The story of Ruth and Boaz provides a surprising illustration of a woman proposing marriage, guided by the cultural practice of the Levirate law. This law established the role of a kinsman-redeemer, a relative obligated to provide for a widow and preserve a family line. Finding God’s will, especially in marriage, is less about receiving detailed instructions for every step and more about surrendering oneself to His sovereign purpose. When two people, like Ruth and Boaz, recognise in each other a worthy character and a shared commitment to the God of Israel, The Lord, they can trust that God will overrule circumstances to bring about His good and perfect will.

Automatically Generated Transcript

[00:00:00] I’m feeling fairly certain that most of us here this morning would be unaware that the Bible has got an illustration of a woman proposing marriage to a man and that it is quite an ordinary exercise of what is a requirement in their culture when this happens. It’s actually the storyline of Ruth and Boaz and how Ruth put to Boaz the idea of her becoming his wife or his more likely, better said, his becoming her husband. And the context in which that’s understandable is actually what we’ve been already going through in these morning services about the return of Ruth and Naomi to their home country and the fact that they evoked the Leverite vow or the Leverite law, which was put into practice by Moses back in Deuteronomy

[00:01:02] and had sections there whereby it would be possible for a relative to redeem a fortune or the family line or the property that’s lost of a man, a brother who had died on behalf of the widow. And this Leverite law is not something that most of us know. I have to confess that until this preparation time I’d heard the wording but didn’t really know what it was about at all. And this Leverite law is where they have enshrined the idea of a kinsman redeemer. And the kinsman redeemer is a relative of someone who feels obligated to step in and provide for the needs of a relative in trouble and particularly if it is a widow whose husband has been killed. And this is a story line which Boaz finds himself as the relative of Naomi and therefore qualifies.

[00:02:06] He’s not first in line in qualifications but he’s second in line that can possibly step in and help Naomi as she returns to their own land of Israel along with Ruth who is the widow of one of her sons. And it’s really interesting how this all works out. It raises a few questions of course that I should tell you just before going any further that if we have a story line which involves Ruth suggesting in a special way that Boaz should become her husband nothing is said as to whether he’s not already married or whether he’s still single. The truth was that this was in a period of time when the people of Israel under God’s direction through Moses had set up things that there might be support for people who became in need such as widows.

[00:03:05] As it happened back then the average age of a man that got married in this particular time this will vary right across history of course but the average age well after all I think Adam was only one or thereabouts in age but mostly in the era of Naomi and going back to her home country and Ruth meeting up with Boaz the average age of a man getting married was around 30 and the wives of the ones they married were usually 10-15 years younger. Now a consequence of that age difference and that wasn’t because of any sense of we might jump to conclusions about the rationale behind that. It’s really because in those days I think better than us today people stayed within their families with a tighter knot and a greater connection

[00:03:59] even when they come to be married and so usually a young woman stayed in her parents’ house until she was married and there was not the case of a whole lot of single people running around free as we now have today but back then the family unit was much stronger and one that was prosecuted more vigorously than we have today and that was just how it was but because of the age difference between 30 and anywhere you know 15 or so years old for the bride that that necessarily implied that there was going to be a lot of widows as the older men died off and so that’s why they had to in their system the Jewish people have to some way to have the widows will be looked after and it came about in what is called this Leverate Law, L-E-V-I-R-A-T-E, Leverate Law

[00:04:57] and the law was really one about preserving the property rights and any other needs that a widow woman, that Naomi was, was looked after and that’s why in the storyline we learn that Boaz is a connection, a relative of Naomi and Ruth comes into the picture because she also is a widow but she’s not the primary widow that this Leverate Law is being applied on behalf of it’s actually Naomi, the mother-in-law of Ruth, the daughter-in-law and so as they arrive back in Israel and the whole of the town as they’re aware of the return of this woman Naomi who’d been gone with her husband Elimelech down into Moab because of the famine that was in Israel now she’s returned hearing that God had blessed Israel and there’s food available and she’s arrived with a daughter-in-law that the others didn’t know about

