Open your Bibles again with me
to the book of Ruth. It's not the fault of the people.
The blame lies with the pulpit. People hear what's preached to
them. They know what their pastors
teach them. And preachers have neglected
the Old Testament for many, many years and have taught the Old Testament
as a book of history, romance, proverbs, and stories, most of
the time exalting the characters of the Old Testament rather than
the Christ. And about all the average person
knows of the book of Ruth is her statement to her mother-in-law,
which is fabulous. It's really a confession of the
believer who says to Christ, entreat me not to leave you or
to return from following after you. Where you go, I go. Your people are my people. And that's their confession of
fellowship with one another. They're brought together as one
body, one family in Christ. And Ruth, her character is not
the cause of God's grace to her. Her character is a result of
God's grace in her. Like every believer, what she
was, she was with the grace of God. But the key to the book of Ruth
is Christ. There's one word that's the key
to the book of Ruth. You'll find it in chapter 2, verse 20. And Naomi said unto her daughter-in-law,
Blessed be he of the Lord, who hath not left off his kindness
to the living, to the dead. And Naomi said unto her, The
man Boaz is near of kin to us, one of our next kinsmen, near
kinsmen. Some of you have a Cambridge
Bible, and there's a little number two. by that one of our near
kinsmen, next kinsman, and in the margin it says, one who has
the right to redeem. Kinsman redeemer. For your information,
the word kinsman, only four chapters in this little book, and the
word kinsman is in this little book thirteen times. Count them
sometimes. Kinsman, twelve times. Ken's men, M-E-N, wants thirteen. And that's what the book is about,
our kinsman Redeemer, who is Christ, one who has the right
to redeem. The Old Testament reveals Christ, our Redeemer. There was a young preacher in Wales, in a Welsh village,
who had been invited to preach for this old established congregation. And he was quite honored to be
invited to preach for them, and he worked on his message. And
he came that Sunday morning and he preached from an Old Testament
text. And when he finished preaching,
he was quite satisfied with what he had done. And he was standing
down at the front of the church shaking hands with the people
who came by to speak to him. And he noted an elderly gentleman,
well-known old elder of the church, coming in his direction. And he reached out his hand to
the old elder and called him by name, and he said, How did you like my message?
And the old man said, it was a very poor message. The young
fellow was shocked because he was pretty well satisfied with
it. And all the people were talking about it, but this old man, it
was a very poor message. And the young man said, I prepared
well. And the old man said, yes, I
could tell. You worked on that message. You prepared well. He
said, what about my presentation? He said, you have a good voice
and you speak well. What about my illustrations?
Oh, he said, they were moving. Well, he said, why if I prepared
well and presented it well and illustrated it well, how can
you say there's a poor message? He said, son, there was no Christ
in your message. Christ wasn't in your message.
Christ and Him crucified. Well, he said, Sir, Christ wasn't
in the text. You don't see the word C-H-R-I-S-T
in this book, as I read. Christ was not in the text. He
said, Son, never forget this. Christ is in every text. To Him give all the prophets
witness. Our Lord opened the Scriptures
to His disciples in the Prophets, in the Psalms, in all the Scripture,
and preached Himself to them. Christ is the Old Testament. Every text leads to Christ and
to the cross. And your business is to get on
that road to Calvary when you read that text. How's that here? All right, you'd heard the stories,
I read it. Naomi determined to go back to
Bethlehem because of the Lord blessing Bethlehem when the famine
was over. And here in Ruth chapter 1, let's
go back to verse 19. So the two of them, here are
these two women, and they've walked a long ways, they've walked
from Moab Back to Bethlehem. Somehow made their way. Much
desert country. They were poor. You'll see in
a moment just how poor they were. No husbands, no income, no home,
no land, no houses, nothing. So the two of them, verse 19,
went until they came to Bethlehem. And it came to pass, when they
would come to Bethlehem, all the city was moved about them.
