Ruth 4:13-22 – “The Big Take-Away”

As always, here’s my fairly literal translation of these verses:

¹³And Boaz took Ruth to be to him to wife and he came in to her and YHVH gave to her conception and she bore a son. ¹⁴And the women said to Naomi, “Praise be to YHVH, who has not caused to fail to you a kinsman-redeemer today. May his name be called in Israel, ¹⁵and he will be to you a restorer of soul and to supporting your old age, because your daughter-in-law, who loves you, has borne him, which she [is] a good to you from seven sons.” ¹⁶And Naomi took the child and she set him in her bosom and she became to him a nurse. ¹⁷And the women neighbors called to him a name saying, “A son has been borne to Naomi,” and they called his name Obed. He [was]…²²the father of Jesse, the father of David.

As I come to the end of the book, I don’t think I’ll note anything about the final genealogy. What is most significant, I think, is that it completes the book with all converging in the birth of David, and through him, of course, ultimately Jesus Himself. There is a wide variety of research and discussion about the list of names, time period covered, etc., but no defensible conclusions, so I think I just won’t spend much time on it.

I’d rather think about what someone called “the big take-away.” Obviously one could conclude the whole point of the book was to trace the genealogy of King David, but I would debate that position for at least a couple of reasons: First of all, if the whole point was simply to trace David’s ancestry, why present it in a story? Genealogies in and of themselves are a legitimate way of confirming lineage. That happens all the time and we even see that very activity in Neh. 7:64 where “These searched for their family records, but they could not find them so they were excluded from the priesthood.” It was the records themselves and not a four-chapter long story that either confirmed or failed to confirm ancestry. So I don’t think it at all defensible to hold the whole point of the book was to present the lineage of David, as important as that may be.

The second reason I cannot accept that position is that “All these things were written for our admonition” (I Cor 10:11).  The Bible is a book of discipleship. The whole Bible from cover to cover was written to illustrate for us what faith looks like and what it does not. Even if the point of the book of Ruth is ultimately to present David’s lineage, yet the Lord always records those things in a way where we can follow the lives of the people and learn ourselves how to walk with God. The Bible is always answering the question, “How shall we then live?” and always saying to us, “Here is the way. Walk ye in it.”

And so I would suggest the “big take-away” is always about our lives, about teaching us what it means to love God and love people. That being said, the book of Ruth is a bombshell of very, very encouraging and helpful truth. I say that because it allows us to see intimately into the very simple day-to-day lives of a group of believers who face all the heartaches, uncertainties, fears, hopes, joys, and blessings the rest of us share and yet show us what real integrity means.

The “big take-away” I would like to suggest is that it really is true that “all things work together for good to them that love God,” that it really is true when the Lord says to us, “Fear not, I am with thee,” when He says, “For I know the plans that I have for you, plans to do you good and not to harm you, plans to give you a future and a hope.” The book opens in almost unbelievable hopelessness and yet, here we are at the end with Ruth married and Naomi holding a baby in her arms. The Lord, of course, knew it all along, but just like us, Naomi and Ruth suffered in the dark, as it were, with no idea how it could possibly turn out well. The book teaches us to trust God no matter what. He is always up to our good. Even as we suffer He’s giving us a Ruth. And even though faith takes us to sometimes strange and scary places, the Lord has a Boaz waiting for us there. And beyond that, the book reminds us that His plans sometimes go far beyond us. We never know when we might have a great-grandson David or find ourselves in the line of the very Messiah Himself!

The “end of the story” for Naomi and Ruth is the same end we will see one day:

Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God!
How unsearchable are His judgments, and His ways past finding out!

We need to be like Ruth and simply trust the Lord and “under His wings to take refuge.” We need, like her, to make love and faithfulness our greatest virtues and let the Lord be the One who pulls it all together for our good. We need to trust Him no matter what!

Another thing that Ruth teaches us is that, even in the darkest days, the Lord still has His people. The book is set in the hopeless dark days of the Judges. And yet we meet in this book a whole group of Israelites who greet each other at work, “The Lord bless you!” and who pray the Lord’s blessings on each other. Even in our present dark days, we need to remember that the Lord has yet reserved to Himself “7,000 men who have not bowed the knee to Baal.” There are always good people out there who still trust God.

Along those same lines, the book of Ruth teaches us that there are some pretty amazing people out there. Naomi, Boaz, and Ruth are three of the most exemplary people you could find anywhere. Who can help but enjoy their simple love and humility and faithfulness -- Boaz’s gracious kindness, Ruth’s resolved faithfulness, and Naomi’s constant selflessness? And probably what tickles me the most is that it’s all seen not on some stage, not in front of a big church group, but simply in their everyday workaday world – exactly where our faith ought to shine the brightest.

One interesting thought is to compare this book to our other “young woman” book, Esther. In Ruth, we see the Lord intimately involved in the very simple everyday lives of Naomi, Ruth, and Boaz. In Esther, He isn’t mentioned even once. Esther is set in the very palace that was ruling the civilized world and yet the Lord isn’t even mentioned in the entire book. In Esther we see His hand at work, without being told specifically it was Him doing it. I wonder why that is? I wonder if the Lord wrote the two books to give us hope that sometimes in our troubles, He will be very present and visible, while other times it seems we cannot see Him at all – yet, in either case, He is always still there with His “plans to do us good and not to harm us.” And He will be up to that good whether we find ourselves in a palace or scratching in the dirt. Whether everyone around us acknowledges Him or whether they don’t even mention His name, He’s still there.

I guess with that, I have to say good-bye to my three friends. It sure has been a blessing to walk with them for a while. I feel like I’ve been with Jesus Himself. It’s been an exceptional blessing to see real faith lived out in such simple lives. I hope the Lord has deeply imprinted their character in my brain and I hope it makes me more like them. Most of all, I hope it helps me to remember “the big take-away” – trust the Lord, … no matter what!