[00:05:54] but well at least we don’t know that they knew about Ruth has come as well now this idea of the Leverate, Leverate, I’ve got to say it right L-E-V-I-R-A-T-E, Leverate Law was one that particularly talked about a kinsman, kinsman, not kinsman, kinsman kinsman, kinsman, because he’s a relative, kin kinsman redeemer and the kinsman redeemer would have responsibility of stepping in as I just mentioned before if there were to be a need of someone like Naomi but what happens is that Ruth arrives and all the town, as you can just imagine it’s Bethlehem but it’s only a small town and it’s all buzzing with the news that Naomi’s come back and if Ruth had been 15 when she was married she’s probably 25 now and it’s news all around the town and they’re all talking about it now what then happens is that this Leverate Law

[00:06:58] also allowed that the person who was the kinsman redeemer could do what was necessary in order to guarantee the return or the getting back of the property that might have been lost by someone who was a relative and Elimelech who left with Naomi was that relative of Boaz and he would, in going off with Naomi to Moab have lost the properties that were bequeathed to his family line and so because they were trying to keep the property lines to be remaining intact even across the years and the lives and deaths of people that was something that the Israeli people were trying to do under God and Moses they had this law that if there were such a needy woman like Naomi that someone could step in as the kinsman redeemer so Leverite Law is what you’ve got to remember

[00:07:57] and kinsman redeemer which is a part of the operation of it what actually happens is not an example of Ruth being a modern woman who’s ignoring all the rest of the people and taking culture into her own hands no it’s actually the opposite because Naomi is instructing her daughter-in-law and last week I was talking about the relationship of Naomi and Ruth and how much of a good mother Naomi turned to be to her daughter-in-law and in this particular case Ruth is not asserting her independence but just the opposite she’s willing to let her mother in this case mother-in-law lead her and Naomi gives her the advice as to what to do now there’s another custom that comes into play here with regard to the way the agricultural culture supplied for people their feeding needs back then

[00:08:56] and particularly had in mind to help those who might be without any support and having no property or not having any crops and it was the idea of gleaning I’ve overheard some people asking what does it mean when the Bible says that Ruth went off gleaning it’s actually the task of picking up the spare pieces of crop that has fallen that the reapers have gone before and collected the bulk of but someone who was a gleaner was someone who followed up after the reapers and managed to pick up the spare pieces that dropped out and the bits that were left and Ruth has proposed that she go and do some gleaning and when she’s there Naomi gives her advice see if you can get to be in the spot which is the land where Boaz has ownership because they used to do this as a bulk group of men who had different properties

[00:09:49] and they’d all work together and organise people to be harvesters in their set of lands and one of those set of lands would be that belonging to Boaz and so Naomi gives Ruth special advice to see if you can get to if you can get to be gleaning in the spot of Boaz now that’s not but a little hint from mother-in-law to daughter-in-law has to where something good might happen for her I think if it’s not there written very much in black and white but if you read this story it’s going to be my second point for this morning’s sermon about some advice as to how to get married not that I’m an expert on that but I want to tell you that there’s something in the Scriptures that gives us a hint not only about how to get married but how to get married under the smile of God.

[00:10:44] How to get married as a person that finds God’s will for your life. And the advice can be generalised to all of us who struggle at times to know how to find what God really wants us to do. I came through a time in my own teenage years where the church I was at, the set of young people that I was the same age as, had a time of revival and getting really keen for Christ. And we became so keen to be doing what the Bible says that one new convert who was brought into the group said to us as he looked at us and he said, we should, he just read in the Bible that we’re meant to look after the widows and the fatherless. And he brought that to our prayer meeting group that we had. He said, I didn’t know we’re meant to be doing things for the widows and the fatherless.

[00:11:32] And he said, I’ll make a list of all the widows and we’ll go and mow their lawns and do things. The rest of us were wondering what that was going to mean for us. But he organised a list of places to go. And we were doing whatever the Bible said. He was a new convert. He’d not been a Christian long enough to know that you didn’t always do what the Bible said. Sorry, I shouldn’t say that. He actually would read it and say, we have to do it. Really did a lot of good for us as a group. Well, it also talked in the scriptures about finding God’s will. And so all the people in the group, we were ones who were a bit fanatical about, let’s do this if it’s God’s will. Why I say fanatical? Because God doesn’t always speak up and enunciate his will.

