Today’s passage is one that Chris and/or I will go into with greater detail in the coming sermon series for the Christmas season. It will be on the genealogy and family ancestry of Jesus Christ, and we will call it “The Roots of Redemption.” So we will only deal with it briefly here today.

The end of the story of Ruth in the final of the four chapters of the book of that name leads into a genealogy of David. Of course, Jesus is of the family of David, of the tribe of Judah – the importance being the right to kingship in accordance with God’s covenants.

So you would expect the family tree to be especially pristine, right? Well, there aren’t really any pristine family trees. Every family tree has some “sap” running through it!

I have messed around a lot with family trees over the past handful of years, and it is a mess. Being adopted adds some complication, because there is the legal part of it. But then there is another whole biological side as well. Working with Ancestry.com in developing this, the only way I could make it work was to have two separate trees. Messy.

David’s tree was not particularly pure either. As we look at this story we see that his great grandmother was from Moab – a Gentile. So there was that side of it, yet the greater legal side of the heritage that went back to Perez in the tribe of Judah.

And for this story to make sense, one needs to remember the events of the first chapter of Ruth – the death of all the men in the family, which leaves the family line without inheritance. Additionally, one needs to understand the times – where in this situation a kinsman-redeemer would step in to marry a childless widow in order that children may rise up in the name of family that might otherwise have died out … along with the associated property.

Boaz steps in to be that redeemer, marries Ruth, and ultimately Obed is born, who is the father of Jesse, and in turn of David.

The sap in our family tree dating back to Adam is the issue of sin. Jesus is the ultimate kinsman-redeemer, who has the right to the family line, but who is also (through the virgin birth) not afflicted with the disease that spreads from father to son throughout the entire lineage.

As I said, more on that in December!

Boaz Marries Ruth

4:1 Meanwhile Boaz went up to the town gate and sat down there just as the guardian-redeemer he had mentioned came along. Boaz said, “Come over here, my friend, and sit down.” So he went over and sat down.

2 Boaz took ten of the elders of the town and said, “Sit here,” and they did so. 3 Then he said to the guardian-redeemer, “Naomi, who has come back from Moab, is selling the piece of land that belonged to our relative Elimelek. 4 I thought I should bring the matter to your attention and suggest that you buy it in the presence of these seated here and in the presence of the elders of my people. If you will redeem it, do so. But if you will not, tell me, so I will know. For no one has the right to do it except you, and I am next in line.”

“I will redeem it,” he said.

5 Then Boaz said, “On the day you buy the land from Naomi, you also acquire Ruth the Moabite, the dead man’s widow, in order to maintain the name of the dead with his property.”

6 At this, the guardian-redeemer said, “Then I cannot redeem it because I might endanger my own estate. You redeem it yourself. I cannot do it.”

7 (Now in earlier times in Israel, for the redemption and transfer of property to become final, one party took off his sandal and gave it to the other. This was the method of legalizing transactions in Israel.)

8 So the guardian-redeemer said to Boaz, “Buy it yourself.” And he removed his sandal.

9 Then Boaz announced to the elders and all the people, “Today you are witnesses that I have bought from Naomi all the property of Elimelek, Kilion and Mahlon. 10 I have also acquired Ruth the Moabite, Mahlon’s widow, as my wife, in order to maintain the name of the dead with his property, so that his name will not disappear from among his family or from his hometown. Today you are witnesses!”

11 Then the elders and all the people at the gate said, “We are witnesses. May the Lord make the woman who is coming into your home like Rachel and Leah, who together built up the family of Israel. May you have standing in Ephrathah and be famous in Bethlehem. 12 Through the offspring the Lord gives you by this young woman, may your family be like that of Perez, whom Tamar bore to Judah.”

Naomi Gains a Son

13 So Boaz took Ruth and she became his wife. When he made love to her, the Lord enabled her to conceive, and she gave birth to a son. 14 The women said to Naomi: “Praise be to the Lord, who this day has not left you without a guardian-redeemer. May he become famous throughout Israel! 15 He will renew your life and sustain you in your old age. For your daughter-in-law, who loves you and who is better to you than seven sons, has given him birth.”

16 Then Naomi took the child in her arms and cared for him. 17 The women living there said, “Naomi has a son!” And they named him Obed. He was the father of Jesse, the father of David.

The Genealogy of David

18 This, then, is the family line of Perez: Perez was the father of Hezron,

19 Hezron the father of Ram, Ram the father of Amminadab,

20 Amminadab the father of Nahshon, Nahshon the father of Salmon,

21 Salmon the father of Boaz, Boaz the father of Obed,

22 Obed the father of Jesse, and Jesse the father of David.