And they said, is this Naomi? She had left there, well, we
know ten years, probably more. Don't know how long she lived
in Moab with her husband, but ten years. The sons were married
and died, but fifteen, twenty years. She left there a beautiful,
wealthy woman. They owned property in Bethlehem. They sold out. They sold out
and moved to the pagan countries. They left Bethlehem. And the
Lord's people sold out, moved to this pagan country. And she
describes it. She said, call me bitter. Don't call me Naomi. Call me
bitter. The Almighty dealt bitterly with
me. I went out full. I went out rich, beautiful, strong,
with a husband, two fine sons. And I'm back here empty. I went away full, and now I come back empty. Rich, I come back poor. Sweet,
come back bitter. Now pauper. Well, you see, that's
the picture of the fall, the fall of man. When God made man,
he made man beautiful, healthy, strong, wise, in his own image. That's why it's said God created
man holy and upright, but man sought out many evictions, left
God, went to the pagan country. And now when I look around me
and I see men and women, we're depraved, demented mentally Sick. The whole head is sick. The whole
heart is faint. The sole of the feet to the top
of the head is nothing but wounds and scars and bruises of the
fall. Evidences of the fall. Wrinkled
and old and weak and depraved and dying. Yeah, in Adam we all
died. We went out of the garden full
and now we're empty. We went out of the garden kings,
and now we're paupers. We went out of the garden sweet,
holy, righteous in Christ, in God. Now we're without hope,
without help, without God, Paul said in Ephesians. The king is
now a pauper. There's none good, no, not one.
There's none righteous. There's none that understand
it. There's none that seek God. This
is a picture to follow. I see those two women coming
into the town, and these old friends, they look at her and
don't recognize her. They ask her, is this Naomi? Is this the man God created in
his own image? It's a poor, a poor picture,
isn't it? Well, let's look at chapter 2. Here, that's ruined by the fowl. Here's a picture of sovereign
love. I want you to watch this. Now, one key, they came to, it
says in verse 22, chapter 1, they came to Bethlehem in the
middle, in the beginning of the barley harvest. Barley was the
crop that they used for bread and all other things, but they
were reaping. God's, the famine was in the
land. Now there was plenty, plenty everywhere. And they were reaping
the barley. And Naomi had a kinsman of her
husband's, a mighty man of wealth, of the family of Elimelech. His
name was Boaz. You know who his mother was. You remember when Joshua came
to take Jericho? And there was a woman who ran
a a house of some sort, entertainment and beverages and whatever goes
with it, in the wall of Jericho. Her name was Rahab. And God,
she found grace in the eyes of the Lord. The only family in
that town, in that city of Jericho. And the spies came and she hid
them. She said, I've heard of your God. I've heard of your
deliverance across the wilderness. And your God is God. And when
you come to take this land, would you remember me? It sounds like
a thief on the cross, doesn't it? And my family? And Joshua's
men said to her, she had a home in the wall. Her house was in
the wall. The wall was around the whole
city. And it was a big, thick wall, probably as big as this
room. But there were houses and stores in the wall. Her window
was outside the wall, her door was inside the wall. And they
said, you get your mother and father, your family, and get
in that, in that, in your house. All of it. Don't go outside the
house. Stay in the house. And put a red scarlet streamer
out of the window. That's the blood of Christ. And you stay in the wall. You'll
be preserved. And when Joshua and Israel walked
around that wall, the whole wall fell. But I can tell you one
thing. There was one part of the wall that didn't fall. That's
her house. God preserved it. That's Rahab
the harlot. That's her son. Would you believe that? Isn't
that something? Now look it up. This is her son. The reference
right there in the middle of your Bible is Matthew 1.5. Rahab
begat Boaz. And Boab was akin to a limalack. He's a kinsman. I'm going to
show you something in a minute now. And Ruth the Moabitess said to
Naomi, let me now go to the field and glean ears of corn after
him in whose sight I shall find grace. And she said, well, go
my daughter. The custom was then, these reapers went through the
fields and they reaped the barley, the corn or whatever. And they
didn't do a total cleaning job. There were
pieces of barley that fell behind them. Now, naturally, in any
field, when you pick cotton, there's cotton left over. When
you pick corn, there's corn left over. When you pick barley, barley's
left over. And the poor beggars of the town could come behind
the reapers with their sacks and pick up these You put it
in a sack and go and mill it and go home and make bread. Poor
people. And usually these folks that
followed the Reapers were abused. They were abused. They were laughed
at. They were ridiculed. They were beggars. And these
proud, rich field owners and Reapers made fun of them. And this was a lowly, lowly,
lowly position to follow the reapers and pick up pieces as
they left. And she said, you go, my daughter,
verse 3. And she came, she went and came
and gleaned in a field after the reapers and her. It happened. She, her happened was to light
on the part of the field that belonged to Boaz, who was a kindred
of Elimelech. Now, let me tell you something.
