FELLOWSHIP GROUPS

 – SUMMER 2002 JUN 25/27

THE BOOK OF RUTH: ‘LIFE-STORY : LIFE-VALUES’

RUTH 4: ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL

READ RUTH CHAPTER 4

INTRODUCTION – what’s going on in Ruth 4?

(Remember the background (given last week) of God’s good guidance for his people – the laws concerning Leverite and Redemption)

BOAZ’S MASTERSTROKE:

In this chapter it appears, as far as we can make out, that Elimelech had not sold his land (or not all of it) when he left for Moab. Land was there in Bethlehem for Naomi, it seems; but two lone destitute widows, unsupported by family, could only hope to live by selling it. First option (and obligation) of purchase in such a case went to the nearest of kin, which was not Boaz (who was second in line!). The nearest of kin who bought it, would have to pay out money for it, but he would at least have added to the family’s (his family’s) inheritance! The nearest kinsman, for these reasons, at first expresses willingness to take up his option to buy the land. But it is Boaz’s dearest wish to buy the land himself and marry Ruth – and in the most far-reaching way secure the prosperity and happiness of both himself and Naomi and Ruth. So, he points out to the kinsman that by claiming his right as nearest kinsman to have first opportunity to buy the land, he puts himself under the other obligation of taking Ruth and raising up a son and heir for Elimelech. (This would mean that the land he’s spent his money on to purchase would not pass into his family, but to Ruth’s son and Elimelech’s heir. So it would impoverish his family and bring no gain to them! The kinsman had probably discounted the Leverite side of his obligation, thinking that he would only be taking on an obligation to Naomi, who was past child bearing age (1.12). So no ‘son’ would result, and so no heir, so the land would come into his family. Boaz brings Ruth, the Moabitess into the picture. Here is a childless widow of the family, widow of Elimelech’s son. She qualifies for the obligations of Leverite law! There’s a family moral obligation to take her! Take up your right to purchase the land and you take on yourself the obligation to raise up an heir to Elimelech by Ruth. The gaining of land is attractive; the prospect of another heir is not. So the nearest kinsman declines his right as Boaz dearly hoped he would! Boaz, eagerly, takes on all the obligations himself, to the joy of the whole community!

RUTH 4: THE STORY AND THE VALUES

4.1-12: ‘AT THE GATE’ : A PICTURE OF COMMUNITY LIFE

Amongst God’s people at their best, life was marked not only by a deep sense of family commitment, but also by a sense of belonging to and being inseparable from the whole community of God’s people, the covenant family of faith.

The ‘town gate’ (4.1) was the place where the community assembled for conversation and the transaction of business and issues of justice. (See Psalm 127.5, Amos 5.10, Deut 22.15,24, Genesis 23.10, 34.20, Proverbs 22.22, 31.23, Job 29.7-10)

• COMMUNITY LIFE
• What is going on, here, at Bethlehem’s gate?
• What picture do we get from 1-12 of community life at the time?
• Is it a good picture? How like/unlike our times?
• How essential is ‘community’ for human living?
• How necessary to a real community life are the common values that the people of Bethlehem evidently held?
• Boaz involves the whole community in the business transaction he plans and in his marriage to Ruth! They were reckoned to be community concerns.
• What do you make of that?
• Today, our stress is on the ‘individual’ and ‘personal privacy’ in our affairs. Are we losing anything valuable? If so, what?
• A whole-hearted commitment to the Church family community, sharing ourselves and our lives in it. How far will this supply the need for community? What of the wider community outside the family of faith? (Is real community possible where faith and values are not shared?? To what degree?)

• MARRIAGE OF BOAZ AND RUTH
• How does Boaz involve the whole community in his marriage to Ruth?
• to what extent is the relationship between a man and woman (marriage) a personal thing between the two and a social and community thing?
• By turning away from ‘marriage’ and ‘weddings’ to cohabiting (or to private registry office ceremonies) our society is making relationship between a man and woman purely personal.

What is lost in doing so? Is it to the detriment of the individuals or to the detriment of society?

(Boaz makes the community ‘witnesses’ to his marriage to Ruth. How does doing that strengthen both marriage and the community?)

• How do you account for the great sense of joy that the announcement of Boaz’s marriage to Ruth seems to have caused to the people of Bethlehem?
• ‘A person needs something to celebrate; so does a community.’ How important to life are times of celebration? Do we overlook this?

• PEOPLE PRAYING : 4.11-12
• ‘This small book throbs with the life of prayer’. (See 1.8, 2.4, 2.12,30, 3.10, 4.11-12, 14-15)
• What do you notice about the life of prayer of the people of God in this Book? What is the relationship between ’life’ and ‘prayer’ that we see? Can we learn anything?

(4.12: ‘family like that of Perez’: Perez was a key ancestor of the people of Bethlehem. And he was the product of a Levirite marriage (Gen 38). They had a sense of family history!)

4.11-13: THE SANCTITY OF LIFE

• How do these verses emphasise the biblical principle that children are not just the result of human will in procreation, but are a gift of God?
• what are the implications of this?
• ‘the Lord gave her conception’

What is implied here about the point where personal human life begins? (and see elsewhere in the Bible: Eccles 11.5 NIV footnote or NEB; Jer 1.5; Psalm 139.13-16; Gal 1.5)

• Is what is in the womb after conception more than mere ‘womb tissue’? What are the implications?

4.11-22: A SENSE OF HISTORY

• How do these verses bring out the sense the people of God had of ‘the interconnectedness as human beings with generations past and present’? Have we lost this? How important to our living is it?
• "Our history matters. We are who we are to some significant degree because of who our parents and grandparents were." And who we are will affect our children and grandchildren. How does such a consideration affect our living?

GOD AND US: SMALL PEOPLE, GREAT PURPOSES

A Moabite girl gleaning in a barley field miles from home. A caring mother-in-law. A big hearted, kind wealthy farmer who goes beyond the requirements of the law.

"It is in the ordinariness of the events of the lives of ordinary people that God is working out his purposes. Future significant lives are bound up with the history of Ruth. Not only David’s but…. that of the Lord Jesus himself.