[00:12:19] Sometimes he leaves it to his sovereign arrangement of circumstances. And sometimes he’s more interested in us being willing to obey than he is to give us specific details. Sometimes his will is found when we do the best that we can of working out the circumstances. But sovereignly he overrules. And we get to discover it was just what he wanted. Think of God’s will, and I was on about this last week a little bit. Think about God’s will as not just some detail. But think about it as the purpose, the overall purpose that he has for you that he’s seeking to bring about. And anyway, what happens is that Naomi gives to Ruth this advice and says to her, see if you can stick to where it’s the land more likely to be that of Boaz. But Ruth doesn’t know which really.

[00:13:12] She’s just there going with a whole group of them as they seek to do the gleaning after those who are bringing in the grain. But what happens is that she does, by chance, end up on Boaz’s land. She didn’t know it was at first, but it was. He tells her. And in the conversations they have, it’s really interesting to see that there’s just a flavour of romance. It’s not a description that’s meant to be telling you a romance story, but it has a flavour of one. And something very interesting about it, it has a flavour of showing how you can find God’s will in the question of marriage if you listen to the storyline and pick up the vibes as to what it gives an example of. Well, Ruth advises her to stay, if she can, in Boaz’s property. And he eventually comes and inspects.

[00:14:09] Now, what’s interesting is some of the factors that have to do with why he’s an appropriate person. As an example for us, how to find the will of God in marriage, for example. Number one is that he’s described as a worthy man. Now, what is a worthy man? It needed me a bit of researching to find out because it wasn’t quite that simple. But Boaz is actually quite a wealthy man. And the worthiness in one sense is because he has the means to support a family. He’s worthy in that sense. Worthiness has another sense in which he has a moral character that is looked up to. A third way that worthiness is exemplified in Boaz is that he’s a leader amongst his people. The way that they did all of this harvesting was that the ones who owned the properties arranged for there to be harvesters who would be employed.

[00:15:04] And they’d come out and inspect the activities, but they didn’t actually do the harvesting. And Boaz is one of those. And his being a worthy man is that he’s a respected man in the town and that he comes out to see how the harvesting’s going. And in that visit, he discovers among those who are doing the gleaning is Ruth. but as he talks to Ruth she realizes that he seems to know more about her than she expected that he would and he says to her how pleased he is that she has been looking after her mother-in-law and I’m summarizing now and how he’s heard of how she took a risk in leaving her own country and her own families mother and father back there mother and father back there and her family and her culture and had come to be a part of the people of God

[00:15:58] and how much he recognised the spirituality of that step of her to come to say to Ruth, your people will be my people and your God, my God. And this was something that the whole town had been hearing about. So not only was he a worthy man in the sense of the money that he had or a sense of the leadership in the town they had of the sense of his moral character with which people respected him. But she is someone who has got a reputation of being someone who’s willing to put God first, who’s left her own culture to come back to the culture of the Jewish people, who’s made great sacrifice to help her mother-in-law and to give her company when others couldn’t take that step. Ruth had come and last of all for her to say, your people will be my people. Your God, my God. And when

[00:16:59] he heard that on the grapevine about this girl who’d come, he was interested. And you can’t help read this story but without recognising these twin facts, that one, that he found her a worthy girl, and two, that she was someone who chose God first. And to say, your God will be my God to Naomi. To come and join a foreign nation with their foreign worship. But she dedicated herself. And I think that one of the chief characteristics that brings us into the position that we will discover the will of God is when we surrender ourselves to do what God wants. Hence the gospel tracks, named as the book of Romans, the gospel track that tells you what the gospel is finishes in chapter 12 with a conclusion. In chapter 12, verse 1 and 2 and 3 and 4, those first verses of Romans 12, Paul says,

[00:18:02] I beseech you therefore brethren. Talking to people now, he can say as brothers and sisters in Christ. I beseech you therefore brethren by the mercies of God. He’s referring to the fact that you’re brethren by the mercy of God, the act of Jesus in coming as the saviour and dying on the cross. The fact that he’d been raised from the dead and gone to heaven to secure a place for us. This saviour of ours, because of what Jesus has done, they’re the mercies of God, to present yourself as a living sacrifice. I beseech you by the mercies of God, present yourself as a living sacrifice and so you will prove what is that good and perfect will of God. I love the word of God. Just about every word in every verse. I’m one who believes in the verbal inspiration of scriptures.

