Women of God
Naomi & Ruth
I used to think the Book of Ruth was a love story between Ruth and Boaz. It’s really not. It is, however, the beginning of God’s love story for us. The Book of Ruth sets God’s plan—that is, to send us His Son, Jesus—into action. As we will see later, not only does God use Naomi and Ruth to set His plan into action, He does so in such a way that paints a picture of who Jesus would be…Of who Jesus always was and still is and always will be forevermore… The Redeemer of the world.
When I was young, I didn’t think much about Naomi. I was too interested in Ruth’s relationship with Boaz to care about such a “minor” character. But this book makes it absolutely clear both Ruth and Naomi play a minor role in God’s major plan. His love, His power, and His mercy are revealed within their lives. From famine to friendship, from hopelessness to God’s grace, from no future to a highly anticipated family line, it would not be right to say the Book of Ruth is Ruth or Naomi’s story. This is God’s story. Both women come to understand that God’s way is not always My way, so we too, can understand God’s way is ALWAYS good and so much better than our own.
With all that being said, Naomi faced indescribable grief and sorrow. Let’s take a look at her role and character:
Naomi’s Role
BETHLEHEM DURING THE FAMINE
Naomi begins as a wife and mother of two sons. Her husband, Elimelech, is the head of the family, and as such his name is listed first and her name, second. They live in Bethlehem during the ruling of the judges (1:1).
**Remember Deborah from Judges? This is during the time period of Israel’s sin cycle, where the Lord allows certain tribes of Israel to be oppressed by enemies until they cry out to Him.
**While Bethlehem is not being oppressed by enemies, there is “a famine in the land” (vs. 1) at this time, so Elimelech moves to Moab with his family.
MOAB
Naomi lives in Moab so her family won’t starve, but Moab is far from kind to her.
- Moab was full of pagan worship.
- Moab had once been Israel’s enemy (Judges 3), so it might not have necessarily been a desired place to live.
Naomi’s husband dies in Moab, and after her two sons marry Moabite women, Orpah and Ruth, her sons die as well.
After hearing word that there is no more famine in Bethlehem, Naomi returns to her homeland.
RETURN TO BETHLEHEM
Naomi is accompanied by Ruth, her daughter-in-law, who, no matter how long Naomi urges her to go back to Moab, insists she live with Naomi.
**In fact, Ruth clings to her and says, “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried” (1:16).
**From this verse, we see that Ruth has chosen God over pagan worship and loves Naomi so dearly they might as well be blood-related.
So…Now That Naomi’s Immediate Family Has Passed, What Role Does Naomi Have?
Naomi’s role of ‘wife’ and ‘mother’ has been stripped away–At this point, she believes she has no role. She declares, “I went away full, but the LORD has brought me back empty…the Almighty has brought misfortune upon me” (1:21).
**Please note what she calls God. Even though she is heartbroken and bitter (vs. 20), she still calls God ‘LORD’, or ‘YAWEH’, and also ‘the Almighty’. She acknowledges God is the All-Powerful One, because she knows He gives and takes away, just as Job knew in Job 1:21.
Naomi is still a mother-in-law, but in her mind, that doesn’t do her or Ruth any good.
- Ruth and Naomi are both widows.
- Naomi is too old to conceive children of her own.
- Ruth, being a foreigner from a pagan land and living in Bethlehem among the Israelites, is unlikely to find any male suitors.
Naomi believes her future and family line are doomed.
Naomi’s Character
I can’t even begin to imagine the grief Naomi is going through. The land of Bethlehem was once struck with famine, but it seems the famine has moved into Naomi’s life.
Yet even through the immense pain, there is something remarkable about the raw honesty of her character.
Naomi does not shield or suppress her grief, as we have already seen in chapter 1, verse 21… “The LORD has brought me back empty…”
Naomi is honest and open with the other townsfolk in Bethlehem. When “the whole town was stirred” upon Naomi’s return, she says to them, “Call me Mara, because the Almighty has made my life very bitter” (vs. 20). Mara means ‘bitter’, while Naomi means ‘pleasant’. In her heart, she felt her real name no longer fit her life.
- Naomi was a wife and mother; Mara was neither.
- Naomi’s life was full of a promising future; Mara had nothing to look forward to.
- Naomi wasn’t afflicted by God; Mara believed God had taken her life away from her.
Regardless of the bitterness Naomi feels, she does not deny God or His character (vs. 21).
Naomi is blind-sighted by grief, so she allows the external circumstances she is experiencing in the present to “predict” her future. Don’t we all do that sometimes? I know I do. In those moments when life has knocked me down, it can be so easy to say, “I have nothing…I have no one…My future is doomed.” But Naomi doesn’t realize God’s plan. Naomi doesn’t realize there is a HUGE “But God” moment waiting to happen.
BUT GOD
The phrase “But God” is used several times in scripture—a phrase full of God’s hope and faithfulness.
- “But the Word of our God stands forever” (Isaiah 40:8).
- “But You brought my life from the pit” (Jonah 2:6).
- “But God will redeem my life from the grave” (Psalm 49:15).
Even though this phrase is not literally used in Ruth, it is written like an invisible mark upon Naomi’s life.
- Naomi was heartbroken, but God would not abandon her to despair.
- Naomi had lost her immediate family, but God would show her she had not lost everything or everyone.
- Naomi believed her family line couldn’t continue, but God would show her external circumstances cannot overcome His plan.