The things that just happened don't just happen to God's people.
to children of God or sheep of God. They happened on orders
from the Lord, according to the purpose of the Lord. This one,
this girl, there were a lot of fields in Bethlehem. But the
Spirit of God directed her before she knew the Spirit of God. The
Lord Jesus led her before she knew the Lord. That's right,
brought her to this field. And behold, Boaz came from Bethlehem
and said to the reapers, the Lord be with you. He was a godly
man. His mama was a godly woman. The Lord, my goodness, what a
heritage. And they answered and said, Lord
bless you. And Boaz said to his servant, he saw Ruth. He said, who's that? Can't you
just imagine? He saw her before she saw him. He fell for her before she knew
he was on the place. And that's the picture. The Lord
loved us from the foundation of the world. He saw us beggars. Beggars. Poor. With nothing. No bodies. The foolish God had chosen. The
weak. The things that are not. And
He set His love upon us. Herein is love. Not that you
love God. He loved you. And He saw her. And Boaz said
to his servant that was over his reapers, whose damsel is
this? And the servant, verse 6, that was set over the reapers
told him, it's the heathen woman, it's the Moabitess woman that
came from back with Naomi out of the country of Moab. And she
said to me, Ruth said to me, this girl said to me, I pray
you let me glean and gather after the reapers among the sheaths. So she came and had continued
even from the morning. She'd been here all day until
now. Except she tired a little in
the house. And Boaz said to Ruth, he got her attention, he said,
now, here's how not, my daughter, don't you go to another field,
neither go from thee hence. You abide here fast by my maidens. And let not your eyes be on a
field that they do reap. Let thine eyes be on the field
that they drew, and go thou after them. And I've charged the young
men, they'll not touch you." See, our Lord loved us. We didn't
love Him. We didn't know Him. Ruth didn't
know Boaz. But He loved us, and He gave
orders to the angels to watch after you, and protect you, and
keep you, and not let anybody harm you or hurt you, before
you ever knew Him. Boaz told these young fellows,
you watch after her. Don't you let anybody mess with
her. Don't you do it. And she fell on her face and
bowed herself to this man and she said, oh listen, why have
I found grace in your eyes? Isn't that a good question? Why
does the Lord love you and me? Why did He choose us and pass
by so many? There were a lot of girls out
there in that field. Lots of them. There are a lot of sinners
out in this world, too. He passed them by. "...that thou
shouldest take knowledge of me, seeing I am a stranger." And
Boaz answered and said to her, "...it hath fully been shown
me all that thou hast done to thy mother-in-law since the death
of thy husband, and how thou hast left thy father and thy
mother." Ruth had some things to commend her. You see, a picture
won't walk on four legs. It's an earthly story with a
heavenly meaning. It can't be perfect. And she's
a picture of us, a poor beggar with nothing. And he loved her
before she loved him, knew her before she knew him. But she
had been gracious to her mother-in-law. You and I don't have any graciousness
at all in our sins when he found us. There was nothing to commend
us to him, nothing. The Lord recompensed thy work,
and a full reward be given thee of the Lord of Israel, under
whose wings thy heart come to trust. Then she said, Let me
find favor in thy sight, my Lord, for that thou hast comforted
me, for that thou hast spoken friendly unto thy handmaid, though
I be not like unto one of thy handmaidens. And Boaz said unto
her, At mealtime come thou hither and eat of the bread, dip thy
morsel in the vinegar, She sat beside the reapers, he reached
her parched scorn, she did eat, was sufficed and left. And when
she had risen up, listen, to go back to the field to glean,
Boaz commanded his young men saying, let her glean even among
