Passage: Ruth 4:1-22
Are you a troubled person?
To answer this question, we must understand first, what ‘troubled’ means. Troubled can mean being in a state of harm. A person about to lose his college scholarship is troubled. A wife whose husband no longer loves her is in a state of harm. Yet troubled can also mean perceiving that you are in a state of harm. Simeon and Anna were joyful when they heard that the King of Jews was born. Herod however, was troubled. Why two opposite perceptions about Jesus’ birth? Herod perceived he would enter a state of harm – he thought he would lose everything with the birth of this king.
So, are you a troubled person?
Why do I ask?
Well, troubled people need redeemers.
What kind of redeemers? Not the kind where you exchange a gift card for a teapot set at the local department store. No, no, no. The kind of redeemer that people in trouble need are those who are both willing and able to save them from the trouble they are troubled with.
Yet here’s the little issue we face. Many people have a hard time admitting they need help. Some have a hard time admitting they have a problem. And if they do admit experiencing problems, many think they are able to fix the trouble. And when they try to resolve their problems, they eventually fail to make any progress.
A good example of this is the common Bible-in-a-year reading challenge. If you ask someone how are they spiritually, they would say, they are alright even if they have not being reading the Bible for two years straight. The past year they think that if they would just recommit themselves to Bible-reading starting January 2024, their Bible reading problem will be fixed. Yet, after one year, they still struggle with Bible reading, and so decide to no longer plan to read the Bible in a year in 2025.
Maybe you are that kind of person today – the kind that finds it hard to admit that you need a redeemer. You may have trouble that is harming you spiritually. Maybe it’s your sin – bitterness, anger, unfaithfulness, envy, lust, adultery, and more. You have trouble harming your sanity. Maybe it’s fatal errors in your work, job retrenchment, market trouble, cheating clients, or an overbearing boss. You may have trouble harming you eternally. You are a sinner. You have rejected Jesus and His gospel. You don’t know God nor think about having to do anything with Him.
Ruth 4 will show us that for people in trouble, God provides a redeemer.
A little bit of overview.
As we enter the last chapter of the book of Ruth, allow me to quickly refresh your memory of what has happened in the last three chapters. In chapter one, Naomi and Ruth became tragic people. They lost their husbands. They became widows. And in becoming widows, they became poor. Yet, God was already preparing to bring light into their darkened life.
In chapter two, Naomi and Ruth were destitute people. They have no means of eating meals. Yet, God provides for Ruth a field with a generous, godly man, Boaz, who gives barley generously to Ruth and Naomi.
In chapter three, they were broken people. However, God was in the process of restoring them – by bringing Ruth closer to marriage with Boaz favourably responding to Ruth’s approach.
Yet as we enter chapter four we will see three important realities that troubled people face.
Reality 1: We all have troubles where we need help.
The kind of trouble that Naomi and Ruth were facing is that their future is dependent on someone beside them redeeming them from their trouble. At this point, Naomi knew that Ruth needed a husband (Ruth 3:1), and the only way for her to have one is to have the redeemer marry her (Ruth 2:20, Ruth 3:2). She recognized that should there be no redeemer (say Boaz gets cold feet), then Naomi and Ruth’s problem will remain unsolved. Yet, thankfully, Naomi and Ruth were honest and humble enough to ask Boaz for help to redeem them (Ruth 3:2-5) – a trait that many Christians today lack to their destruction.
Unlike Naomi and Ruth – who were honest and humble about their troubles – some Christians do not like seeking help for their troubles. They don’t want to admit that they need a redeemer for the troubles they are encountering. They don’t seek help with their sin, their family struggles, or about their spiritual life. They would rather keep it to themselves. And if they ever express that they have problems with any of these, they would immediately present themselves as capable of resolving the problem in due time.
Now, before we go on, let me clarify. I believe there are problems we are not meant to ask redemption for. These are problems where we bear both the responsibility and ability of resolving it. For example, if you have no job, you cannot ask help for money constantly without looking for a job. Your tita in Canada is not obligated to regularly finance your Zus Coffee expenses if you are refusing to find a job. So merely having a trouble doesn’t mean that others should help you with it.
