Ruth 4

For you Ruth, who loves you, is more to you than seven sons. (Ruth 4: 15 paraphrase)

Ruth is such an odd little book and so beautiful. It is so odd because it deals with what appears to be entirely ordinary events. No kings here. No prophets. No great men of God being spoken to by God himself. Just a family that during hard times leaves their homeland to go to another country to find work, illegal immigrants that during tough times go where they are not wanted except for the labor that they provide. Not surprisingly, the story is sad. The men die, father and sons. The wife is heartbroken and dirt poor. She decides, of course, to go back home where. at least, she can live among her relatives and not starve to death. There is love between her and her daughter-in-laws. But all of them are poor, no-name individuals that would have hardly been noticed by anyone - nameless faces in a crowd of poverty, moving around the country, going wherever they think they can find a little work and something to eat.

But among these nameless people, there is love, and God blesses love. God blesses love among the rich and the poor, and this story becomes a fairy tale. The rich man Boaz falls in love with the the young widow, Ruth. By the end of the story Boaz, head over heels, is throwing away his shoes and his honor and his wealth to marry into a family that is poor in everything but a love for each other, a love straight from the heart of God. And Naomi, an old woman bereft of husband and sons, again is the star of the story, the everyday, ordinary woman, who has seen more than her share of sorrow and grief, now with hope and joy rising within her because of a baby in the womb, an almost grandson, and Naomi's family becomes a family of kings.

An ordinary story of the kingdom and the family of the Messiah... an ordinary story that shows you that to live in love creates an extraordinary world. Read and believe.