the sheaves. Don't restrict her to picking
up what's left. I don't care if she goes among
the sheaves. And don't you shame her, don't
you reproach her. Now listen, I love this. And
let fall also some of the handfuls of purpose for her. Leave them on purpose that she
may glean them, and don't rebuke." Hadn't he left us a lot of handfuls
on purpose? Good gracious. He said to these
reapers, when you're cutting, just accidentally throw a whole
bottle down. You know, throw a whole bottle
down. Handful on purpose. She gathered, that's the love
of our God, the love of God, how rich, how poor, how measureless,
how strong, all our lives, all our days. God takes care of His
own, even when we were pagans and unbelieving. All right, verse
17. So she gleaned in the field until
evening, and beat out that she had gleaned. It was about an
ephra. of barley. I don't know how much. I knew
what that was. I forgot a whole bunch anyway. And she took it
up and went into the city. And her mother-in-law saw what
she had gleaned. And she brought forth and gave
to her that she had reserved after she had sufficed. And her
mother-in-law said, where did you glean today? This is amazing. She had an abundance of barley. Where did you glean? Where wrotest
thou? Blessed is he that did take knowledge
of thee." She showed her mother-in-law with whom she had wrought. She
said, the man's name with whom I wrought today is Boaz. Boaz, a type of Christ. It had that magic meaning and
ring to Naomi. that Ruth knew nothing about.
But when she said Boaz to Naomi, it was the most glorious
thing she could have heard. For listen, Naomi said to her
daughter-in-law, Bless the Lord. Oh, bless the Lord. The man who
has fallen for you and paid attention to you, and you found grace in
his sight, is our kinsman-redeemer. He's our kinsman-redeemer. God
has not left off His kindness to the living, to the dead. This
man is our kinsman-redeemer. What did that mean to Naomi that
it didn't mean a thing to Ruth? But to Naomi. Turn to Leviticus,
chapter 25. Leviticus 25. Now this land that
God gave Israel across the flood, across the river, Canaan. This land, God says in chapter
25 of Leviticus, verse 23, the land, He divided it to the different
tribes. This land shall not be sold forever. You can't sell it forever. The
land is mine. It's not yours. It's my land.
And you can't sell it forever. You're strangers, you're sojourners
with me. You're my people and you're with
me, Israel, but the land's not yours to dispose of permanently. It's mine. I wish we could remember
that too. Not yours, it's mine. Earth's
the Lord's and the fullness is ours. And you can't dispose of
it, it's my land. So, verse 24, and in all the
land of your possessions you shall grant a redemption for
the land. We're going to fix up a way for
the land not to be lost forever, but to be redeemed. Now, if a
brother be waxen poor, now listen, Elimelech sold out and left,
took his wife Naomi. That was her land along with
him. But he sold out and left, went to pagan Moab. Now she's
back. but the land's in the possession
of someone else. But God said you can't do that
forever. If a brother's poor and sold his possession, and
if any of his kin, kinsmen, somebody of near kin, come to redeem him,
then shall he redeem that which his brother sold. If there's
a near kinsman who is willing to redeem the land, who is able. He's got to be both willing and
able. Willing and rich enough. Able. He can buy it back. Now
that's Christ. He's our kinsman redeemer. What
we lost in Adam, God intends to redeem. And our Lord Jesus
Christ became bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh. His brethren. His children. His people. And
He's our near kinsman. He's one with us, numbered with
the transgressors. And He's able to redeem. He's the only one that is able.
He's the only one who has a perfect righteousness and a sinless atoning
blood. He's the only one who can satisfy
the law of God and the justice of God and the holiness of God
and the demands of God. He's not only able, He's willing.
