Let's go to our Father in prayer together. Our Father, we come to you, first of all, with thanks. We always come with thanks because we have so much to be grateful for, just to be here this morning with other individuals who want to be here this morning, with our weak goal of worshiping you.

And in that, we ask, Lord, that you'll bless our time together so that we can do that. We ask, Lord, that this hour together is spent focusing on your son, the only one not deserving of being forsaken, who was forsaken, the only one to not deserve to feel agony, who did feel ultimate agony, just because of his love for your people. Lord, that is what we need to hear about. We need Christ. We pray, Lord, that our time not be wasted this morning, that we hear about Christ and learn more about Christ and what he has done for his people and how he is the one, the only way to salvation. the only way to his father. And his work is finished, and he is victorious, and that is what we hope to hear about this morning, Lord.

And we pray that you'll bless our time so that that is all that is preached, and that that's all that is heard. We pray the same for all of your churches throughout the world, all of your people who are gathering this morning to hear about Christ. We thank you, Jesus. once again for everything you are and everything you've done. We pray this in your name, amen. You can take out your hymnals one more time and we'll sing number 453 and we'll stand as we sing.

Oh, the deep, deep love of Jesus, number 453. ♪ of Jesus, vast, unmeasured, boundless, free, rolling as a mighty ocean in His fullness over All around me is the current of Thy love. Leading onward, leading homeward, to Thy glorious rest The deep, deep love of Jesus Spread His grace from shore to shore How He loveth, ever loveth or his loved ones, died to call them all his own? How for them he interceded? Love of Jesus, love of every, love the best. Tis an ocean vast of blessing, tis a haven sweet of rest. of Jesus, tis a heaven of heavens to me. And it lifts me up to glory, for it lifts me up to Thee.

You can turn your Bibles back to Ruth. So the full book of Ruth is one big story, and it's four chapters. So I'm not gonna read the whole thing. That would take a really long time. So I'm gonna give you a quick overview of what happens in Ruth, and then we're gonna discuss the topics from there. When you look at the Bible, it's a common thought or trend, especially in modern day, that they think this teaches us how we ought to be for God, what we must do for Him, when in fact that's not true at all. The Bible actually is a book about what God has done for His people.

The book of Ruth is no exception, it's often taught as like a moral lesson. And there are some beautiful morals in the story of Ruth. The loyalty of Ruth. She's an incredibly loyal daughter-in-law. It talks about, I mean, she will go, the only thing that will separate her from Naomi, she says, is the grave. It's honorable for human standards.

But that's not what the Book of Ruth is about. It's not about the kindness of Boaz. which we'll get to as well. It's not about honoring your family or helping others. This book is simply a redemption story. It's not self-help. The gospel is not self-help. It is a redemption story.

This morning, we're gonna talk about why Ruth needed a Redeemer, what the Redeemer had to be, how Boaz redeemed, why this points directly to Christ, and then what it means for us. So the story in brief, the story of Ruth takes place in the time of Judges, which was a dark time for Israel.

Unstable, to say the least. And a man named Elimelech leaved Bethlehem because of a famine. He left there because they had no food. So he took his wife, Naomi, and they went to Moab, which is actually a pretty hostile country. Israel and Moab do not jive. They don't get along well, and they never have.

Elimelech, shortly after getting there, dies. They had two sons. Naomi's two sons married Moabite women, Ruth and Orpah, and after about ten years, both of the sons die. So this is where we pause, just to take a look at the situation that Naomi, Orpah, and Ruth are now in, especially Naomi at first. Naomi now is left, after moving across, well, could have been the world as far as she's concerned, it's to a whole other place. Place she doesn't belong.

She has no husband, and now she has no sons. She has no land, she has no inheritance, and in those days, for a woman in that situation, it meant she had no future. Think about, first of all, just the pain she had to go through of losing your husband and your only two sons. She lost her entire family. crushing, heartbreaking. And that's just the beginning of it. Because this was not just emotional pain. In that culture, this was catastrophic for Naomi.

In this ancient world, a woman's security, her provision, the way that she brought in goods and food and money, and her legal standing were tied almost entirely to her husband. And now she is without that. And then if it wasn't her husband, it would be her sons, whom she is now without. So she had no protection, she had no legal standing, and no steady provision. She was in a terrible, terrible spot. No sons meant no future, no care for her as she aged. and no way to preserve the family name or any land that they might have. She was helpless. Naomi is not simply grieving, she is economically, socially, and legally destroyed. When Naomi decides that we should return back to Bethlehem because she has heard that the Lord has ended the famine there and there is now food, She urges her daughters to stay in Moab, which is their home, which is where they're from.