[00:19:00] That does not mean the dictation method necessarily. It means the very language. Our word verbal comes from Old English to mean the language. And when you talk about the verbal inspiration of the scriptures, you’re talking about the inspiration having had impact at the very language in which the original documents were written. And when you believe in the verbal inspiration of God, It does something to your preparation for sermons. What it does is that you get each word, you track back to what might be the original, you might even look up different languages where the Old Testament was written in Hebrew and then there’s a Greek translation and you very eagerly go and compare the two, learn about what the original meaning was in the language that was inspired originally. There’s purpose to be found

[00:19:50] and words, I find them are like those little lollies that are wrapped up and you’ve got to take off the outer part of the lolly and then you lick them to death and the words of the Bible I think of as mine to lick to get the last bit of flavour out of and when you do that to the scriptures you discover that when it speaks about so you shall prove the will of God it’s not actually talking about first up an intellectual rationale that will make you accept it mentally that could be involved somewhat but when it says prove the will of God it’s talking about having it come true having it happen and when you’ve prayed about something or you’ve been led about something sometimes you’re made it to go into something and you didn’t even know it was going to happen and God did it but it got proven to be his will

[00:20:54] by what happened and the best way to prove the will of God is when you surrender to him the whole issue and lean back into his arms and let happen what he designs and when that happens you prove the will of God on the issue you don’t actually have to know and I was about to tell you a story It’s one of my favourite stories and some of you older ones have probably heard it too many times. But that little revival time that I went through when I was a teenager and we became keen for Christ and we used to go and clean up old people’s backyards as a part of what the book of James said we were meant to be doing. That’s how we interpreted it. The will of God was something we really got hyper on and I remember that friend of mine used to go with me and was in our little group.

[00:21:50] He came and we were doing something at the church. I think we were at a prayer meeting in the pastor’s vestry and we went out from there and he was riding home on his bicycle. This is an age, I was 16 so sometimes I rode my bicycle and sometimes I drove dad’s car and considered myself an adult if you can picture what a 16 year old does. And he had come by bike and when he got halfway home he came to a partner in the way where there were two roads he could take. Both would take him home. But he didn’t know which was the will of God. So he stopped on the bike and sat in there and prayed we wanted the Lord to tell him which way to go to be in the will of God. Now that actually was very silly. It wasn’t silly to have the attitude to want to always do the will of God but it was something untutored

[00:22:37] to think that the will of God is this detail or that detail. Rather what he wants you to be is surrendered. I beseech you therefore by the mercies of God that you surrender. Your body is a living sacrifice and when you live out, letting God have control of all you are and all that you do, you’re giving him the principle of who you are. You’re giving to him that your entire you belongs to him. Sometimes he’ll let you know what to do and sometimes you just do what’s normal when you think it over and sometimes another Christian comes. It’s better if you find some solid Christians who’ve had some experience and listened to them. That’s a good way to find a better way to go but sometimes you do all those things or sometimes you don’t know. It’s just plain, you don’t know, pick this one.

[00:23:29] That was me going to university first of all. I was so unknowing as to where I should go and what I should do and I did nothing. That was my character to be a bit slow at jumping in and doing something. I just did nothing and my mother got desperate with me and went out and got me a scholarship to go and do an honours degree in physics which she picked on because I was good at physics and I didn’t make the decision at all but it turned out to be a wonderful thing even though I never won the rest of… Anyway, the point I’m making is that what’s important is that you belong to God and then he overrules and gets you where he wants you to go. Do you understand? And that’s what’s happening with Naomi and what’s happening with Ruth and Naomi says to Ruth what to do