No man takes my life from me. I lay it down willingly, he said,
for my sheep." This Boaz, and that's the reason when Ruth came
in with all this abundance, and Naomi knew this is not ordinary. Usually these girls came in embarrassed
and with very little and abused and mistreated, and she came
in happy and with plenty. And Naomi says, where have you
been? With whom did you? Somebody,
you found grace in somebody, she said, his name is Boaz. And that's that resurrection,
when I say Christ to you, just say Boaz, everybody here loves
him, that's just a, that's a redeemer. My redeemer. But I lost ten atoms,
restored in Christ. Oh, she said, this man's our
near kinsman. Now listen, verse 21, I've got
to move. And Ruth the Moabite said, well,
he said to me also, I shall keep fast by my young men until they
have ended all the harvest. And Naomi said to Ruth, her daughter-in-law,
it's good, my daughter, that thou go out with his maidens,
that thou meet not in any other field. So she kept fast by the
maidens of Boaz to glean to the end of the barley harvest, wheat
harvest, and dwelt with her mother-in-law. Here's a picture of repentance
and faith. Now, listen to Naomi. She talks to this girl in chapter
3. Now, Naomi, her mother-in-law, said to her, My daughter, shall
I not seek rest for thee? Rest and happiness and joy, that
it may be well with thee. This is what I feel like when
I'm talking to a congregation of beggars, sinners, Moabites. I seek rest for you, that it
may be well with your soul. I want you to see how you can
be brought out of poverty into riches, brought out of sin into
sanctification and life, brought out of the kingdom of darkness
into the kingdom of God your Son. And the only one who can
do it is Boaz, our Lord Jesus Christ. Now she said that. I
want to seek rest for you. And listen now, Boaz is not Boaz
of our kindred with whose maidens you were. Behold, he winneth
barley tonight in the threshing-floor. Now you wash yourself, and you
anoint yourself, put raiment upon you, and you get down to
the floor. Don't you make yourself known to him. He's great and
rich and wealthy and powerful, and you are nobody. And don't
you presume anything. Don't presume anything. He showed
grace to you, but don't presume. Don't you rush forward and make
yourself obnoxious. Don't make yourself known to
Him until He has finished eating and drinking. It shall be when
He lies down, you go mark the place where you saw Him lie down,
and you go in, uncover His feet, and you lay down at His feet. That's some orders to give a
young lady. You talk about humility. But
you know this is where beggars are found, at the feet of the
Lord. At the feet of the Lord. Mary,
it always talks about Mary who sat at His feet. The story about
the harlot who kissed His feet. Didn't say a word, just cried.
sat by his feet and kissed them, dried them with her hair of her
head. John on the Isle of Patmos, even the beloved disciple said,
I fell at his feet like a dead man. Don't talk and carry on. You
sit at his feet and he'll tell you what to do. This generation doesn't want
to hear that. The preachers and the people
and everybody else, there's too much talk about what we're going
to do for Jesus. What are we going to do for Jesus?
How are we going to serve the Lord? Naomi told Ruth, keep your
mouth shut and sit at His feet. Sit at the feet of His Word.
Let Him speak to you. To you, speak to you. And listen,
she said, all you say to me, oh, I wish I could get a congregation
somewhere to say, everything you say, I'm going to do good
night of life. Wouldn't that be something? She
went down to the floor and did according to what her mother-in-law
told her. And Boaz had eaten and drunk, and his heart was
merry. He went to lie down to the end of the heap of corn.
She came softly and uncovered his feet and laid her down. At
midnight, the man was Afraid, something startled him. And he
turned to himself and behold, a woman laid his feet. He said,
who are you? She said, I'm Ruth, your handmaid.