And Orpah and Ruth both refuse at first, and eventually Orpah is convinced to stay, but Ruth absolutely denies the option. She says, where you go, I will go. Where you stay, I will stay. Your people shall be my people, and your God shall be my God. Pretty adamant, she's not leaving Naomi's side. Now if we talk about the situation that Naomi's in, which we've already discussed and how dire that is, it's worse for Ruth. She has all those situations, all the same situations. Her husband is gone, she has no protection, she has no provision, but now she's a foreigner.

They're going back to Israel, and she's a Moabite. She's part of a nation that is despised by Israel. Moabite women were looked to, looked as lesser than human. They were looked at as dangerous because they didn't believe in the same gods. So Naomi not only has no husband, no provision, no land, no security, but she's also less than human at this point according to the people around her. They arrive in Bethlehem penniless and completely vulnerable in every single way.

I'm going through this kind of quickly because we've got a lot to cover. To survive, Ruth begins to glean in the fields, meaning she basically is following the people that are harvesting wheat or grains, and she's picking up what they leave behind, which is not much. She's just trying to find some food for her and Naomi. It's not an opportunity, it's a last resort, basically, of survival. They're trying not to starve.

And gleaning was actually dangerous for a lone woman, especially a Moabite. Matter of fact, it says a little bit later, Boaz tells her, I have told the young men not to touch you. Well, if they have to be told that, there's a chance they were gonna touch her. And who knows what that means. It's not a safe place for her. She is in danger constantly. So which tells us that harm again is a real possibility, especially for a Moabite woman.

The Lord places Ruth in a field to glean that happens to be owned by a man named Boaz. Again, the Lord put her there. Everything is under his power. Everything is under his discretion. It was not happenstance or chance that doesn't exist. The Lord placed her there for a very specific reason.

Naomi, shortly after they all meet each other, or Ruth meets Boaz, Ruth goes back to Naomi and Naomi says, well this Boaz is one of our kinsmen redeemers, and that's a very important word. So this man is a close relative, he is one of our redeemers, it says that in Ruth 2.20. And then in Ruth 3, Ruth approaches Boaz at the threshing floor, not proposing romance, but asking him to fulfill his legal role, as a redeemer. And then in Ruth 4, Boaz publicly redeems the land, marries Ruth, and restores Naomi's future. And the book ends with a genealogy actually saying that the children of Boaz and Ruth are the line of David, which of course is also the line of our Savior.

So let's go back. That's the full story. That's all four chapters of Ruth really quickly. There's a lot more in there, but I wanted to, rather than having to read the entire thing, I wanted you guys to have a background of what exactly happens in Ruth. So Ruth opens in devastation. It doesn't take long for them to move and for Elimelech to die. It's in the very beginning of Ruth.

Naomi loses her husbands, she loses her two sons, she loses her land, she loses her future. Ruth loses protection, provision, identity, and basically any hope that she could have for a bright future or even a future at all. So they're not just sad, they are powerless at this point. They cannot help themselves. In the culture of that day, women in this situation had no way out on their own. Naomi says it plainly in Ruth 121. She says, I went away full and the Lord brought me back empty. Empty. No amount of loyalty or effort or goodness could fix this. And this is important.

Redemption, by definition, is a costly act of buying back what is lost or restoring its life. It's costly. There's a cost involved in redemption. But the necessary price to give the lost a home or to redeem is to pay the necessary price to give the lost a home or to give life to the dead. That's what redemption is, to pay the necessary price.

But redemption is only meaningful when the situation is utterly hopeless. It's only meaningful when the situation is dire, is life and death. If you have a path to fix your situation on your own, redemption has no value. Redemption only has value when the situation is dire, hopeless.

The person cannot save themselves. That is the human condition. That is our condition. I mean, it says it so many ways in the scriptures. We are dead in our transgressions and sins. We are blind. We are hard-hearted. All of these things, we cannot affect ourselves. What can a dead man do? You can't look at sin as a setback. It's not a setback. It's not a hole that we fall into that we can climb ourselves out of. That is not how sin works. It's a full loss. And the scary part, and you don't hear this in this modern world very often, all it takes is one.