However, there are also troubles where we need outside help, where the trouble is a long time one, and shows no signs of going away.
And the thing is, you know which troubles you have that you need help with.
You often make it obvious when you do one of two things.
First, you show that you need help from others when you publicly sink into immorality in response to your troubles. You show you need help with bitterness whenever your face contorts like elephant wrinkles when you spot your sinning brother in the same room with you five years after your conflict with him. You show you have an addiction to porn when your Facebook wall is full of sensual images of women (unless of course your account was really hacked). You mark yourself as one who needs help with same-sex attraction when you are marching in Quezon City on June for the Pride Month parade while holding hands and caressing a person of the same sex. In short, your public display of your trouble is a clear tell that you need help.
Some of you will say though, “why should I need help, I don’t see my – let’s say, same-sex attraction – as a problem. I embrace it. It’s who I am. I was born this way. Who are you to judge?” Paul Washer once said, “there are no atheist but only liars who claim that God does not exist.” So, there are also no same-sex oriented, born this way image bearers of God. There are only liars who claim that God is not clear enough about something as clear as male and female (Genesis 1:27, Romans 1:18-21).
Thus, you need help when you are becoming proudly and unrepentantly immoral.
The second tell is when you meticulously hide your problem. You probably need help with your porn watching habits when you are in a pattern of watching porn and then deleting your browsing history to cover your tracks. You most surely need help when you claim to have forgiven your brother, but constantly remind him of how he betrayed your trust 10 years ago every time you see him. You need help when you teach bombastically against homosexual practices but find yourself having sensual pleasure being around your youth leader of the same gender.
As such, you need help when you are being an imposter.
How have you responded to your troubles? Have you responded by being more immoral? Or have you covered yourselves with a variety of masks – joking around, saying you are OK – when in fact you cover your troubles with your secret sin?
What trouble do you have right now that you need help with?
Reality 2: We all have something we trust that fails us
So far, the ‘redeemer’ system decreed by God and obeyed as law by His people seemed to be on track to provide Ruth (and Naomi by extension) a redeemer (See Deuteronomy 25:7-9). Boaz, though he seemed to have a desire to be Ruth’s redeemer, knew that there was another redeemer who had first dibs. So, he went to the gate and talked with him about being the redeemer (Ruth 4:1-4). He let him know that Naomi plans to sell her late husband’s property, and that as redeemer, he has the first right to buy the land. Being interested, he said sure – that is until Boaz told him that marriage to Ruth is part of the package (Ruth 4:5-6).
Yet, the person Boaz talked to, the one who had the right and privilege to redeem Ruth would not and could not. Why? We are not told why. Probably because he already has a family that he is providing for, and adding one more wife would make it more difficult for him. Or maybe because Ruth was a Moabite, a foreigner, and he may have concerns about having a wife from a different culture than he had. Whatever the reason, we are not told.
All we can tell is that this potential redeemer wanted the benefit of the property of Naomi and Ruth, but not the responsibility of taking care Naomi and Ruth.
For sure you can relate right? You have had trouble with sin and have really sought help. Maybe you talked with your pastor about your porn problem. Maybe you sought a Christian counselor for your bitterness towards those who betrayed you. Yet, despite the countless times you’ve tried to get help, you find your trouble deepening in your heart rather than going away.
Or maybe you tried distracting yourself from the problem. Maybe you looked to your work to save you from the weight of the trouble you have with your family. You do that by focusing on your work so that you won’t have to face the reality that your wife doesn’t respect you, nor do your children listen to you.
Or probably your friends, your barkadas are the ones you look to to help you deal with your problem. You spend late nights playing Mobile Legends with people living 2,000 kilometers away from you simply because you feel that when you talk with them, they’re words comfort and strengthen you.
Yet, your trouble hasn’t gone away hasn’t it? After talking with your pastor, in two weeks time, you went back and clicked that sensual video to watch. After working for long hours, your wife and children seem more distant to you instead of missing you. After talking with your team-mate in Mobile Legends, you still feel that emptiness in you when the game is done. Why?
Because there are troubles that are rooted in our hearts that cannot be removed by any person around us. They can help cover, they can help monitor, they can help encourage – but like a cheerleader in an operations room, they cannot deal with the spiritual tumor in your heart the way only a skilled surgeon can.