Spread therefore thy skirt over thy handmaid, for you are my
Redeemer. You are my hope. You are my help. You are the only one who can
help me in all the universe. If you don't help me, I'll perish. He said, Blessed be thou of the
Lord, my daughter. I showed more kindness in the latter
end than in the beginning. And as much as you follow us,
not young men, whether poor or rich, you follow your Redeemer. Now, my daughter, fear not. I'll
do to thee all that thou requirest. For all the city of my people
doth know thou art a virtuous woman. And now it's true that
I am your near kinsman. How be it? There's another one. nearer than I. Now that kind of throws a monkey
wrench in this thing, doesn't it? There's another fellow that
has a demand on you that I have to meet. There's a fellow that has a claim
on you. I say this can't walk on four
legs. It's like him talking about her
being a virtuous woman. That's not why the Lord loved
us. He loved us like we were. Anyway, this other kinsman, I
think, I believe, is the law of God and the justice of God
who has first claim on me. Christ loved me. He made me His
own. And He laid claim to His church,
His people, you and me, all who believe. But the justice of God
had a claim on us. That's why he had to go to the
cross, to satisfy that claim. And the law had a claim. So Boaz
went to see this other kinsman over here in chapter 4. And he said, verse 3, he said
to the kinsman, Naomi that is come again out of the country
of Moab, selleth a parcel of land which was our brother's,
Elimelech's. And I thought to advertise thee saying, buy it
before the inhabitants and before the elders of my people. If you
will redeem it, redeem it. If you will not redeem it, then
tell me that I may know, for there is none to redeem it besides
thee, and I'm after thee, and I'll redeem it. And said Boaz,
what day thou buy'st the field of the hand of Naomi, thou must
buy it also of Ruth, the wife of the dead, to raise up the
name of the dead upon his inheritance. And the kinsman said, I can't
redeem it. I can't redeem it for myself,
lest I mar my own inheritance. You redeem. Redeem now thy right
to thyself. I cannot redeem it." Law couldn't
save me. Law couldn't save me. Had a claim
on me, but all the law can do is damn, condemn, and curse. So Christ came and satisfied
the law and the justice of God and redeemed us. He redeemed
us. And while all this was going
on, Ruth went home. Now listen, Ruth went home. Now
she, my, don't you know her heart was
beating 100 miles an hour, but out of poverty, out of want,
out of misery, out of the beggar state, this man could redeem
her. And he told her to sit still. And she came home to her mother.
Verse 16 of chapter 3. Let's look at this. This is good.
Chapter 3, verse 16. She came to her mother-in-law,
and she said, Who art thou, my daughter? And she told her all
that the man had done to her. And she said, These six measures
of barley gave he me. For he said, Go not empty unto
thy mother-in-law. And then said she, Sit still,
my daughter. Sit still. Well, guess I'm sure
there's something I must do. Sit still. But I'll go see him
again, make sure he hasn't forgotten. Sit still. Well, I'll go and
sit on the front porch so he can see me out there, because
he could, you know, take up with somebody else. Sit still. Sit
still. Listen. Sit still, my daughter,
till thou know how the matter will fall. The man will not be
in rest till he's finished the thing Our Lord Jesus Christ said, I
must be about my father's business, redeeming my people. When he
prayed in Gethsemane, he said, I finished the work you gave
me to do. And when he was hanged on that cross, he said, it's
finished. He'll not rest. And when he finishes it, he'll
rest. And you will too. He'll enter
into his rest, and you will too. Cease from his labor. I love
that. Sit still now. Wait on the Lord. If He loves you, He'll call you. He'll redeem you. He'll save
you. And you know, here's the last
thing, chapter 4, verse 13. So Boaz took Ruth. He chose her. He loved her. He chose her. He
called her. He paid for her. He paid the price. She was his
wife. And he went into her, and the Lord gave her conception.
She bare a son. And the women said to Naomi,
Blessed be the Lord, which hath not left thee this day without
a kinsman. Brother, let me tell you, that
is a statement that means so much. He hadn't left you without
a kinsman. Ooh, he could have, but he didn't
leave you without a kinsman redeemer, one who's able to save and will
it. Oh, my goodness. His name may
be famous in Israel. And he shall be unto thee a restorer
of thy life, and a nurse of thy old age, and thy daughter-in-law
which loveth thee, which is better to thee than seven sons hath
borne him." And Naomi took the child, laid it in her bosom,
became nurse to it, and the women, her neighbors, gave it a name.
There is a son born to Naomi, and they called his name Obed. He is the father of Jesse. the
father of David. Isn't that so? Mercy of God. How great. How wonderful. The Lion of God's grace. There
was Rahab, harlot, pagan, found grace. God gave her a son, Boaz. And Boaz became a mighty man
who loved God and a type of Christ. He met this girl Ruth, whom he
loved, and bought her. And she bore a son. And to that
son was born a son called Jesse, and to that son, David, man after
God's own heart. I tell you, God's providence
is better than anything, and God's grace is Oh my, just don't
preach this word salvation to me. I don't listen to it. I want
to hear about how God saved sinners. You sit still and he'll finish
the word. Paul said in Philippians 1.6,
I'm confident of this very thing, that he who hath begun a good
work for you and in you will finish it in the day of Christ.
Salvation is of the Lord.