If you sin once against God, you are deserving of death. Pretty sure we've all done more than that. And we were born into it. Before we took our first breath, we were in the sinful line of Adam. That is not a setback. That is not, oops, I tripped, next time I'll try not to. We don't just stumble, we have fallen into death. And we cannot escape. There's nothing we can do. This is the picture that is being portrayed by Ruth. She is in a position that is utterly helpless. There is no way for her life to be better than what it is. There is no way for her out of this situation on her own.

But then, God provides a kinsman redeemer. And I say God provides because even the Old Testament laws that describe the rules around a kinsman redeemer, they come from God. They come through Moses. They're codified in the law of Moses. God gave the rules about what a kinsman redeemer must be.

So I can tell you this story about this kinsman redeemer is incredibly important. It's a description of the only way out of our situation. The only way out for Ruth. There's only one. The kinsman redeemer. So enter Boaz. Naomi says, that man is one of our Redeemers. She says that in chapter two, verse 20.

In Israel, the rules that were set in place by Moses, by God, through Moses, were that a kinsman Redeemer was a relative The original word is called goel instead of kinsman redeemer, but the relative could buy back lost land, rescue someone from poverty, restore a family line, and remove shame.

But not everyone could redeem. It was very specific about who could be a kinsman redeemer. A redeemer had to meet three requirements, and if even one was missing, redemption was not possible. So let's go into those three requirements. The first one, must be a near relative. Boaz could redeem because he was family. He was not a stranger moved by pity who happened to walk by and feel bad for Ruth. He was not an outsider offering charity. Redemption required kinship, relation, connection.

You cannot redeem what you are not connected to. You cannot restore what you don't belong to. And this is why salvation could not come for us from heaven from a distance. God did not shout forgiveness from heaven. He did not send instructions. He did not outsource redemption while he's up here in heaven.

He entered the world and he became one of us. He became a kinsman because that was required for redemption. Says in Hebrews 2.14, since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things. Jesus became fully man, truly human. He stepped into hunger. He felt grief. He felt temptation. If Christ, it's as simple as this.

Talks about how these three requirements are completely necessary, and if one of them isn't there, redemption isn't there. If Christ wasn't fully man, redemption would be not possible. He did not take our nature. If he did not take our nature, he could not take our place. It's that simple. And what place did he take? He took our place in the court in front of the judge. The eternal court in front of the judge of all things. That's where he took our place and he could not do that were he not one of us.

The second requirement of a kinsman redeemer, he must be able to pay the price. Boaz was not just related, he was also sufficient. He had enough money. He had the resources to buy the land, to absorb the cost. He had the power to take Ruth as his own and restore what was lost. Redemption cannot happen from good intentions. Redemption cannot happen from pure compassion. You have to have the ability. Redemption always comes with a cost. It has to be paid. And the person who is the Redeemer must be able to pay it.

And the only price for eternal redemption In the eyes of God the Father and the Judge, the only accepted currency, the only payment for our insurmountable death, the only thing accepted is the perfect blood of Jesus Christ. Nothing else is of interest to God. Are you gonna bring him something else? That's not gonna go well. Says you were ransomed, says this in 1 Peter, you were ransomed, not with silver and gold, but with the precious blood of Christ. Jesus didn't bring partial payment, he didn't negotiate our debt, he paid it in full.

And I'll tell you this, he's the only one that can. So he must have, he must be sufficient. And there is only one that is. And in the third aspect of this kinsman redeemer, he must be willing This requirement can be overlooked, but a Redeemer could be related, could have the money, but might not want to.

They might refuse, and they have that right. And there is actually a part in this story that we didn't talk about. There's a second Redeemer that they talk about, the closer Redeemer, who refuses. The cost is too great for that Redeemer. And that Redeemer has that right, but not the willingness. And we'll talk about that Redeemer in a little bit too. He says, I cannot redeem it for myself. This Redeemer is the law. They talk about a close Redeemer.

The law is close. We are under the law. The law is always with us. If that were not the case, we would never sin. The law is what decides what sin is. It is always with us. We're born under it, and the law is right. There's nothing wrong with the law. Of course it's right. Christ followed it perfectly.

But the, and you know, the interesting part, if you think about this, the law actually can redeem. It just can't redeem any of us. The law can redeem if you can live it perfectly. It's just that no one can. One could. The law cannot redeem us. The law for us is only condemnation. The law can identify our problem. The law can expose our guilt. And just like this man, the law cannot redeem a sinner. The cost is too great. The law doesn't pay the cost. The law only tells you what you owe. The law only knows justice. The law doesn't know grace.

