Her mother-in-law said to her, "Where did you gather barley today, and where did you work? May the Lord bless the man who noticed you."

Ruth told her mother-in-law whom she had worked with and said, "The name of the man I worked with today is Boaz."

Then Naomi said to her daughter-in-law, "May the Lord bless him because he has not abandoned his kindness to the living or the dead."

Naomi continued, "The man is a close relative. He is one of our family redeemers."

Ruth 2:19-20 CSB

You can sense the hope being rekindled in Naomi, and just imagine the conversation that these two women would start having about what and who a redeemer is, what Leviticus 25 means, and how good God is to build this safety net into society. 

For many of us our culture is all about the individual, that we can do it all, never need help, yet the reality is that our circumstances can and do change, that the strong can become weak, the rich become poor, and we need one another. 

(How does Boaz express his love for God by letting the alien into his field if none turn up?)

Living as a body means we need one another, including those who we need to slow down for, wait with, tend, support and love. 

And the redeemer. 

When this book was written no one knew about Jesus, the redeemer, but there is a picture here of one with the resources to make things right, one who sees us just as Boaz saw Ruth, one who acts out of righteousness, justice, and love. 

We too have a redeemer beloved. 

#sunday

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#thisisourGod