Originally posted: 10/28/2019
“Blessed is the Lord who has not left you without a redeemer today…” (4:14).
The book of Ruth makes me happy. I love happy endings. And I especially love redemption stories. Both television and the big screen offer a countless array of films with underlying themes of redemption.
Imagine the scene: when the search for significance through money, fame, power, and position continually comes up empty, the time is ripe for the great awakening. The beleaguered, bewildered hero finally comes to grip with reality and ultimately discovers true value in this life is not found in these meaningless pursuits, but rather in love, family, and relationships… and they live happily ever after.
Corny… maybe… but the truth is everyone loves redemption stories. They are stories of hope and a future, stories that make some sense in our crazy mixed up planet.
And within the heart of every man, woman, and child is this need, this need for redemption; because whether we acknowledge it or not, deep down we know this life is not our final destination. Deep down we know, because the Creator of the universe has placed the awareness of life after earth in every human heart, whether we understand it, or even acknowledge it; the truth is, it is there.
He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end, (Ecclesiastes 3:11).
We were created to love God and fellowship with Him, in this life and forever; and our hearts yearn for relationship with Him. But sin has separated us from Him Who is Holy and Who has no fellowship with evil.
For You are not a God who takes pleasure in wickedness;
No evil dwells with You, (Psalm 5:4).
But your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God,
And your sins have hidden His face from you so that He does not hear, (Isaiah 59:2).
But oh… His Compassion, His Mercy, His Grace…
“Blessed is the Lord who has not left you without a redeemer today…” (4:14) .
Consider Him Who Has Not Left Us Without a Redeemer
- We are all in need redemption.
- for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, (Romans 3:23).
- There is no work we can do to redeem ourselves.
- …because by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight, (Romans 3:20).
- Because we are in desperate need and because we cannot redeem ourselves, in His Compassion, His Mercy, and His Grace, He Has Not Left Us Without a Redeemer.
- For we also once were foolish ourselves, disobedient, deceived, enslaved to various lusts and pleasures, spending our life in malice and envy, hateful, hating one another. 4 But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love for mankind appeared, 5 He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, 6 whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, (Titus 3:3-6).
How do we respond to Him Who Has Not Left Us Without a Redeemer?
We have a choice, just as Ruth did. She could have ignored Naomi’s advice and continued in her life of destitution and slavery. But instead, she humbled herself as she lie at the feet of her kinsman-redeemer, depending on him to provide what she could not.
“It shall be when he lies down, that you shall notice the place where he lies, and you shall go and uncover his feet and lie down; then he will tell you what you shall do,” (Ruth 3:4).
How foolish it would have been if Ruth had not surrendered herself to the care of Boaz. How much more so if we reject Him Who Has Not Left Us Without a Redeemer.
- Because He Has Not Left Us Without a Redeemer, we have the hope of eternal life.
- so that being justified by His grace we would be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life, (Titus 3:7).
- Because He Has Not Left Us Without a Redeemer, we have purpose in this life.
- This is a trustworthy statement; and concerning these things I want you to speak confidently, so that those who have believed God will be careful to engage in good deeds, (Titus 3:8).
- Because He Has Not Left Us Without a Redeemer, we will enjoy His happy ending for all eternity!
- For our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ; 21 who will transform the body of our humble state into conformity with the body of His glory, by the exertion of the power that He has even to subject all things to Himself, (Philippians 3:20-21).
- For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord, (1 Thessalonian 4:16-17).
Let us lie at His feet in love and adoration, and pray we would grow in our desire to bring Him glory in this life as we eagerly await our eternity with Him Who Has Not Left Us Without a Redeemer.