Scripture Daily

Context No. 4208 of 4322 · Ruth

Context · Reflection

Ruth 2:17-23: in context

17So she gleaned in the field until evening; and she beat out that which she had gleaned, and it was about an ephah of barley. 18She took it up, and went into the city. Then her mother-in-law saw what she had gleaned; and she brought out and gave to her that which she had left after she had enough. 19Her mother-in-law said to her, “Where have you gleaned today? Where have you worked? Blessed be he who noticed you.” She told her mother-in-law with whom she had worked, “The man’s name with whom I worked today is Boaz.” 20Naomi said to her daughter-in-law, “May he be blessed by the LORD, who has not abandoned his kindness to the living and to the dead.” Naomi said to her, “The man is a close relative to us, one of our near kinsmen.” 21Ruth the Moabitess said, “Yes, he said to me, ‘You shall stay close to my young men until they have finished all my harvest.’” 22Naomi said to Ruth her daughter-in-law, “It is good, my daughter, that you go out with his maidens, and that they not harm you in any other field.” 23So she stayed close to the maidens of Boaz, to glean to the end of barley harvest and of wheat harvest; and she lived with her mother-in-law.

Ruth returns to Naomi with an abundance of grain gleaned in Boaz's field, and when Naomi hears whose field it was, hope stirs in her for the first time since her bitter losses. Blessed be he by the LORD, she says of Boaz, whose kindness has not forsaken the living or the dead. And then she tells Ruth something significant: the man is a close relative of ours, one of our kinsman-redeemers.

This is a turning point. Boaz is not only a kind landowner; he is a near kinsman, one with the right and the means to redeem, to rescue this destitute family and restore its future. Naomi, who had returned from Moab empty and embittered, begins to see God's providence at work, quietly weaving kindness and hope through the ordinary events of gleaning in a field. The kinsman-redeemer has appeared, and with him, hope.

Boaz the kinsman-redeemer, who rescues the helpless and restores their future, points forward to Christ, our redeemer, who took on our flesh to become our near kinsman and to buy back those who had lost everything. And there is comfort in the way God worked: quietly, through ordinary providence, turning Naomi's emptiness toward hope.

Can I see God's quiet providence at work in the ordinary events of my life, weaving kindness and hope as he did for Naomi through Boaz the kinsman-redeemer, and do I rest in Christ, my true Redeemer, who became my kinsman to buy back what I had lost?

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