So this first Redeemer who Boaz talks to, he's like, this cost is way too big for me. The law doesn't pay the price. Only one could. Boaz, however, chooses to redeem. He didn't have to. No one forced him, no one pressures him, no one manipulates him.

He says, in effect, I will pay the full price. I will take the loss. I will take her as my own. And now you listen to Christ's words. He says, I lay down my own life. No one takes it from me. Christ willingly accepted the ultimate wrath of God. Willingly, He chose it to be your Redeemer. Jesus was not trapped into the cross. He was not overpowered. He was not surprised. He willingly bore the shame that we deserve. He bore the wrath that we deserve and the judgment that we deserve.

Again, of all these three things, all of them are necessary. Were God, were Christ not willing, there would be no salvation. But from the first moment he was born on this earth to his last, he was about his father's business. This is from John, for I have come down from heaven not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me. He was about his father's will from his first breath to his last.

So he willingly took on that shame and bore that guilt and that wrath to be your kinsman redeemer. Now this redemption took place when Boaz was publicly talking to the people of the city by the city gate. It was a very public place and that's when he declared in front of everyone, may everyone see this, I now take her as mine. Witnesses were present, and they had to be. He talks about that, he said, and may you all witness.

The price was paid publicly. And once Boaz redeemed, everyone knew the debt was paid, the matter was satisfied, and it was over. This is the publicity, the public aspect of the cross. It is finished. The public outcry, you are all witnesses. The matter has been taken care of. And the other part I love about this, because it shows us this in every picture of the gospel and throughout the scriptures, and there are so many, but this is there every time. Where's Ruth? Where's Ruth when redemption happens? She's not even there. Ruth does nothing during redemption, during her own redemption.

Matter of fact, it talks about how she wants to go to the city gate. And Naomi says, this is probably my favorite piece of scripture in this book. It says in Ruth 3.18, wait, my daughter, until you learn how the matter turns out. For the man will not rest until rest, but will settle the matter today. Wait here, Ruth. He will not rest until your matter is settled. And that's the truth for us. What can we do? Even if you really wanted to, what do you have to offer in your redemption? What can you bring to that table? No, wait. He will not rest until your matter is settled.

The redeemed, redemption is solely the work of the Redeemer. The redeemed, their only role is being the redeemed. Your salvation belongs to Christ. It was started by Him, it was finished by Him, and it was perfected by Him. He did it all. If this were not so, you would have no salvation. There is only one. In every aspect of the gospel, there is only one. There's only one way to the Father. There's only one way from death to life. There is only one. There is only one Redeemer.

Do you want redemption? There's only one place to go. Have you seen your helpless estate without a Redeemer? Are you Ruth? In a world that is not your home, in a helpless estate, there is only one place to go. There is only one who has all the qualifications to be your Redeemer.

Run to Christ and do it now. If you haven't, do it now. We don't know what the future holds. Do not wait. Run to Him. Say, Christ, save me. And even if you have, have you not had to do that over and over and over? Not that you're being saved again every time. Once you're his, you're his before you even know it. But that's the situation we find ourselves in. We run away and we run back. Just keep going back. There's only one salvation, redemption, justification in front of the Father. There is only one who can do this. Our Lord Jesus Christ.

And that aspect we talked about a little bit earlier in Ruth, where it says, wait, Ruth, wait here, as Naomi says this, wait here to find out what happens, for the man will not rest until the matter is settled. This part is slightly different for us. We don't have to wait to find out what happens.

The matter is settled. Thousands of years ago, even before the creation of the world, your matter is settled. Rest in him. Rest in the thought that this kinsman redeemer has everything it takes to save you and has already done it. Christ has settled your matter. He has redeemed his people. The redemption is fully successful and completely final.

I love the story of Ruth. It is not about the loyalty of Ruth or the kindness of Boaz. It is about the position that humans are in now. The utterly, utterly helplessness, utter helplessness of humanity. And how there is one singular kinsman redeemer that has everything necessary to save his people and he has done it. Our Father, we thank you so much for loving us, showing us that daily in our lives here. You show us your love constantly. We have so many blessings to be grateful for, but none compare to our kinsman Redeemer. We are so grateful, Lord, that you orchestrated this perfection. that you laid the ground rules about what was necessary for a kinsman redeemer and then you provided them. All while we waited. We thank you for not leaving any of it in our hands and placing it all in the hands of our perfect savior. We pray this in Jesus' name, amen.