[00:24:24] and it is actually a custom back there at the threshing floor when they’re getting all the garnered stalkies with the grains in and they thresh out the grains and they throw out the parts not wanted and at the threshing floor that has to do that and it’s like a big hall where they’re all whacking sheaves of grain and catching the little parts that they want to keep. At that threshing floor when the day’s work is done they all go and try and sleep And there was a custom that a girl could go and if there was someone that she needed protection from, it’s more a case of back then there’s always dangers when young women are doing work and they’re out there in the dark and there’s no police in the whole business of the people of Israel. But what they could do is lay themselves down at the feet of a man

[00:25:22] that would be saying, I’m under your protection. But it gained a little bit of a romantic message as well and it got to mean that if you lay yourself at the feet of the sleeping man on the threshing floor that you’re proposing that he marry you. And Ruth told Naomi how she was to find where he was and to watch where he had a good feed and had plenty to drink and was going to have a good sleep, in other words, and not get awakened, that she was to creep along and then get herself lying down at her feet. just near where the blanket stopped, if I’ve got the picture right. And he, of course, woke up and there was a woman there. That must have been a bit of a surprise. No doubt he recognised who it was and they have a conversation. But that was her way of proposing two things. One, that he become her husband.

[00:26:15] That’s where she was a feminine person proposing to a man. And then secondly, that he become the kinsman redeemer because it’s only by him becoming the kinsman redeemer could he, by marrying Ruth, cause her, when having a child, to provide an heir to Naomi. For Naomi and her husband, Elimelech, had now died, her two sons had now died, and there were no children in the picture. They, completely having no heir, lost all of her rights to the property that were granted to her as a part of the tribe of Elimelech, as a part of the children of Israel, coming into the Promised Land where God made sure everybody would have a property. Our politicians should understand that point, that God wanted to see that everybody could have a property. But anyway, it was to guarantee for Boaz,

[00:27:10] who’s the relative of Naomi and therefore doing it on behalf of Naomi as kinsman redeemer, that she would then have an heir. It was going to be the child of Boaz and Ruth. What a fantastic picture. And it’s interesting how that is what Naomi exhorts Ruth to do, which she does. And Boaz wakes up and finds her there, and his reaction is just as complimentary to Ruth and as she is of recognising his worthiness. He doesn’t use quite the same language, but she says, how is it that a man like you should be showing kindness to someone like me? And then he tells of how the rubers have gone around, and everybody’s heard how she’s looked after her mother-in-law and how she’s committed herself to be the person under the God of Israel. And so he has a warmth because of who he is and because of who she is

[00:28:14] and discovering in each other someone who is a worthy man or a woman who loves the Lord and is trusted to his purposes. And that gives us in the Scriptures a bit of a model about how to have a good marriage. It is one by there being two people who both recognise in the other that they’re those who have a spirituality that’s going to mean that they’ll have a family unit that walks with God. The other thing we notice about the attitude to Boaz, and I had a good time preparing this, of reading through just the things that he says and realising that that man had a warmth and a compassion. And it is the compassion of Boaz that is a part of the story that gives it the flavour, I think, of romance, of a love that’s happening. And he is here and he talks to her

[00:29:16] and he speaks to her about what things he’s already done to look after her. And one of them is that he’s arranged for his workers to look after, keep an eye out. So if there were some males around who might be looking for a woman that’s got no protection, that the men from his family and his harvesting would look after Ruth. And secondly, that he’s even given them, this is really good, he’s given them a special instruction that they were, when they did their reaping, to drop bits and leave them where Ruth would come along as a leader and find plenty to pick up because he’s already seen her need. And one of the things I think that made him a worthy man was not because he’s very important in the town, not just because he’s got a lot of money and he doesn’t have to come and do the harvesting,

[00:30:14] he’s got workers to do that. But it’s because he comes. And when you look at how he greets his workers, it’s with a Christian greeting and a blessing and they reply back to him, recognising him as a Christian owner of the land. I’ve used the word Christian wrongly, sorry, because this is pre-Christian era, but a godly man. And in the greetings he gives to his workers and the way he treats them, it is as a godly man treats his workers. and they respect him and in the picture of their respect they see him as someone who is a man that walks with God and those recommendations are ones that have come down to Ruth and Naomi as well as his being a relative but coming back to her from Boaz’s words is his description of how he’s heard all the townspeople talking