Ruth 1:22 is like a “But God” moment: Naomi and Ruth arrive “in Bethlehem as the barley harvest was beginning.”
But God sent Ruth and Naomi back to Bethlehem at the precise time of the barley harvest so Ruth would glean in the fields and meet Boaz—“a relative on [Naomi’s] husband’s side” (2:1)—so Ruth would “find favor in [Boaz’s] eyes” (2:13), marry him, and, through that marriage, begin the family line that would lead to King David and, eventually, Jesus.
Naomi’s sorrow causes her to forget about Boaz as a blood relative on her husband’s side until the Lord places Ruth in his field. Again, Naomi is blinded by her grief.
BUT…
Naomi still thinks about Ruth’s safety and security before her own.
- When Ruth comes home after gleaning in Boaz’s field, Naomi says to her, “It will be good for you, my daughter, to go with his [servant’s] girls, because in someone else’s field you might be harmed” (2:22).
- Naomi also says to Ruth, “My daughter, should I not try to find a home for you, where you will be well provided for?” (3:1).
- She then instructs Ruth to “wash and perfume” herself, go to where he is sleeping, and “uncover his feet and lie down” (vs. 2-4).
And Ruth, being caring, loyal, humble, and obedient, does exactly what Naomi tells her.
Why Does Naomi Instruct Ruth to Uncover His Feet While He’s Sleeping?
**Because Boaz is one of their “kinsmen redeemers” (2:20).
Boaz: A Kinsman Redeemer & Picture of Christ
Leviticus 25 explains that a kinsman redeemer is a near relative who offers to “redeem the land and provide a son to carry on the deceased father’s name” (https://www.ligonier.org/blog/ultimate-kinsman-redeemer/) when there is no one else able to do so. Well, if a kinsman redeemer inherited the land, he would also inherit the deceased man’s widow…Ruth.
In this case, Naomi and Ruth’s only chance at having a future is through a kinsman redeemer.
**Do you see God’s hand in this? Do you see it wasn’t by coincidence Ruth ended up gleaning in Boaz’s field?
God was preparing Ruth and Naomi for His own Son’s family line–Jesus–The Redeemer–and He used Boaz–a kinsman redeemer–to symbolize and foreshadow Who was coming!
There is no Author like our God!
Boaz is also a picture of Christ in the way he treats Ruth and his harvesters.
Boaz greets his harvesters by saying, “The LORD be with you!” (2:4), meaning he is kind and loving toward them.
Boaz notices Ruth because of her actions rather than her beauty. He tells her to continue gleaning in his field and says, “I’ve been told all about what you have done for your mother-in-law since the death of your husband—how you left your father and mother and your homeland and came to live with a people you did not know before. May the LORD repay you for what you have done” (2:11-12).
**Like God, Boaz is not focused on outward beauty. He knows Ruth is “a woman of noble character” (3:11).
Jesus looks at character; He inspects our hearts.
Boaz isn’t ashamed to invite Ruth to dine with him, even though she is a foreigner. He beckons Ruth to “have some bread and dip it in the wine vinegar” (2:14). This is a Moabite woman, not an Israelite. Yet Boaz still desires to help her, make sure she has everything she needs and more; he includes her at his table as though she was one of the Israelites.
**What a beautiful picture of God’s Grace extending to the Jews and the Gentiles!
Boaz chooses to redeem Elimelech’s land and marry Ruth out of love rather than obligation.
**When Ruth implores him to “spread the corner of [his] garment over [her]” (3:9), which was the Jewish way of accepting marriage, he is more than willing to become her kinsman redeemer. However, before he is able to accept, he goes and asks a nearer relative of Elimelech’s (it was customary for the nearest relative to have first opportunity to be the kinsman redeemer).
**However, when the rightful kinsman redeemer learns he will inherit the land but also inherit the Moabite woman, he tells Boaz, “I cannot redeem it because I might endanger my own estate” (4:6).
**In other words, the nearest relative doesn’t want to marry the foreign woman from a pagan country, because it might make him look bad.
Boaz, on the other hand, does not hesitate to address “the elders and all the people”…
**He says, ‘Today you are witnesses that I have bought from Naomi all the property…I have also acquired Ruth the Moabitess…as my wife…’(4:9-10).
Let’s fit this picture with Jesus’ love for us:
Boaz is willing to sacrifice his good reputation to help Naomi and Ruth. He is willing to face rebuke and mockery. He treats everyone with kindness, and it is a joy for him to help his family.
Jesus sacrificed Himself on the cross and faced rebuke and mockery so we could be redeemed. He treated and still treats others with lovingkindness, and He is our “ever-present help in trouble” (Psalm 46:1).
Ruth: A Picture of Reaching Out to God
If Boaz is a picture of Christ, then Ruth is a picture of a transformed believer.
After all, she denies the pagan gods she grew up worshipping to follow God. She leaves her home and family for God. When Ruth uncovers Boaz’s feet while he is sleeping and asks him to be the kinsman redeemer, it is a picture of when we ask and accept Jesus as our Savior.
Ruth was obedient. She listened to Naomi; she came to Boaz; she and Naomi were blessed. Why?
Because God’s promise of the Savior had been set with the birth of Ruth and Boaz’s child & Naomi’s grandson, Obed.
Obed was “the father of Jesse, and Jesse the father of David” (4:22) …
… And soon, Jesus would be born in Bethlehem.
When the future seems dim, come to Jesus, and remember that He is Redeemer.