Have you trusted in something that eventually failed you or forgot you? If yes, your question then will be, “well can I be saved from my trouble then? Will this sin remain with me continually? Will my family struggles never cease? Will I never be revived?”
Yes, you have Someone you can turn to.
Reality 3: God has not left us without a Redeemer.
Here is the wonderful news for God’s people in trouble: God has not left you without a Redeemer. If Ruth chapter 4 stopped at verse 6, then yes, we can say that there are problems that God will leave us to deal for ourselves. I mean, if the potential redeemer said no, and Boaz said no as well, then Ruth will not have a husband for the foreseeable future, Naomi’s optimism will return to her bitterness and depression, and their future provision would still be uncertain.
Yet, God made sure that the story won’t end without Ruth and Naomi having a redeemer. God confirmed that Boaz is that redeemer (Ruth 4:7-12).
Because Boaz is the redeemer, there are three ways Ruth and Naomi was saved. First they were saved from their present troubles. Because Boaz committed to marry Ruth, Ruth and Naomi were ensured of long term provision and protection. Now Ruth and Naomi will benefit from the produce of Boaz’s fields, not just the leftovers. Now Ruth has a godly man to protect her and nurture her physically and spiritually.
Second, they were saved from long-term troubles. Naomi’s bitterness was that she lost her husband and children, which means her family lineage would have ended with the death of Mahlon and Chilion (Ruth 1:4-5). Yet, God ensured that Elimelech’s line will continue through Boaz and Ruth. Furthermore, God blessed Boaz and Naomi with a child, which was named Obed. This ensured that Naomi will have a child through Ruth, and that her legacy will be marked by fruitfulness, not death (Ruth 4:13-17).
Third, they were saved from their eternal troubles. Eventually, Obed gave birth to a son, named Jesse, and Jesse gave birth to a son, named David, who became King of Israel. And in Matthew chapter 1, we discover that from the lineage of David, was born Jesus, the Messiah, the one who will save His people from their sins (Matthew 1:21). Jesus came to redeem sinners like Boaz and Ruth and the rest of mankind, from their sins, and reconcile them to God. Boaz and Ruth were saved by believing this promise, just as we are saved by believing in this promise by God as well.
Today, you may have trouble that can be short-term, long-term, or eternal. It may be you have been struggling with depression for a short while now. It may be you have been painfully crying out for help for your porn problem since you were 8 years old until now. It could be that you have stage 4 cancer, but you are afraid to die, for you know you don’t have a relationship with God, and you know that you will receive judgment in hell if you should die right now. And you are frustrated because, you feel that there is no reason for you to be delivered from your troubles, simply because you are just an ordinary person – nothing special, nothing praiseworthy in you.
The good news is, God has not left ordinary folks like us without a redeemer for our troubles. Ordinary folks like Naomi and Ruth received a kind of redeemer that saved them short-term, long-term, and eternally. Today, if you are an ordinary folk like them, the same God they had, is the same God who has given you a Redeemer to save you from these kinds of trouble as well.
The redeemer’s name: Jesus.
At this moment, Jesus wants to help you, even if you are all messed-up (Romans 5:6). Right now as you are reading this, Jesus wants to save you, for that’s why He came (Luke 19:10). At this moment, Jesus calls you to come to Him with your burden, your troubles, and lay it before Him (1 Peter 5:7). Why?
He is the redeemer who is willing to bear your burden, that you may find it is light (Matthew 11:28-29). He is the redeemer who is willing to pay the price of your sin, so that you won’t be slaves to your sin anymore (Romans 6:6). He is the Savior who will… will… will… not maybe will… but will… save you from your sin (Matthew 1:21).
He is the Redeemer that God has given you. And He is a very good Redeemer.
So, will you o troubled soul, draw near,
To the One who sees you, and hear,
Your darkness, your pain, your struggles, your cry,
For He is your Redeemer, your Lord Most High.
Stuck in sin, in anger, and malice,
Same as yesterday, I’m frustrated with this,
Jesus will you redeem me from my darkened soul,
“Yes, I will save you, and make you whole.”