeemers. Now, what she did is she introduced a new word into this study that we need to be aware of, and it's translated redeemer here at the end of verse 20, but it is the Hebrew word, go’el, and it literally has an interesting meaning of both redeemer and relative. So, it is a verb and a noun. You guys remember your grammar in school? A verb is an action word, and so as a verb, go’el, in the Hebrew means to redeem, right? Whether it's redeeming a person or property or whatever. But the noun version of, go’el, refers to the family connection of this redeemer, which is one of the reasons I love how the NIV rendered this back in the 1984 revision. They used kinsman redeemer, which I thought was a great translation. The new 2011 NIV tried to improve on that, and I think they ruined it. But you know, kinsman redeemer gives you both the verb and noun sense of what this Hebrew word means. And the reason it's important that you understand that it carries this family, or relative, connection is because there were some very very important responsibilities that fell to relatives under Jewish law, and it had to do with helping your family when they fell on hard times, or in this case when they passed away.

A kinsman redeemer could rise up and do several things. They could purchase back land that had been sold elsewhere outside the family. They could do all kinds of other things to redeem even your relative who maybe fell into debt and became someone's slave. That's how they paid off debts back in those days. You literally became a slave of someone to whom you owed money and you worked for that person until your debt was paid off. Well, a kinsman redeemer could enter the situation and say, I'm going to pay off the remainder of the debt for my relative, and I'm going to redeem them from this work slave type situation they've gotten themself into. And this is all outlined in the Old Testament in various passages, but I'm going to show you one from Deuteronomy chapter 25 up on the screen here. It says,

“If brothers dwell together, and one of them dies and has no son, the wife of the dead man shall not be married outside the family to a stranger. Her husband's brother shall go in to her and take her as his wife and perform the duty of a husband's brother to her. And the first son whom she bears (in other words, the first male child) shall succeed to the name of the dead brother, that his name may not be blotted out of Israel.” And this is, again, one of the responsibilities of the kinsman redeemer was to perpetuate the name of his deceased relative, whether it was his brother or cousin or uncle or whatever. It didn't really matter. So this was taking care of family, and they wanted to make sure that those things got done. Verse 21. It says, And Ruth the Moabite said, “Besides, (and she's still talking to Naomi) he said to me, ‘You shall keep close by my young men until you finished all my harvest. And Naomi comes back to Ruth and says, yeah, that's really good, and I want you to really pay attention to that. Lest you go into some other man's field and they treat you badly and so forth.

And so it says in verse 23, that Ruth kept close to the young women of Boaz, gleaning until the end of the barley and the wheat harvests. And it says that she lived with her mother-in-law. By the way, this is interesting. The barley harvest in Israel starts in May, so it's just during this time of year right now that we're in. And then the wheat harvest extends into June. So we can see from here because it says here that she stayed gleaning in Boaz's field through barley harvest and into wheat harvest. So this is going on now into June, perhaps even to the end of June. So you can see how long this is really taking. So, as we look at this second chapter of Ruth, some of you might be thinking, yeah, I wonder why this is in the Bible. I mean, it's a cool love story. But you know, if we want a love story, we can just tune into the Hallmark channel and watch one of those corny things. Whenever the Hallmark Channel comes on at our house, I always look at Sue and I go, I have no idea how this is going to end. What's going to happen? And I'll tell her, I got to keep watching this because there's no telling how this is going to turn out. Yeah. Anyway. This is so much more than just a love story. This is a story of redemption. This is a story of restoration. This is a story of God taking some people from the ashes of hopelessness into a great hope of life, and beauty. And we're going to see that as we go through the remainder of the two chapters in the next two weeks, but let me just tell you this little bit of a spoiler alert, for those of you maybe that haven't been through the book of Ruth, Ruth and Boaz are going to eventually come together and they're going to just, it's going to be so much more than just a love story. These two will be connected to the earthly lineage of the Messiah, our Lord and Savior Jesus. And it is so beautiful to see how God takes someone like Ruth and frankly even Boaz's mother, who was Rahab the prostitute, and brings these women into the fold in such a way that they're actually in the lineage of Jesus Christ, his earthly lineage. And it's so beautiful. It's so powerful. It's so full of grace. And you're going to see that in these last couple of chapters. But for right now, we're going to close in prayer. So, stand with me if you would please. If you need prayer come on up front here after we're done, and we'll have our prayer team up here to pray with you. So let's pray. Father, we thank you so much for the opportunity today to dig into Your Word. And Lord, we thank you for the examples that we see in these passages. Lord, the graciousness of

Naomi, the diligence and hard work of Ruth and her unwillingness to make it all about herself and ask, why is this happening to me? But rather saying, why is this good coming my way? And we see her appreciation. And Lord, this model, this example of Boaz, this man who understands what a woman needs most, provision and protection. And we thank you Lord, and we pray that you would help us to pattern our lives after these examples. And to trust in you through your Holy Spirit to give us the strength to live the way we ought. We thank you and praise you for who you are and the goodness you've poured out into our hearts. And we commit our week to you, that you might lead us and guide us into all truth, through the name of Jesus Christ, our Savior, and all God's people said, amen. Have a good rest of your Sunday.