[00:31:08] and telling the sacrifice she made to have to leave her own family background her own nation, her own culture and come back with Ruth to make the God of the people of Israel her God and he respects it so much and I think one of the characteristics one of the ways you know someone that’s appropriate to marry is when you meet someone who has a love for God and someone whose obedience to God means that in the language of the Bible at this point you’d call them worthy and so the worthiness is seen in the compassion of Boaz in him looking after Ruth though he’s a very high exalted person and in Ruth’s case the fact that she has been obedient to her mother-in-law and has come and cast herself the very act of putting herself at the feet of a woman in their culture meant that they are going to be submissive

[00:32:11] she wasn’t looking for just a home that she could boss around she wasn’t looking for something where she would be in the limelight by laying at the feet of the man she was saying I will be obedient I will be trusting I will have trust in you to be that husband and that’s a pretty big statement for her to make coming from another country but you see a good example of what it is to be a person who has a romance I’ll call it though it’s really romance is not the chief purpose of the narrative as such but it’s just there anyway is when there is this flavour of kindness and mutual respect for a mutual spirituality of being committed to the God of Israel in their case and in our case when people discover someone that loves the Lord when people discover someone who has I’ve been a teacher at Bible college and I want to tell you

[00:33:12] one of the features of Bible colleges is the students who come many of them come are just good examples of someone looking for a Christian spouse but one girl who was in the same year of intake as me described how she felt called of God to a certain mission this made it very difficult for her she even knew the place in the other country to go to so it limited how many people she could meet it was zero for a while I think who satisfied having a call to the same place, it was really interesting I watched that couple by the way when they eventually got married that she had to give in about her vision because he had a particular place to go to that she didn’t necessarily do but in the long run she had to say she would be prepared to give an obedience to the vision that he had not always does a man

[00:34:11] have the vision but if he does it’s not going to work a marriage if the woman says no no no I’m going to South America and you’re going to Africa, they’re going to have a lot of writing letters. There is a thing about romance and about Christian marriage that you have to let the Lord’s guidance overrule your personal guidances. That can happen in a number of different ways, not only about where you go to live and whose ministry you follow and nestle in with, but also in terms of little matters as to when you have disagreements about what’s the best decision to make. Sometimes you have to be prepared to say, not what I think. And that willingness and that submission, which I think is a mutual submission, is a part of what makes something that is not essentially about guidance,

[00:35:07] but in the middle of getting guidance, it’s got the flavour of romance. And there’s nothing more wonderful than when two people are led together and share together their walk with the Lord. The Bible says can two walk together unless they be agreed and there is a sense in which we have to learn how to be agreed well this is why what I found in our passage for today and the fact that Naomi being a relative of Naomi had a relative who was Boaz was able then to qualify for the Leverite law to apply and for Boaz to be a kinsman redeemer but a part of the package was that he had to marry Ruth in order for all that to happen and God put together in his great plan those two facts, the Leverite marriage requisite and the facts that the necessity of Ruth providing the offspring a baby which baby when born

[00:36:11] became in the line that eventually eventuates in the birth of Jesus Christ. So you can see the purpose of God in this whole story even though it wasn’t as though God spoke to Boaz and says I need you for a special job to be a grand great great grandparent of the Messiah and you better then marry this woman here. None of that revelation happened by God on the details but it was his purpose and this is included in the scriptures because of how the lineage of Jesus has got this figure Ruth that’s a part of it when she came from a race of people who at one time were banned from ever being a part of the children of God because of the bad event that that nation had against Israel. Here is something God did and it proved in the sense of Romans 12 verses 1 to 4 how to prove the will of God and gives us an example to learn

[00:37:10] from it for our days. Let’s have a word of prayer. Heavenly Father I thank you for the storyline of Ruth and Boaz and I thank you for this Moabitess girl who’s had no Sunday school training who had no background of correct religion. In fact she had a background of her nation being rebels against the God of Israel. That this girl by willingness to be surrendered and to be obedient and to respect the God of Israel you have used talk about finding the will of God I don’t think any of us are going to get an oration in heaven as much as Ruth will. Lord I praise you for the example it is of how you can find the purposes of God and know that you’re in his will. We give you praise for that in Jesus name. Amen.